This article is is the final part of a series I’ve been writing about my experience taking a two week bicycle frame building class in December from master framebuilder, Doug Fattic.

Two weeks somehow became three and a half months. Back in December, I spent two weeks learning the trade of framebuilding from Doug Fattic in Niles, Michigan. At the end of the two weeks, I was supposed to have a functioning transportation bike frame, ready for painting and building up into a bike. When I left Niles in mid December, I had a completed frame. Front triangle, rear triangle, dropouts, fork. I had everything I needed for a working bike except the braze-ons. Those are the little things like water bottle bosses and cable stops that increase the utility of your bike and give you a clean setup. Doug assured me that those items don’t take much time to do, and since we had run out of time, I could do them on my own.

We he was right about the actual doing. Once I finally got to the actual brazing of these items, I was finished in about a day’s work in my workshop. Getting to the point of having said workshop to do these brazes was another matter. The holidays, my commitments with my consulting business, my family, planning for the venture this experience helped launch, and even this blog all conspiring to delay getting setup to finish this bike and move on to building the next (which is being finished as you read this.)

Specing my first frame

At the same time I was pushing to get my workshop ready, I spent countless hours trying to finalize the component specifications of this bike. I had had an idea of how I wanted to spec it, but I got nervous and obsessive compulsive about finding the “right” equipment when it came time to order. I read component reviews, test rode Marcus’ Azor Secret Service, and searched countless sites for the best deals so my bike would be just the way I wanted it. Once everything was ordered, it took weeks in some cases to get the parts I needed and was held up by “little things” like getting sent a 32 hole rim for a 36 hole hub which added a week to my wheel building schedule. Other things like a full cover chain guard were simply unavailable in the North American after market, and I was unwilling to wait weeks more for a chain guard shipped from Europe.

I choose these cable routing bosses for a cleaner cable housing routing

Still, by late February my components were in and my frame was ready to be painted. I chose to go with powder coating instead of traditional bike paint covered by clear coat. This was going to be a transportation bicycle, stylish yes, but in the end a utility bike. I wanted the most durable paint option available and current powder coating comes in dozens of colors. Plus, since powder coat is baked on instead of using chemicals to cure it, it is a much more environmentally friendly option. The only thing I would be sacrificing would be the option of doing two tone or having interesting patterns put on. I tend to be conservative on this count wanting the natural lines of the frame to express its beauty, not wanting colorful hues to distract.

I took the frame to Crosslink Powder Coating of Austin, which was the only local powder coat company to actually respond to my request for a quote. In this whole process, my experience with Crosslink went off without a hitch putting my beautifully finished night blue frame and fork in my hands in a week.

The Final Build

I really wanted to ride my finished steed in the Bike Hugger Mobile Social, but due to all the delays, I received the finished frame the Friday afternoon before the ride. After a half-hearted attempt to build up the bike Saturday morning that involved loosing the rear hub lock nuts (somehow they appeared Monday morning sitting on my work bench!), I decided not to rush things and instead resolved to finish off the bike in the following week. I was quite discouraged as I set internal deadlines for myself and get pretty upset when I don’t meet them. Still, I loaded up the kids on the Xtracycle and was in a considerable better mood when I won another Xtracycle Free Radical kit that evening at the post ride BBQ party.

Lovely Shellacked Cork Grips from Velo Orange

By midweek, I had finished the bike build up and was ready to roll. Before I discuss the ride quality, here are some thoughts on the components I chose. I have always liked Velo Orange for its stylish, retro components and accessories and used their products for my headset, fenders, chain guard, water bottle cage, saddle, handlebars, and grips. I really like the look of the VO Model 8 saddle, water bottle cage and cork grips. I liked the look of the fenders as well, but disliked the complete lack of installation documentation. I’ve installed quite a few fenders in my day, but never retro designed ones like these. I was flummoxed for about a week until I looked at my copy of the Golden Age of Handbuilt Bicycles for pointers. Of course two days after I finished the bike, Velo Orange posted instructions on their blog.

The front hub is Sturmey Archer and the rear Shimano Nexus. I usually don’t like to mix brands of  hubs for purely aesthetic reasons, but the offerings of these companies limited my options. I wanted a front roller/drum brake dynamo hub and a rear 8 speed internal hub with roller/drum brake. Sturmey Archer offered the first but not the second and Shimano the later but not the prior. Both companies have offer both of these hub options in the past but for some reason there is a gab here in the current model lines. Anyway, I have to say I was really impressed with the quality and design of the Sturmey Archer compared with the Shimano roller brake dynamo I’ve experienced on other bikes. The hub rolls smoothly, looks cleaner, stops better (no silly brake dampener here!), and does not require multiple wrench sizes for wheel removal. If Sturmey Archer can bring back the 8 speed internal with drum brake, I’m going to seriously look to make the switch.

Ride Quality

While I was attempting to get my ducks in a row on the workshop and components, I spent three weeks riding Marcus’ Azor Secret Service to get a baseline for the ride experience of a Dutch style city bike. I’ve been mostly riding a road bike for transportation in the past with the Xtracycle converted Trek 7200 thrown in when I needed to carry more than my messenger bag allowed. The Secret Service was a totally different experience and honestly not much fun to ride until I began to purposely ride about 5 MPH slower. At the slower pace, the Azor really began to shine. Still, I prefer to have the option of peppier riding, and I was a bit nervous about how my bike would ride.

One of the reasons I took Doug Fattic’s class was to explore this interest I had in framebuilding not only as a hobby but also a business. I’ve been an entrepreneur for the last six years and have always attempted to combine my interest in a subject with making the world a better place. This has been true in my political consulting business as well as my work to create and launch Austin Carshare.