Sydney's New Ellis

I'll have more pics of this one on my website soon, but here's a few of the highlights.

Sydney is a fairly petite rider, so we decided to go as light as possible with standard gauge tubing and some ultra light S3 chain stays. The frame alone came in just over 3 lbs.


In order to accommodate the gently sloping top tube, I used the bi-laminate lug technique. The head tube has "half-lugs" and then the top and down tube are fillet brazed into them.

The seat cluster is also bi-laminate, and you can see the exit hole for the internal and the stainless washer on the brake bridge to eliminate paint chipping.

Can't forget the signature Ellis dropouts as well. Pretty thinned out on a frame this small, but still plenty strong.

Cheers,

Dave

Busy week, D2R2, and more to report!

Shoulda' taken a photo when I was leaving Wi, but I was a bit harried and just looking to get in the car and go. Left about 11:30 in the morning on Wed., (the 18th), so I was a bit worried about the traffic going through Chicago, but it turned out to be pretty easy going and I made good time all the way through Indiana and Ohio. I thought about trying to do the whole trip in one day, but I always underestimate how huge NY is. I got to Erie, Pa about 9:00pm and I saw that I was just past halfway on the mileage, time to get a motel room!

Well, that brings me to the first photo, the Honda, all packed up on Thurs. morning, ready to keep heading east.





I got in on Thurs. at about 3:00pm and hooked up with an old friend from my racing days, Karl. Turns out he lives less than a mile from my folks new condo in Schenectady! We headed out for a nice 30 something mile jaunt and got caught up on what we've been up to the last 10 years or so. Hard to believe I've been in Wisconsin that long!



Friday was a big day of helping my folks with some woodworking and jobs around the house. Henrik got in just in time for dinner and we carbo loaded in anticipation of D2R2 the next day.

Here we are at the start line in Deerfield. On the left is Chris, looking awfully chipper and ready to go, and on the right is Henrik, (in his Ellis kit), and Bill. Bill turned me on to the D2R2 at Cirque this past summer. I had just returned from the Saturday's "Rustic Ride" around some of the beautiful Virginia dirt roads and he mentioned that if I liked that, I should check out the Deerfield ride.

Chris, still looking good on his Ahearn 29'er on the early hills! Lots of comments on the cool titanium spork that's bolted onto the head tube.

OK, my attempt at a self portrait. I always think I look goofy in these and especially since I'm wearing my $10 REI "backup" sunglasses. They never sit straight on my face, but good to have when you forget the nice ones at home.

I pulled a bit ahead of Henrik on the last climb before lunch just enough to get this nice shot of him muscling up the last few yards of the climb.

The lunch stop was at a beautiful covered bridge and wooden dam. It was pretty well swarmed with cyclists!

The dam.

After lunch Chris was having some trouble with leg cramps, so here he is desperately trying to open some electrolyte tablets to ease his pain.

Henrik checked the cue sheet one last time to make sure we knew where we're going. Turns out a large group caught us just after the stop, so we could just sit in and follow everyone else.

We got a bit split up in the final miles, but everyone made it home OK, just not looking quite as chipper! In fact, Chris looks like he's seeing through time and space in this shot. Some food and drink helped get everyone feeling better.

Finally, just so you don't think I've stopped building entirely, some shots of Tom's rando frame. Started before I left for D2R2, and finished just yesterday and off to paint.

Some of Ritchie's Rene Singer lugs, for some reason they just look "right" on a rando frame.

The seat lug with some gently wrapped points on the stays.

Now, I just have to get ready for this weekend's Cream City Century! It's on Sunday the 29th, and we'll be having an open house with tours of the shop after the ride. I'm planning on trying the 100, but if it seems to be going long, I'll probably take a shortcut home so I can be ready for folks to show up around 12:00 noon. Hope to see you there!

Ellis Cycles

500 Racine St.

Waterford, WI 53185

Rob's 29'er

Just a quick post with some pics from Rob's new 29'er!

The new Ellis and the Paramount that was the inspiration for the 29'er project.

Nice shot of the Niner fork and you can just see that down tube lug/gusset.

Rob's "Inspector". "My what big eyes you have!"

Cheers,

Dave

New Inspectors!

After Alley passed away, it didn't take long for Lisa and I to decide we needed some new cats in our household, but I wasn't sure if they were going to be "shop cats" or not.

Lisa found a little gray tiger kitten named Chuckles at the Milwaukee Humane Society, and when we went to meet him, he was having such a great time playing with his roommate that we adopted them both! Below is Marshall, who seems to be the new Inspector looking over Scott's Waterford refurbish.


Here's Chuckles keeping an eye on me while I work in the office!

With Scott's bike, he was trying to get a bit of extra clearance on his RS-22 so he could run fenders and a bit wider tire. We initially talked about just building a slightly longer fork, but in the end I talked him into doing a fork and making the seat stays a bit longer as well. This way, the bike gets raised up a bit, but the angles and the handling should stay pretty similar.

The new and the old forks, along with the bits of seat stay that I removed. The new fork only has about 3mm more rake, but I must say I really prefer the small radius bend that I do over the rake in the old Waterford fork. The new fork also has an attachment point under the crown for fenders and a single eyelet on the dropouts.

I removed the "fastback" style seat stays and replaced them with these nice flat capped "sidetack" stays. These allow for more tire clearance and better placement for canti studs.

Marshall checking out the curved seat stay bridge with a fender mount.

A shot of the bridge reinforcing tang.

Finally, I had to add a chain stay bridge so Scott would have an attachment point for his fender. Unfortunately, it lands right in the end of the tire clearance "bump". Not an easy part to miter, but I managed to get it in there!

For the fender attachment on the dropout, I just drilled the flat part of the Waterford dropouts and threaded the holes.

Not quite a new bike, but the next best thing!

More 29'er Pics

A few more pics of Rob's new 29'er. Here's a nice shot of the custom bent brake bridge and seat stays. Those top miters on the stays are always fun to hand miter, but they're plenty tight.

A shot of the bi-lam seat lug. I used an externally butted seat tube and just brazed the socket on for the top tube.

The bottom bracket is originally a road shell, but with a little gentle persuasion, the sockets got a bit angled.

Finally, the sweet chainstay disk mount Paragon dropouts. Really liking these!

Cheers,

Dave

Rob's 29'er

Rob first contacted me about updating his '95? Paramount so he could use disk brakes and more modern componentry. I'm pretty hesitant to do a lot of work upgrading an older bike like this since it really wasn't designed for the loads that disks will put on both the frame and fork. Plus the fact that suspension forks really aren't available for an older bike like this got Rob thinking about a new frame, and if it was going to be built from the ground up, why not a 29'er?

I did a few drawings and while I may have been able to squeak the angles out of existing lugs, I felt like the bi-laminate construction wouldn't constrain the design and it would allow for some extra strength in certain areas as well. Plus it made for nice paint mask lines so Rob's new Ellis would still retain the classic lugged look of his old, well loved Paramount.

Here's the original.

Here's the modern, Ellis take on a suspension corrected 29'er. I gotta say, as I was building this frame I was getting a bit jealous of Rob, I'm gonna have to build one for myself soon!

The Niner carbon fork is a bit massive up front, but I think once the bike is built up it'll look just fine.
A shot of those beautiful bi-lam head lugs!

I extended the bottom lug down the tube a bit to act as a gusset for the front end. The tangs should take any stress and distribute it outward instead of down the tube.

This one's off to MI soon, but I should have some more pics before it's gone!

Cheers,

Dave

Paul's Modern Classic

Paul sent me some pics this past week of his new "Modern Classic" in the wild!

Should've gotten my "studio" photos of this one up sooner, but here they are. More are posted on the website under the title "Blue Goodness"!

Paul wanted the same look as the "Modern Classic" that won best lugged frame at NAHBS in 2009, but since he was going to be fitting a rack and fenders I choose to use standard tubing instead of 953 for the rear end and have it chromed. The 953 chainstays and seat stays are just too thin for my taste on a touring bike.

A good shot of the new double eyeleted Ellis dropouts.

The seat cluster and seat stays get a lot of detail work with the lug carving and the sleeved seat stays.

Some more finished bike shots. Nice to see he's not afraid of getting it wet!

Ride on Paul!

Cheers,

Dave