Josh's Road Frame

Jason finished up Josh's frame last week, it's a pretty simple, classic paint scheme. I used Henry James lugs with just a few little modifications.

I added the circular cutouts on the chain stay points like my road frame.

On the fork, it was circles again on the inside and outside. The rear dropouts are Ritchey's, but I finish them down quite a bit.

The seat lug is just clean and simple with side tack seat stays.

The head lugs get the small circular cutouts in the corners, and you can see the internal brake routing.

Rafael's frame is heading off to Jason's for paint. Here's some shots of the finished frame.

As always, the inspector has to have a look...

The head lugs and cable guides.

A couple views of the bottom bracket, Ellis Cycles #12.

I decided to finish the internals a bit more than I showed in the previous blog posting. Rafael went for the fastback seat stay, nice and tidy.

My favorite part, the Ellis dropouts.

I left the bottom of the dropout raised and finished it to a point. Since the dropouts are stainless, I'll have Jason mask this part so no more chewed up paint from wheel changes.

Rafael's Frame

Rafael wanted a road frame with a bit of slope in the top tube, so I decided to go with Llewellyn's slant six lugset and I did a bit of carving much like my own road bike.

I'm using the Ellis dropouts too, here's a couple shots of them before and after brazing.

I wanted to throw in some pics of the internal cable routing that I use. Here's the step by step view as I prepare the tube and the internal housing.

Here's the end protruding slightly and then fluxed for brazing.










After brazing and then the finished end. Ready to go into the fixture.










All the tubes and lugs cleaned and ready to go in the fixture.

Fluxed up and loaded, now for the tacking.

The seat lug and bottom bracket after tacking, not very pretty at this point.

After brazing.

The frame is soaking as I write this, so I should have more pics soon...

Doug's Bike is Done!

Jason dropped off Doug's bike on Sat, so I got the headset pressed in today and gave it to Drew for some of his photo magic. Here's a couple shots.
















I decided to mount the front brake for the photos, looks pretty sharp with the silver headset. If you peek through the brake you can just see the fender mount on the underside of the fork crown. I think this really cleans up the look of the fender when you don't have to use the clip included with the Honjo fenders.

The seat stays got a little tight with the cable routing and the rack mounts, but everything has it's space.

I didn't want to risk scratching the fenders, but they are painted to match with the triangular tips in white with a black pinstripe. Very classy, I look forward to seeing the bike complete when Doug gets it finished.

Gibbs Lake Cross Race

Headed out to Gibbs lake near Janesville this past Sunday to watch the cross races and see James in his spiffy new Ellis jersey and shorts.

On Saturday James raced in Verona, near Madison and took 3rd place, congrats! But I think the fatigue was getting to him on Sunday, he looked to be suffering but still managed a respectable 5th.

I'm still getting used to the new camera, so I haven't got the focus quite dialed in. The trees and background are sharp, but James in kinda blurry.

Rolling up to the barriers and running like hell.

Don't look so unhappy James, there's always next week!

On the 26th, the race is in our back yard at Washington Park in Milwaukee. Ellis Cycles will be there to support James and we'll have a tent with some really pretty bikes to check out, including James'. Stop by and say hi, you might even see me racing in the Cat 4 race, hopefully I can stay upright!

Harlan's Singlespeed

Harlan's single speed is off to paint, here's some shots of the latest Ellis. I'm not normally a weight weenie, but this one came at 3.5 lbs for the frame.

I really like this fork crown for road bikes that don't need clearance for large tires. It's super clean and tight.

I positioned the internals almost at 6:00 under the top tube, this way if he wants to run it brake less you won't be able to see the cable routing at all.

Harlan wanted the classic side tack seat stays. I made the cap as long and tapered as possible.

These were some old Rivendell lugs that were saved from the trash at Waterford. I carved them back a bit and added the circles on the lug points.

Pacenti track dropouts, nice, clean and elegant. I really work to get those crisp reveals along the dropout edges.

Paul's Singlespeed

Paul's bike ready to for paint, I set it up with his wood fenders just to make sure all the clearances were good. He wanted a single speed that he could run fenders with and up to 32c tires. In order to make wheel removal easier with fenders I decided to use some of my Campy 1010a dropouts so the wheel would come out forward rather than back. It works just the way I planned too, I can just clear the bolt in the chain stay bridge when removing the wheel.

The inspector was looking over my shoulder the whole time.

THIS IS ALL WRONG!!!!

Those sweet Campy dropouts, I cut off the derailleur hanger and filed the groove on the bottom of the dropout to match the non-drive side.

Some shots of the head lugs, they were a set of pressed lugs with basic windows that got pretty modified.

The seat lug got a new pinch barrel to replace the flimsy pressed one and some extra brass for shaping. The boss in the background!

Below you can see both heart cutouts on the seat lug, and the nifty canti brake stop.