goings-on

just a few pics. a pic from our window of the san francisco peaks at sunset with a dusting of new snow. awful cold, a high of 18 plus windchill, and it was blowing hard! the other pic is denise's new mountain bike out on the trail, she really likes it alot, looks like it handles just fine! doing pretty well, i'm able to cruise about a 1/4 mile on the urban trail with crutches using the new shoes i got to remedy the fact that my left femur is 1 1/4 inch shorter then the other because my femur was busted in 20+ pieces in my accident. we also just got our new sae kayak, but havent built it yet, i'll post pics when i get it together! thanks for reading, steve.

frame blocks

frame blocks! you can't build frames without them, but you can't buy them any where.....

brazing pics

here you go, nothing but a whole bunch of filing, polishing, and braze-ons left. - most of the work! in order of operations: frame all tacked up, polished and cleaned with alcohol, fluxed, raw ht junction fresh from the flame, and fully brazed frame. any questions? please note, unless you have a blog, i cannot reply to the questions you post! steve.

frame all tacked up!

so here it is, i'll put in the cs and ss braces today and braze it up. all in all, it went together really easy! the ss holder is great! the ss's are totally in plane, and they were a snap. of course, having an anvil ss fixture really helps as you can miter both stays at once. more pics post-braze, steve.

thanksgiving seatstay cookin'

thanks for following the frame process! the first pic is the raw materials, 2 lengths each of 1/2" and 5/8" sitting on a schematic drawing of the ss with tire, brake boss and drop out possisions mapped out. then i brass braze them together, de-flux them and polish them up. now you figure out where the bend is, where the tire will be. too much bend and the canti bosses will be too far apart. but, there has to be room for fat 700c tires and fenders. i was going to do an s-bend, but went with single bend, as the clearence looked great and heel clearance was not an issue with the long cs's. on the jig, boy,that ss holder sure is cool! i hate the sound of ss's bouncing off the floor! more tomorrow, i'll miter the ss's and install the braces. then braze er' up! later! steve.

front triangle/chainstays all tacked up + d. kumasaka's frame done!

here's the promised photos of the new henry james 65 in action. the frame in the jig is the replacement frame for b. fry, the original got distroyed by fed ex, but that's another {sucky} story...i'm documenting this build in www.frameforum.net ,check it out! the finished frame is d. kumasaka's frame, one sweet little ripper! i'll post pics when it's back from paint and done, steve.

new henry james access 65 jig with salient features

here's the basic features. i'll chuck some tubes in it and post more pics, steve.the build will be a 700c cross/touring rig, the tubeset shown is the entire bike on the full-size blueprint. tubeset is as follows: prestige dt and st, truetemper ht, hand bent 4130 tt, ths ss's will be made from the smaller tubes-hand bent s-bends, paragon dropouts and bb, hand made seat sleeve,and dedacciai zero-tre s-bend 30x16 cs's. all tools shown were included with the jig. going armbiking tomorrow, i'll post more on wed.,i got the d-outs on and the st fab'ed, so i'll do more assembly then. later, steve.

denise's bike, armbiking, and crutch walking.

new stufff as promised! denise's new bike looks sweet, huh? she's stoked! check out the matching chris king goodies.least i could do for her getting me through the last year... also, some pics from upper brookbank, and some walkin'. walked for 20 min. on the urban trail behind the house today, didn't make it too far, but further and further every time! thanks to all for the comments and replies, it means alot to me that you all still care and think i'm interesting enough to keep tabs on! steve.

just a bit of what's up!

howdy, all, i got about 4 people today tell be how stoked they are to read my blog, so i figured i better update it or folks would quit reading it! alot of folks have been asking how my rehab is coming along. i have been walking on crutches alot more.soon i think i will be strong enough to do most of my cruising around on them, but i still work in a chair. after the accident, i was so wasted that my first leg brace was a child's x-small.so, alot of it is just getting back some muscle mass.also, my balance and co-ordination got really scrambled.but, if you consider that i got out of the rehab a year ago on nov. 18th and could only wiggle one toe,then it's easy to se how far i've come. i bottomed out at about 115lbs. in febuary and i'm at about 170 now.i finally got some custom shoes with a 1 1/4" lift on the left to accomidate the fact that my femur was busted in 20+ pieces. it helps alot! also got off one nerve pain med and on a different one that gives me more energy. denise says i'm back to my old fiesty self,and the pain seems more controlled, although i still have a couple of hours a day when i get uncontrollable foot spasms.{like right now} bad news on frames-fedex distroyed bill fry's x-bike frame, caved in the thick-ass head tube, and this especially sucks as he was coming from switzerland to pick it up. so, now i'm going through a claim with fedex. i insured the shit outta it, so i'm hoping for the best, but i still have to re-build it. should have denise's new curved toptube disc brake mtb together tomorrow, it's orange with matching chris king headset and hubs. i'll post pics tomorrow. got a couple more orders, i'm not even sure how many i have to build, maybe 15. denise is doing great, if you have not seen it, there is a post to her blog on the right, check it out. got a new metal roof, and skylights in every room, pretty nice. should have my seakayak soon, pretty stoked on that too. gonna go armbike climb 3/ upperbrookbank/ wienie walk tomorrow, i'll post pics of that as well, and some of me walkin' for ya'll as well! thanks for reading, i'll post more cool stuff soon, steve

what's been going on?

sorry i haven't checked in lately, been really busy, and denise was in wisconsin and she took the camera.been doing pretty good, been trying to swotch nerve pain meds,and had some wierd side effects like tunnel vision and stuff yesterday, had to take a break from frame building, but managed to lay these sweet fillets before things got wierd! did a great ride 2 days ago on the arizona trail out by mormon lake, went from dairy springs to double springs, which is some damn sweet trail, as you can see, more used by critters then humans. the tarantulas are on their yearly treks to find mates, saw this guy on the ride, out trolling for chicks, only to probally get eaten for his troubles. barry ward and brian herzog stopped by with their bikes, barry was well armed as usual, all you need to survive-an ar-15 and a 1-speed! i'll have denise's birthday bike and bill fry's bikes back from paint soon, and i'll post pics as soon as i get them, probally mid week. thanks for carin' and readin', walked 10 minuites on the urban trail today with crutches! look forward to seeing you all! steve.

big ride up mormon mountain

just did a big armbike ride up mormon mtn - 1500ft. of climbing in 3 miles of single track! that's 1 foot in 10 and that's steep! mormon mtn is about 20 miles south of flagstaff, and is a great trail, totally unused, moist and covered with pineneedles. it's sorta cool to knock off first ascents and stuff. it was definately one of the most difficult workouts ever, my arms and neck were burning! the down hill was sweet, fast and rocky, got a flat and did a high speed rollover. the trail also bisects the arizona trail, see the pics, one goes to mexico, one to utah, almost 800 miles of trail! later, steve.

same color, two different bikes

a couple new rigs to share today. the bare frame is greg e's long travel 1-speed frame, built for a 140mm fork and some heavy use, moab style. the touring rig is eric s.'s, and will live here in flagstaff when it's not out seeing the world! the sweet color is "guacaloco". i'll be wrapping up bill f's tour rig that's going to zurich, switzerland, all it needs is braze-ons! been doing some arm biking as well, did weatherford/lookout trail the other day. real nice in flag lately, cool, clear, and not too windy. thanks for reading, steve.