January 2012
1 post
December 2011
1 post
s-bendz
i’ve been wanting to build a bike like this for a while. happy to get the chance to try s-bend stays on a track bike, where they can stay uncluttered and awesome. the paint is something special that needs to be photographed in the sun- the lugs have a blue tinted clearcoat. it’s the kind of sleeper scheme that grabs you in just the right lighting. thanks to indy fab for letting some...
November 2011
3 posts
October 2011
3 posts
September 2011
1 post
August 2011
1 post
July 2011
2 posts
ironman
a great weekend to get out of boston- was literally melting (actually, literally) in the shop, and the heat just had everyone a little punchier than usual. lucky for me, i had an excuse to get out to upstate to new york to see this year’s lake placid ironman triathlon.
here’s a picture of pete out there on the course killing it on his royal h STEEL tri bike. you could count the...
June 2011
2 posts
a long day at the shop
sometimes, the right combination of isolation, repetitive tasks, and hunger can produce a sort of temporary maddness…
where the deranged mind would see futuristic eye-ware, the correct use for these ovals is internal cable routing reinforcement.
this top tube is stainless steel. stainless, being stronger than plain steel of the same diameter, can be thusly made much thinner. thin to...
May 2011
3 posts
a hollingsworth h
the royal h tumblr fell a bit cold these last few weeks, but this bike is definitely worth dusting off the old internet tubes and sharing with the world. it’s for my aunt jane. i wanted to improve on her current bike- a late eighties trek that was aggravating some shoulder issues and generally not fitting. a few degrees of top tube slope allowed for a taller head tube, and nitto albatross...
newness
nothing really ‘new’ about seatstay caps, in general, but this specific combination of letters has never before been seen (on a seatstay cap)! i’ve been wanting to do these for a while, and couldn’t have done it without aaron’s -getting it drawn in solid works and out to the machinist.
they look pretty good! and they’re stainless, so that should make for...
new england bicycle expo
another weekend, another show! this one’s in my backyard, so i’m psyched. folk engineered custom bicycles are coming up and staying in my living room for the weekend- bike builder sleepover! if you’re in the somerville area, head over to the armory on highland ave and see some sweet bikes. icarus, ant, iglehart, geekhouse,… firefly? you’ll have to come by to see for...
April 2011
7 posts
new amsterdam bike show
this saturday is the premier of the new amsterdam bike show! there will be a ton of awesome exhibitors there including my good friends at geekhouse, horse, and ant. oh, and specialized and raleigh as well (!!). here’s a preview of what i’m bringing to whet the appetite-
this one is for sale too! more photos are on the flickr. it’s a 56cm and i hate to see it go… but...
RHC 1974
man, what would it have been like to build bikes in the seventies? no power tools, plenty of cutoff shorts, mustaches, steel tubing, schlitz tall boys with pull tabs. oh, exactly the same. except for the pull tabs. thanks to jefferson for this shot and a new ‘casual cockpit’ look.
fillet of fillet
just putting the finishing touches on a partially fillet brazed frame. they’re not my usual construction choice, but this frame needed a few degrees top tube slope and i didn’t feel like fighting with lugs this week.
can you spot the differences between these two photos? five hours of sanding and filling in voids with silver and sanding and re-filling voids and more sanding. oh,...
March 2011
4 posts
spring track
excellent shots of the new track bike by eric baumann. shooting on a blustry spring day was the biggest challenge. what you’re not seeing in these shots is me in my sprinter’s crouch ready to catch the bike when the wind took it. the white saddle and grips were making me nervous! more on flickr.
click here for non-matrix animations of the newest royal h track bike.
February 2011
4 posts
paint prieview
so that last track bike is at the painter’s now, getting a scheme inspired by a rapha club jersey. some people might grumble about rapha’s 175 plus price-tag for a shirt, but i did a little reading and these things are packed with features! for one they are guaranteed to remain odor free, they feature zipper and pocket technology, and, AND, they have a headphone cable buttonhole....
superb bowl
while i only have a passing interest in professional athletics, i always tune in each year to the super bowl so i can know what new products to purchase from my favorite corporations. this year there were some subtle product placements that didn’t fall on blind eyes. check out this ad for a popular snacking chip-
spinergys! this is a strange marketing tactic, since the wheels have been...
January 2011
5 posts
pacific northwest
there’s no better time than to visit portland, OR than in early january- no matter what the precipitation, the temperature is guaranteed to be 20 degrees warmer than anywhere in the greater boston metro area. but it’s not just a wintertime gettaway that brings me to bridgetown- it’s my friend jordan hufnagel! jordan and i go way back- we both graduated in the same u.b.i....
another year, another royal h
alright! you know the drill- teaser shots to pass the time until the build is complete. just had a free five seconds in the afternoon’s fading light to run out into the parking lot and grab these.
this one is getting the full campagnolo treatment. should be pretty amazing. need to order a few odds n sods, but should have it ride-able next week.
looking forward to one of the very...
December 2010
7 posts
first rides
there was a five minute window this afternoon between sleeping in for the first time in three weeks and the impending blizzard that allowed for a quick inaugural ride on the 650c fixed gear.
the thing was solid.
impossible to capture the raw speed of this machine. impossible for me.
totally track stand-able.
i dusted off my canadian tuxedo and took the new bike out to see firsthand...
royal h cycles makes cycles
see? this was a bike related gift that was actually a bike. impossible to wrap. used a sheet.
as i have mentioned in blog posts past- a bike for my sister for riding out on the high plains of the greater denver metropolitan area (wolf town). featuring a veritable who’s who of parts you’ll never need to replace- phill wood, chris king, white industries, salsa, dimension...
crimbus time in wolf town
holy hell. another year of making leftover bicycle parts into presents, ornaments, and decorative signs. last year i had a stack of campagnolo dropouts to work through, and this years offerings were no less inspiring- a box of old ladies step through lugs made a handsome ‘W’, and leftover stainless from a custom front rack can be made into cursive if you have infinite hours to devote...
rando-rama
how this beauty got away un-photographed i’ll never know. one of the classier builds- modern campagnolo and american cast lugs. melting pot or mixing bowl?. thanks to eric baumann for catching a shot of her on the banks of jamacia pond. will be adding the whole set to the gallery soon. enjoy the teasers for now!
janet's a cube!
it’s down to the wire, but i have forty five minutes left to say happy birthday to my sister janet (and have it still be topical)!
for those of you who don’t know janet- that’s a reflection of her disembodied head floating over somewhere in colorado. janet’s pretty amazing, and has been a cycling pioneer for as long as i’ve known her.
case and point- fourth of...
a can of worms, opened
well, you know what they say about lug carving- never do it. made the mistake of taking a little material off the head tube/top tube lug and now i’m already thinking about how to modify the next one. got a good ‘before’ photo this time. in front of some of the classics.
again- nothing fancy. just there was SO MUCH material on that lug. it was begging for some re-work....
November 2010
10 posts
back to work
thanksgiving’s tofurkey barely cold and tupperware’d, and it’s back to the shop to get some orders out the door.
this is when taking a ‘before’ picture would have been helpful- before the actual hacksawing started. ANYWAY, that one up there shows what the lug looked like to start. that bike was for the most brutal rider in the northeast, so i dared not remove the...
the show bikes- philly bike expo 2010
#1- royal h track
this one was fun. classic track geometry and clearances. the frame is based around a columbus zona ‘mega’ downtube. i found a bottom bracket lug that worked with the super large tube (45x32mm airfoil shaped) and went from there. super clean chrome job from south shore plating company underneath a candy clearcoat applied by tim dixon at classic colors east. h+sun...
Watchanother video of the disc. this one will melt your face.