Porter Bicycles – Made in New Mexico, USA

A surprising number of folks have asked me about the round adobe house I call home after seeing the couple snippets over on the Picasa gallery. So, OK here’s a bit more about it.

First, Arno. Arno was the name of one of early Albuquerque developer Franz Huning’s sons.  His two other children, Edith and Walter also have streets in their names. The general location is near downtown on the edge of the so called North valley. Officially it is the Stronghurst neighborhood, reported to be the 1st such association in the city’s history. I have not researched all of this but I’m fairly confident someone will quickly point out any errors…

This property is 3/4 of an acre and the neighborhood was re-platted into really odd shapes and sizes in the 50’s and 60’s. It has a SU or special use zoning. This one being part of an old veterinary clinic belonging to the parents of the 1st owner of the hovel, err, house.

The first owner was one Stanley “Ivor” Williams. Williams was a student of Frank Lloyd Wright at the Taliesin West school of architecture. I think this was Ivor’s first house he built, along with a couple friends on a shoe string budget. It was about 1964.

Wright was a fan of plain, simple, low ceiling structures leaving the details to the contractor to figure out on their own. Stanley was in complete agreement and when my ex-wife and I purchased the house it could best be described as a dark, poorly finished cave. She loved it, I hated it. My fate was sealed.

Click on pix to enlarge. Use “Back Arrow” to return to text.

This is the picture most have seen. The roof is shaped like a floppy Mexican sombrero, the tallest center structure is the central column from which everything cantilevers from and which houses the heater for cold days like this one..

This is roughly the same shot, inside the gate. The floor joists for the main living area are just visible poking through the left side, under the rectangular window. Ivor used wood protrusions through the walls in all his subsequent buildings. These pictured lend themselves to a simple out door table top.

The front door is pretty unique. It pivots inwards on two offset bearings. Note that the threshold is sloped!

To the right of the door is a second addition that the second owner added as a home office or guest room with a bathroom. Good thing too, as I spent the first two years remodeling the round portion!

This is the south side. Floor joists pretty obvious here. Also note that the swimming pool has a pass through into the interior of the house. More on that later. In the background are the garages and workshop which I added and where I spend most of my days. This pool is a PITA, as the walls at either end make it very problematic to cover, but after a hot summer bike ride, the pool is the best. A true conundrum.

And here is from the North side looking West

OK, enough of the outside..

I’m shooting down from the upper lever (that of the joists) and the steps in the left corner ramp gently to the below ground level master bedroom. The shape of the adobe bricks is pretty easy to see.

With my back to the door, this is the heart of the structure. It was 33 bare 2 x10”s  before I covered it with chicken wire and plastered it. The heater sounded like a C130 taking off when it started and just blew hot air randomly about the open spaces. The low wall to the left was added to keep people from falling onto the entrance level small sitting area, which was previously dirt with a small “pond”. I removed about 1100 wheelbarrow loads of dirt and rock from the inside, which are now large berms used in the landscaping..

Another shot of the column from the upper level looking back towards the door.

This shot shows the entrance level, the upper level with the living room in the back left, the kitchen back right and the opening into the master bedroom. The roof joists are visible pretty clearly and why I like the place. It’s like a huge spoked bicycle wheel on it’s side. Nothing much is either level or plumb.

This is the dogs domain, they are old, this is ground level, no steps to navigate. The door in the background is the bathroom entrance. This was a half height wall originally. Winter bathing was quite cold and pretty exposed, so walls were added, as were the exposed vigas and the Bas relief Kokapelli .

By now I was getting pretty artistic with the plaster so I went for full  effect in the bathroom…

Here’s the base of the column. The ramping brick floor curves up to the next level. The squarish base was added, as there was nothing but a small concrete pad supporting the column (read house!) The storage area doors on the left are about the only thing of Ivor’s that remain. He really liked railroad ties and rough cut lumber. The “circular” is repeated a lot, as in the floor, the master shower, kitchen work surfaces, even the master bed originally.

Floor detail, very big fireplace, adobe banco seating, dirty laundry…

Background is Imelda’s walk-in. The glass blocks face back to the dogs sitting area. The bedroom has an Asian feel, which surprisingly is very similar to Native American design.

This was a gathering at “the party house” looking from the kitchen entrance south towards the big, what else, round window in the living room.

About the pool in the house, I can’t find a good picture, so I’ll tell you I didn’t like it. No security and an air gap, so I fit a 1” thick piece of Plexiglas, had a guy add rock sides to the gunite and turned it into the new fishpond/water feature. Here’s the winter treatment to keep some of the leaves out of the pool.

Sort of like a Christy draped work of art..

Well, that’s the basics. Now that I’ve started a story, it should be easy to add additional pictures and text as I can.

Thanks for taking the tour.

Dave

Comments (0)

http://imgur.com/a/BIg3A#1

Comments (0)

I have decided to attend the 2011 San Diego custom bike show as an exhibitor.  My last booth was probably an Interbike in the eighties.  Any way, it was suggested by a few that it would be cool to take a couple of the old  record bikes.. I still have a half dozen of them here in the shop. I dusted this one off yesterday. It’s probably one of the oddest of the bunch, but it did set a record the first day on the track. Oddly the men didn’t like the ideas, but the women did. Don’t ask me.. Carol Anne Bostick rode it to two records on two different dates. see

It is Columbus EL tubing.  Has some sheet metal fairing/gusseting, has a 24″ front wheel (which needs to be cleaned up), it has a gazillion holes through it (which should pique the ire of some on the CR list) and it has an eccentric BB. This last feature was an attempt to make some adjustment in seat tube angles for different riders. It added a lot of weight, but was located well below the axle line, so it added some noticeable stability with a lowered center of gravity. And note the skirts on the fork tips.. This was done after wind tunnel tests showed the air flow went up the blade instead of remaining in a horizontal flow..

Here ya go…

I’ll put this in the running for making the trip.. Perhaps a vote is in order as the showtime nears.. dp

I got the 14 foot ladder out and got his bad boy down off the wall the other day. It was so filthy with dust that I’d forgotten it had a pretty cool fade paint scheme.. This one was used exclusively for track record breaking. The most notable is Kent Bostick’s  100 kilometer record. Like some of the other “record” bikes this record is 20 years unbroken, partly because the UCI has stopped doing a 100K event and second is because riding 60 miles at full bore is a really tough challenge, though the popularity of brevets would indicate otherwise.

Kent’s time is 2 hours, 9 minutes and 11 seconds  about 28 mph average! In comparison the UCI record held by Ole Ritter was 20 minutes slower.. Kent, you the man!

Here’s some pictures:

It is Columbus MAX tubes, Cinelli cast BB, Zeus track dropouts, streteched Kevlar disc wheels (supplied by Scott & Vickie Gordon), Shimano drive train (supplied by Shimano-Wayne Stetina, Continental Olympic and Panaracer 26″ front tubulars  and a very early CF seat post. The whole package was 15 pounds.

This next one is a little different, but one that caused both great angst for me and great satisfaction.

The complete story of the bike is in an earlier blog post if one cares to go back a ways.. I’ll try to link to it before I run out of time tonight. Here:

To make a long story short, this is still after 18+ years the National Tandem TT champ.. and here are some pictures of how it’s set up now for riding with anyone who’s daring enough to trust a half blind captain…

It’s all Columbus MAX tubing except the oval boom and the middle seat stays which are fork blades as I recall.

I got this from Pino Morroni. It’s part 3TTT and part Pino and is very handy for fitting different riders. Also a stayer brace is added to stiffen the bars, which as tandem riders know can deflect a bit with the mass at hand.

More choke holes and skirts.. what on Earth was I smoking?

I worried that the Max chain stays weren’t up to the job so I added a second set of stays..

One of the stiffener tubes can be seen in the boom tube. One can click on the photos to enlarge them, then use the “BACK” arrow to return to text..

and lastly for those of you curious about the handle bar stem another shot for you..

I’d like to have another of those MAVIC headsets.. a real work horse..

that’s it.. Dave

 

Comments (2)

I had this same frame up for sale several months ago. Unfortunately I knocked it off the hook it was hanging on and bounced it off the fender of a customer’s car fender. Ahh, both were dented…  The frame fared better than the car, but it’s really hard to sell damaged goods. So I stripped the paint, repaired the small dent and polished the dropouts as a bonus.

It’s a 58cm seat to top, 57cm top tube c to c. Seat angle is 73 degrees and the head tube angle is 72 degrees. It weighs a tad over 3lbs and is freshly painted with DuPont Imron slate grey metallic  and clear coated too.  It’s a 27.2 seat post, English threaded BB and 130mm spacing. The Columbus Spirit (shaped) tubes are arguably the most advanced bicycle steel tubing ever offered.  Near the weight of carbon fiber, but the resilient high performance feel only steel can offer.

This was a frame I made for my personal use as a long distance road bike. I’m an old racer at heart and still like the steeper head and seat angles, so it just sat around collecting dust. This should make any discerning collector a really nice bike! It’s an inch and a quarter ID head tube for thread-less fork. I am asking $750.00 and I’ll ship it anywhere in CONUS.

“Back”  arrow to return to text.

Call me at 505-352-1378  Dave……..

Comments (0)

I decided, due to scratches and just needing a change, that I’d repaint my personal ride.

So last Saturday after returning home from a ride I removed all the components and started to coat the frame with aircraft grade stripper. It took two heavy coats to soften the old polyurethane (Imron) and another coat for the primer. Then after a thorough washing I used a heavy grit sand paper to remove any remaining traces of paint.

I then surface prepped the Columbus Niobium Spirit  tubes with a DuPont cleaner. I had been using a DuPont acid etch primer but after what I thought were mixed results decided to go with a primer designed for color adhesion rather than adhesion to the substrate.

After the primer was dry I just touched it with 1200-1400 sandpaper and then wiped it down with a tack rag.

I decided some years ago that I really liked this green shade from DuPont, and had enough on hand to do a frame for myself.

The frame is 3 coats of color, light coat, wet coat and a wetter coat. After that stage I mixed about 5cc of the color with DuPont clear and a drizzle of blue pearlescent.  This clear coat goes on as a very wet coat.

These steps started at 1PM and the frame was hanging in the heated booth by 8PM. During the slack times I was busy cleaning the component parts and what not.

After an overnight cure (probably not long enough, but I’m really careful) I removed all the masking from the silver work that I use more and more of now. Then added new decals, still need to get a new Spirit decal from my supply house.

And after another 3 hours had the bike reassembled and ready for a ride by noon on Sun. See if you can find a turn around time like that from some other shops… ;~)

So, here’s the new look. I really like it. People now look at the bike instead of me when we pass on the streets. I even had a guy pull up along side and tell how beautiful it was, now that was a first! Also the last few rides I’ve increased my average speed 1-1 1/2MPH  just because of the brighter color.

Here’s the pictures…

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Native American Kachina lore here is a link http://kachina.us/

I had to laugh, I thought I should explain Kachina’s and while looking for the link above, I found the very same picture above in a site with Mudhead images.. computer age!!!

Now that this has been up for a week, I thought I’d mention how many of you think that it looks way better than the previous color. I agree and thank you all.

Note to self: do not change saddle after repaint and ride an aggressive 200 mile week with a new style. DP you are old and the prostate is not what it used to be…you knew this.. The choice looked really good in theory, but did not perform as advertised for me, but (see below)

Note to others with minor to severe to preventative prostate health measures: I highly recommend the newish Sella Royal “Respiro” saddle. It has a center groove that is actually wide enough to protect the perineum and narrow enough nose to not cause rubbing and is ventilated to reduce chamois degradation. The draw back is it is rather heavy compared to other saddles but, a small concession for comfort and protection. The gel padding is quite tall and the trough created is deep so changes in angle (more nose up) and lowered seat post are required.  The last positive is they sell for about a third of the competitors, so if the gel only makes it a half season, you’ll still be ahead.

Comments (0)

Nearly 20 years ago I built this tandem as an experiment. It was made from Columbus MAX road bike sets and a generic oval boom tube. Here’s a picture of it’s current dirty-dusty state, in the equally dirty-dusty crowded frame building corner of the shop.   (Click/double click on photos to enlarge)

As you can see, it has old components, Mavic drive train, down tube shifters (7spd freewheel), Campy brakes, no name levers, in other words it’s just equipped for general around town riding. It does have track dropouts with a derailleur hanger.  But, it’s main intended purpose was for track use. Perhaps, you’ve heard my story about Track Nationals, the USCF, and this frame set. I’ll add a condensed version of the story later.

(The story)

When Columbus MAX was first introduced I just fell in love with it. Light and strong and steel.
So, I decided to build a tandem with it, even though it was not recommended. Well, it was amazing. A little over 30lbs and wicked acceleration with a couple strong riders.
So, I thought I’d ask the USCF Nat. coach if he had any interest in using the tandem at Nats which were being held at Trexlertown that year. He said “yeah Dave get it to so and so in San Diego”, as they were the two hot tandem riders. I duly delivered the bare frame to these guys and drove back to NM.
In those days the only source of racing news was Velonews. When I read that the tandem these guys were riding at Nationals had broken and they had to borrow one it was a huge slap to my reputation/ego. Or so I thought. Well,…as it turned out, these guys had never even assembled or ridden my tandem…. Slap number two.
I tried for over a year to get the frame back. I finally sent the USCF an invoice for $6000.00 and it miraculously appeared back at the shop.
Needless to say I was miffed that after all my expense and effort it remained untested. So, at the next Nat. road TT in Moriarity, NM, I added a derailleur hanger, shifter bosses and brakes and gave it to a couple of the shop team riders for the event.
Result..gold medal. Every event its entered since then it has won gold, except the last when the age graded riders missed the gold by 9 seconds. (90+) It still holds the National record for Cat I men. 44 minutes some seconds set in 1992 I think..

Very cool I think and great redemption too. It’s been used by juniors, seniors and mixed gender too.
Well, that’s the story.

I was just rooting through my desk drawers and found this letter. Funny, I don’t remember the check, only the frame coming back. I don’t remember, it gets worse with age..

Click here tandem-fiasco

click back button to return to blog..

It’s a very compact design, due to the fact that the MAX tubes were made in only road bike lengths. It’s a 75 degree HT, 74 degree Captain’s ST and 72 degree Stoker ST. Wheelbase is 1645mm and the boom is 615mm. BB height is  10 1/2″ rear, 11 1/2″ front BB.  Captain’s seat tube is 56cm, Stoker is 57cm  and top tubes are 58cm and 61cm respectively.

The stem is a custom adjustable length and employs a “stayer” brace of Titanium. The fork is one of my signature “aero” designs and has special skirts at the drop outs for wind drag issue.

Since building this one, there have been more huge leaps in the steel technology available for bicycles. So, since the economy is slow, meaning my automotive restoration business, I decided it was time to test some new materials and to try out the new tandem jig, which in a previous blog story I explained building a single frame on.

I’ll do the same for this new tandem in the following entries. “Squirt II”  (authors note: It seems to make the project more tangible when it has a name)

Yikes! Here’s over $800 bucks of raw materials..

and here is the jig configured for a tandem build.

Ready for the first two welds.

The “keel” is laid. This stage forms the backbone of the tandem frame. This stage was done using brass. This was done so that when the seat tubes and down tube is added I can use silver and not disturb the older welds. All of these five pieces shown are the thickest wall and not much bothered by the additional heat.

Oh My God! There I go again. Cutting big holes in a perfectly good boom tube. What was I thinking??

Here’s what I was thinking. I made two slightly off set (front to rear) holes through the boom tube and inserted two wing shaped inserts. The general idea is to help resist twisting of the boom. I probably should just finish them flush with the boom, but I think I’ll let them protrude like this just to add some interest. Not much to look at on a track tandem..

In this next picture I am what one would call “committed to the steering geometry”. I will interject at this point that I am having one of the guys from the bike builders e-mail list collaborate with some of the design work. He is an engineer, I’m a self taught guy with a lot of years experience. I thought it would be interesting, at least for me, to compare notes in a manner of speaking. I’ll leave him nameless for now, to protect the innocent.

The down tube and head tube are now joined thus completing the “keel”. Everything goes up from here. These are the first two silver fillets. The next picture is for Mr. Garro. I’ve washed the flux off and just rubbed it a bit with steel wool. The head tube won’t get much, if any clean up, until the internal lateral and captain’s top tube are fitted. Those fillets will be blended together to minimize the head tube height as the tubes have a vertical dimension of 43.5mm each and I’m trying to keep the head tube at a minimum.

Between multiple distractions today I was able to get both seat posts welded down as well as the stokers top tube.

The tricky part is the top tubes. This old jig was designed for 1″ round top tubes. This Columbus tubing is 43.5 x 29mm and is 8 sided, plus the oval rotates 90 degrees from end to end. Needless to say, it would take a handful of various sized blocks to hold the tube, so I just turn the entire top tube holder assembly upside down and set the tube on it’s machined surface. A couple measurements and some old toe straps and it’s good to go.

Oh, oh! The stoker’s  top tube is too short!

Yeah, well it was part of the plan. Really.

Like the MAX these tubes weren’t designed for tandem use.  I wanted to increase the stoker cockpit over the old tandem.  The captain’s top tube will appear to be pierced by the seat tube and the two top tubes will be butt welded. That will take some time and will be repeated on the internal laterals. Both the riders will have an additional 3cm of leg room, this is good.

Here’s how it works. Here is the cold fit stage.

I thought I’d try these new fangled track drop outs.  Already I’m thinking it was a bad decision as I want to attach 2 pairs of seat stays and there is limited room to do so. I’ll ponder it a while. There may be a clever solution, may be not.

The first set of seat stays and the bridge are on and now I’m not sure that I want to add a second set as planned. The triangular chain stays are naturally rigid and the three point attachment on the seat tube is a bit stronger (?) than normal and the lower attachment on the seat tube makes a smaller triangle too. I’ll have to think about it some more. I don’t know about the rest of you but sometimes I’ll just sit there and stare at the project at hand until an idea strikes. This may be one of those instances.

It’s one of those days that looks like it will snow any minute, but still a couple of degrees too warm. So, I’ve decided to use my Sunday working on fitting the internal laterals. I have it fit up pretty close here, but it needs just a couple touch’s more to get alignment and gaps the way I need them. Since the seat tube is only 0.38mm wall thickness where they intersect, I brazed a couple of split scrap pieces on the seat tube, which I’ll bury under the fillet. I also left a larger than normal perimeter gap that I’ll fill with silver. These tubes are pretty brittle and I think if they don’t actually butt up that movement in the filler is superior to contact of the tube ends. I’m hoping that it will keep the paint from cracking too.

That little coil of silver hanging from the jig is all I have left. It looks like I might not be able to finish the brazing until I get restocked next month. Maybe Santa will be good to me this year.

It’s Christmas day.  Presents are opened and the belly is full. Life is good.

So, yesterday I finished brazing the remaining main tubes in. I had to mix some  Brazage Pro and All-State 45%, which I was told was OK to do. (we’ll see) I’m confident that the joints are structurally fine, but I was being so miserly with the silver that there are a couple “rough” spots in the fillets.  I’m torn between leaving well enough alone and going back over the spots to fill with additional material. To get it hot enough to accomplish this is probably not worth the risk of heat damage to the overall structure. Some “filler” primer will make it look fine. Above is the rear BB and chain stays. That’s a 22mm tire shown, we’ll use a 19mm Continental Olympic when it debuts on the track. (220psi for a mere $300 a piece).

Here’s the front BB and eccentric. The only thing left is to install seat tube binders (2 on each tube) and to split the eccentric shell and add binders to it. Oh, the head tube needs to be trimmed to length and reamed.

The frame is weighing in at an amazing nine pounds, so I guess I’ll splurge and add a tiny bit of silver smith decoration on the connecting tube between the seat stays. Perhaps a couple nice bits of New Mexico turquoise as I’ve done before. It’s only a few grams, and it makes it oh so regional.

I only have the fork to finish now. I’m definitely out of silver filler, so now I’ll get on the phone and start shopping for some components in the mean time.

The specs so far are: Wheelbase 171 cm; captains seat 57 cm @ 74 degrees and a 63cm top tube; the stokers is a 57.5 seat @ 73 degrees and a 64cm top tube. BB drop is 5.2cm The head tube is 76 degrees with a 40mm fork rake planned.

This is the finished but unpainted frame. Tomorrow I’ll make the silver adornments to doll it up a little. Hope to have the supplies to make the fork soon. I put wheels on it today and stood on the boom tube and it seems to be plenty strong despite the light weight. I would not recommend trying to stand on one of the top tubes though. They are deformable with the thumb and fore finger. Maybe some ” No Step” decals like an airplane are in order.

I’m thinking about painting the frame all in a bright silver metallic. But, I’m always open to suggestions…

Here are the two silver cups to hold the turquoise stones which will be brazed on as stay caps. Very New Mexico.

Yesterday, I followed through with the silver decorations.  I went a little over board with the head tube badge.  It’s my standard “P” with a nice piece of Arizona turquoise in the “hole” of the P and at the base I made little doodads to represent Chamisa plants with some stylized fronds. It’s on there now so love it or hate it.

and here are the turquoise caps on the seat stay connector tube ends.

Oh, oh. I’ve got left overs. To tell the truth, this one was so much fun maybe I’ll do a road version next and save this set of seat stays for it.

The forks were a bit of a challenge. The blades are aero shaped and to get the desired length I would have to have cut virtually all the wing shaped ends off. And that shape was the whole point. So to get 40mm of rake I started curving at the distal ends and slowly and carefully moved up the blade. A bit tricky with a non round shape. Anyway, here’s the cut off ends. Needless to say the dropouts fit entirely into the ID of the remaining blades and requires a lot of brass to fill. But, they are nice and beefy there and should handle the tandem weight demands without problem.

The finished forks.

A few details left, a little more clean up, headset machining and paint. It’s too long for my new paint booth so I’ll take it to a friends car booth after the New Year holiday. Anyone happen to know if the UCI has a minimum tandem weight? I’m really excited to try this out. Unfortunately I’ll have to wait until the Spring to go up to Colorado Springs.

To be honest, the more I stare at the frame and every  time I pick  it up I get the feeling in the pit of my stomach that it simply is too light. Now I know that Calfee has a bamboo tandem and there are some damn light Carbon Fiber tandems out there but I still don’t have a warm fuzzy feeling that this will withstand the rigors of the velodrome with two world class athletes aboard.  I’m thinking about adding an additional internal lateral to the stoker’s main trapezoid, which will also give an ideal location for an additional set of seat stays. Perhaps I’m jumping the gun as it hasn’t even been ridden around the block yet.  Any suggestions??

Well, I chickened out and added another lateral to the frame yesterday. Also added some little 3/16″ SS tubes to the rear triangle. I saw them on one of Pino’s bikes click here:  and not knowing of this technique previously I thought I’d give it a try since I was on the fence about this too.

I was still feeling nervous, so decided to try something new, I think, and radical, I think. So, what do you think?

I was told that the stokers BB gets four times the stresses of a single frame’s BB. So since this is already bolstered on the top, I thought I’d beef up the under side with this truss like contraption.

I’ve received a fair number of comments on the “mid-stay” tubes  usefulness. The jury is still out on that one. Another builder on the “frame-builders” list also pointed out that the curved truss under the BB is a poor design. I knew that, but did not want to spend an inordinate amount of time making miniature lugged spigots to use straight chords. It is a bicycle, after all, not a 7000 HP dragster.

More to come in the coming weeks. The riders need to do some shake down and training rides now that the weather is starting to cooperate.

I haven’t been able to find any real sponsorship from any of my old sources. Used to be they were happy to provide parts in exchange for advertising. Only Shimano was willing, but unfortunately they don’t have the necessary tandem parts.  This may have to come all from my own threadbare pockets. Oh well, been there before.

As of right now, we are looking at a date to coincide with the NM Track Championships, June, I think.

As soon as the riders are happy with it I’ll get some paint on it and post those pictures. Should be a handsome tandem, IMO of course.

March 20th, the two prospective riders and I all had our schedules in perfect alignment today and we got to give Squirt II and 20 mile test run.

Well, the bad news is that I can’t go that fast anymore! They could drop me like a rock. The good news is that even with skinny width road bars the captain was very happy with the handling. The Stoker was equally happy that his position was identical to his road bike, except for the bend of his bars.  The frame was absolutely rigid and dead quiet. Very cool. Next week we’ll change it to a 49 x 17 gear for better flexibility around town and then work on some position nuances for the guys.

Here’s how it looks for the 1st official test ride.

I was hoping the “truss” was visible on this side but, not really. At any rate, while on the wheel going down the street I asked the guys to stand and sprint for a few revolutions to see if there was any discernible deflection of the rear triangle. I couldn’t accelerate with them for very far and I saw no movement at all. We did the same thing at low speed on steep grades. No flex! I was a happy camper.

Finally decided on a color scheme.  Here’s some pictures post paint and decals.

Click on pictures to enlarge.

The brake is for around town test rides. The Campy headset and TA cranks make it On Topic for the CR folks, yes?

It’s a Lt. Violet metallic with Silver met. over spray and clear coat. Imron by DuPont.

More to come, check back from time to time and thanks to all the well wishers who have contacted me.

Jump ahead about a year… Frey has contacted me and wants to know if Squirt II is available for the annual Paula Higgins Memorial Record Challenge out in Moriarity New Mexico. I explain that it is currently on consignment sale at the Bike Coop and has been stripped of most of its parts, but sure why not. I need to get it out there in the public eye and also to see how it runs in a competitive setting.

Photo: John Price

Well, the results were pretty good, all things considered.

John picked the bike up on Thursday. Added wheels, seats and what not. Selected a training gear and did a Friday ride with his stoker, who had never ridden a fixed gear before.

Sat. he did another shake down ride with a different stoker and Sun. evening before the event John and Randy did a ride on the actual course.

John did not have the best gear choices, so he went with a 60 x 13 that he used 18 years ago to set the tandem record.

It was unfortunately a crossing headwind out and the same coming back. Their competition were a long standing team of National champs ( I’ll probably brutalize the spelling here, Nico Toutenhoofd and Jim Dickerson.) Who also had a very custom tandem (Dave Tiemeyer) with triple crank set and better suited for a wind hindered ride.

The winners managed a 48 something and my guys were in with a 49 something. John thought that with a bit more training, a better gear, and faster start and turnaround (fixed gear) that they would have beat them… well, perhaps next year eh?      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=th9Xepc72A8

 

here’s one more picture..

Comments (10)