Bicycle spags?

[Eater of Clowns]

So I wouldn't call myself an avid bicyclist, but I really enjoy going for a long ride.  Right now I'm on my sister's Gary Fisher, one of the lower end models, and I'd like to get my own bike when I get my MA tax return.  Here's the thing.  My budget would be around $600, which could get me a decent but not really exciting bike.  Craigslist is a good resource, I know, and I found a good bike there for my girlfriend, but I'm very tempted to be daring in this.

I'm considering building my own bamboo bike frame, which can be done for about $150 to make a frame that would usually retail for about $2000.  The process seems involved but not out of my ability range.  It requires the use of propane torches, mitering, epoxy, and frame design, none of which I have ever done.  Resources are pretty solid online, with a bunch of guides to cross reference and ideas to draw upon.  These two are catching my eye in particular, the former about single speed and fixed gear cycling and the latter about bamboo frame construction:

http://www.sheldonbrown.com/singlespeed.html

http://bamboobike.wordpress.com/

I really like the idea of having a unique bike that I can really say is mine and get extremely upset about when it inevitably gets stolen.  It's spring/summer and I could use a project to work on.  I want to know if anyone here has any experience building bikes (not necessarily constructing a frame but assembling them) or knows anyone who's really into it, if this is feasible for a newcomer, or really anyone who has opinions on fixed gear/single speed bikes they'd like to share.  Or anyone really, who wants to help me out with some perspective.

The project would, of course, be accompanied by a Bring & Brag thread with pictures and write ups of my progress.  I'll also try to carry a camera and note on me while riding it to upload photos of my mangled corpse should my construction prove faulty.

[Lies]

Screw the bike, show us pictures of your mangled corpse!

[East Coast Hustle]

I know nothing about building frames, but I know that single-speed bikes are worthless shitcranks that are only fit for asshole hipsters who only intend to ride them from the coffee shop to whatever bar has PBR on special. Unless you live in a beachside town with no hills higher than 3' above sea level, that is.

If you have a good bike mechanic who won't rape you on labor charges or especially if you're mechanically inclined and have the tools, you might look into buying a lower-end bike with a good frame and cheaper components and just upgrading the components. That's what I did, and for a total cost of a little under $400 I have a bike that is the equal of any bike I've seen selling for twice as much.

[Sir Squid Diddimus]

I know nothing about building frames, but I know that single-speed bikes are worthless shitcranks that are only fit for asshole hipsters who only intend to ride them from the coffee shop to whatever bar has PBR on special. Unless you live in a beachside town with no hills higher than 3' above sea level, that is.

If you have a good bike mechanic who won't rape you on labor charges or especially if you're mechanically inclined and have the tools, you might look into buying a lower-end bike with a good frame and cheaper components and just upgrading the components. That's what I did, and for a total cost of a little under $400 I have a bike that is the equal of any bike I've seen selling for twice as much.

hi there

also-- Shitcranks 

[Triple Zero]

I know nothing about building frames, but I know that single-speed bikes are worthless shitcranks that are only fit for asshole hipsters who only intend to ride them from the coffee shop to whatever bar has PBR on special. Unless you live in a beachside town with no hills higher than 3' above sea level, that is.

I always get single speed bikes without transmission. Now, probably the entire slope of my city ranges no more than -3 to 1 feet above sea level so, yeah. It's not that I don't like being able to switch gear or can't afford them, but getting rid of extra wires and mechanisms in and around my bike is worth more. This is a city bike. I expect assholes to kick it over when I park it in the street when I go out at night. I expect parts of it to get bent when I slide a couple of yards and spraining my wrist when it's wet and slippery and I'm not paying enough attention.

Same goes for the brakes. There's the type with the levers on the handle bar which, again, have wires that are fragile. And then there's the type you activate by stepping on the pedal backwards. I suggest getting one with the latter. Apparently these are called "rear coaster drum brakes".

Then, since you're thinking of building your own, here's some more stuff I think adds value to a bike:

- first off, a bamboo frame sounds wicked awesome

- about the frame. over here we got male and female frames. the male frames have a bar going straight from the saddle to just below the steer. the female ones do not. I'm reading wikipedia to get names of bicycle parts and terms, what you want is a http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Step-through_frame the point being, they're easier to get on and off off, as well as if you were to quickly take off and make a running jump onto your bike but somehow you swerve and miss the saddle, you will not crash your nuts into the upper bar. this is a major plus plus extra good feature. in fact the only reason to put the ball-piping nutcrusher bar there is if it is required for the integrity of the frame or if your name is Professor "balls-of-steel" Cramulus, standing world-champion ball-piper, record holder in the olympic, paralympic and just barely-limping tournament ranks.

- the chain. you want something like this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chainguard (also check out the pic of the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_city_bike fuck yeah that's an awesome bike and check this one out, the "Vintage Dutch Ladies Bicycle" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Gazelle_Omafahrrad_series_-1.jpg  my old bike that was stolen a few weeks ago looked almost just like that ) ANYWAY, the chainguard/gearcase is important because otherwise you will get a lot of dust and crap and sand and mud and rain into your gears and they will rust and rot. you already know this, of course. but my IMPORTANT ADVICE is to somehow make your gearcase out of sturdy weatherproof cloth and make it open and close using VELCRO. velcro??? YEAH FUCKING VELCRO! because that's amazing stuff and it'll keep working no matter how much mud or crud gets into it. and most importantly you can open it with your hands without any tools, so if your chain runs off in the middle of a trip, that's cool. make sure the stitches are also sturdy and weatherproof.
Seriously I don't understand why they even bother with hard plastic screwed variant .. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_city_bike#Fully-enclosed_chain_guard_.28chaincase.29

- you also want carrier bags on the back of your bike which are attached to a "Rack with strap" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_city_bike#Rack_with_strap . Carrier bags are useful for everything, especially getting groceries from the streetmarket. You do not want to skimp on these, either. Get simple quality ones, no extra clips or pockets or shit, and the flaps should close with VELCRO because anything else will either ultimately break, or you will curse while hurting your cold fingers when it's freezing outside trying to handle metal clips and wishing you got VELCRO instead. it should also have an insanely bright colour such as green, orange yellow or pink. and while you're at it, some reflector strips won't hurt.

- you say it will ultimately get stolen. this is true. however, you still want a good chain lock so you can chain it to streetlights and shit. always chain it to the world. especially when you spent so much effort on it building it yourself. surely, some asshole with a portable bandsaw will have no trouble stealing your bike anyway, but such is life. the point of chaining it to the world is that some asshole without a portable bandsaw won't be able to just lift it on the back of his truck and use his non-portable bandsaw at home to detach the lock. consider buying a lock made out of VELCRO (um, or not).

- I like bicycle lights that do not require a dynamo but run on their own separate batteries. Even if the drag on the wheel is probably just a psychological thing, I find myself a lot more likely to quickly switch them on when driving at night.



Ok I just described my dream bike. Which is your typical run-of-the-mill European City Vintage Lady Bike, reinforced with extra VELCRO.

On the off-chance that you want a completely different bike, this post is probably useless to you.

[Eater of Clowns]

ECH, that was one of the primary concerns I had about single speeds.  I live in New England.  There's no shortage of hills.  New Bedford isn't exactly a bike friendly city either, so finding a good bike mechanic won't be easy.  I will look around for that suggestion though.  The single speed thing is one of the links' focus but he does talk about derailers and such should one want a several speed bike.

Trip, wow, damn you really are a bike spag.  I like to ride for more recreational touring than city errands and such.  Usually I take the quickest route out of the city, actually.  Like I said above with bike friendliness, our drivers just don't know how to deal with a bike on the road (likewise 90% of our cyclists don't know how to deal with themselves on the road).  I'm definitely going to check out those links at work later, sounds like a hell of a fun bike.

[Roaring Biscuit!]

putting a bike together ain't too difficult, if you're buying all the fiddly bits its pretty much just "attach to frame in a sensible fashion", I'd get instructions anyways though.

Bamboo frame seems like a pretty awesome idea

I pretty much agree with ECH as far as single-speed goes, I wouldn't go for it unless you live in a particularly flat area

I don't know exactly how you will be using the epoxy, but your probably going to need to order microfibers to mix in so you can use it as a glue.  Fibreglass tape might be helpful as well, but it depends on how its going to be contructed.  Also, most epoxy manufacturers will sell pre-measured dispensers for a small price which I'd recommend, just makes things a little easier.

As far as handling the stuff, disposable latex gloves and some old clothes and you'll be fine  Just try not to get your clothes stuck to your skin, as that can be a bit uncomfortable.

x

Rb,
yup, i talked about epoxy 'cause thats the only thing on list I know a reasonable amount about

[Richter]

I've always been a fan of watching yard sales, dumpsters, junk yards, and charity stores for frames and parts, then changing in tube, tire, chain and brakes as needed.  There are some specialty tools (for cranks, bearings, chain), but I rarely need more than a few wrenches, pliers, and screwdrivers.

You can make a simply fixed gear easily, it will look not worth stealing, and is minimal investment if it does walk off.

[Eater of Clowns]

putting a bike together ain't too difficult, if you're buying all the fiddly bits its pretty much just "attach to frame in a sensible fashion", I'd get instructions anyways though.

Bamboo frame seems like a pretty awesome idea

I pretty much agree with ECH as far as single-speed goes, I wouldn't go for it unless you live in a particularly flat area

I don't know exactly how you will be using the epoxy, but your probably going to need to order microfibers to mix in so you can use it as a glue.  Fibreglass tape might be helpful as well, but it depends on how its going to be contructed.  Also, most epoxy manufacturers will sell pre-measured dispensers for a small price which I'd recommend, just makes things a little easier.

As far as handling the stuff, disposable latex gloves and some old clothes and you'll be fine  Just try not to get your clothes stuck to your skin, as that can be a bit uncomfortable.

x

Rb,
yup, i talked about epoxy 'cause thats the only thing on list I know a reasonable amount about

Well it's appreciated.  The epoxy is one of the parts I'd be most concerned about.  Most people recommend a really fibrous hemp rope.  Scuff up the bamboo with low grit sandpaper, epoxy it, then put rope on top of that and epoxy the rope.  Layer it a few times and do it with a tight lashing and that's how the frame is assembled.

I've always been a fan of watching yard sales, dumpsters, junk yards, and charity stores for frames and parts, then changing in tube, tire, chain and brakes as needed.  There are some specialty tools (for cranks, bearings, chain), but I rarely need more than a few wrenches, pliers, and screwdrivers.

You can make a simply fixed gear easily, it will look not worth stealing, and is minimal investment if it does walk off.

Yard sale season is coming up.  As is the end of the college year in Boston, meaning craigslist will be going nuts with bicycles.

[Roaring Biscuit!]

well, it looks like you could use pretty much anything, i think it just depends on how you want it to look.

I think the hemp rope option is probably the simplest, even with thin strips of fibreglass cloth you might have a hard time getting it to lie flat in such awkward spaces.  On the plus side, fibreglass will be almost completely see through once its saturated with epoxy, so you bike will look like tis held together with willpower

Could use kevlar cloth/tape as well if you wanted it to be really strong, but that dries a kinda muddy yellow colour (not very attractive)

x

edd

[Shibboleet The Annihilator]

I bought a pretty decent bike for $300. I took it to a bike "mechanic" at the store I bought it from because they recommend having it checked out every 90 days and the first one is free. The guy actually fucked it up when he when he gave it a tune up.

I came to the realization that I wasted my time bringing the bike in and that they're really not complicated. I fix my own bike now and it's pretty goddamn easy.

As far as making your own bike frame goes, I've got no experience with that but as long as you build a solid frame you should be OK. I wouldn't recommend doing anything crazy on it until you're sure it's durable enough not to fall apart at 30 mph or something.

[Richter]

I can't straighten tires, everything else short of welding breaks falls under wrench twisting, so I don't see much point to a bike mechanic.

[Dysnomia]

A bamboo bike sounds awesome.  Could you build the frame and send it to a mechanic (or otherwise bike savvy person), and have them install gears/such on it?

[Cain]

I came to the realization that I wasted my time bringing the bike in and that they're really not complicated. I fix my own bike now and it's pretty goddamn easy.

Absolutely this.  I had a really nice quality, 18 gear mountain bike, which I rode virtually every day for about five years.  During that time I had punctured tires, had to replace the breaks, clean the gears etc and none of it was more than a couple of hours work on a Saturday morning, nor terribly expensive.

Also, the only excuse for having a single-speed bike and being an adult is living in Holland.  Or Ohio, or whichever state in the US is really flat.  Even if your route is only moderately hilly, 10 gears will make a significant difference.

[AFK]

I can't straighten tires, everything else short of welding breaks falls under wrench twisting, so I don't see much point to a bike mechanic.

Small talk?

I hear they tend to be well spoken.