Wood-stained cork and shellac.

Hi all,

Back from the post hiatus.  I don’t post enough in my blog and it’s become more of a tendency for me to post when I am building something new.  I recently started working at a new job – I’m working at a proxy research analyst, but that’s beyond the point.

You may remember my headset press post from last time.  I installed a Chris King headset into my Surly Karate Monkey last time and since then I’ve been collecting new parts and building it up bit by bit.  A couple of days ago, the last component finally came in (a 22T freewheel) and I was able to ride it the next evening!

I’ve done a few things new to this bike that I haven’t tried before.  I have an antique brown Brooks Swift coming for this bike in the mail (I have loaner Brooks on it right now) and I wanted the color of the grips to match the saddle.  I thought, why not try staining the cork with wood stain?

I went out to local hardware store to find some kind of woodstain color that match with the antique brown color of the Brooks quite well and I ended up with “red mahogany”.

As you may imagine, cork acts like a sponge compared to wood.  I applied the wood stain onto the cork, let it sit for 10-15 seconds and then dried most of the remaining off with paper towels before it was allowed to soak in even more.   I let the wood stain sit overnight to make sure it had fully absorbed.  Now you don’t want to just leave it at that as the toxic wood stain would just come off on your hands.  Instead, I applied clear shellac on top of the stainto prevent this.  Even though clear shellac is clear, it still makes the color underneath one shade slightly darker.  I ended up applying two coats of shellac to get the waterproof sealing effect to kick in, but not too many more coats as I don’t like it to be to “slick” of a finish (as you see with 3-4 coats of shellac).

Wood-stained, pre-shellac:

With two coats of shellac:

Try it out yourself!  The nice thing is that wood-stain comes in so many shades of colors that it’s very easy to find one to match whatever application you’re looking for.

Blue Collared Headset Press and Crown Race Setter

OK, I admit that generally I love buying bicycle tools.  I didn’t want to settle for the cheaper version of Park’s headset press nor did I want drop $140 for their really fancy headset press.  As for a crown race setter, I also didn’t see the point in paying $40 for a metal tube.   …so, solution?

Build my own tools!!!

Before I get started, you should know these are not my own original ideas, but they are ideas that have been done before by many others.   For this specific project, I got help from:  Bike Commuters Blog.

Headset Press

This is a little bit fancy for a homemade tool in my opinion.  Instead of spending $50 on Park’s economy HS press or $130 on their fancy one, I made this one for $15.  To make this headset press you will need the following supplies:

-3/8″ threaded rod – 1 foot long
-Two 3/8″ nuts (flanged nuts if you can find them!)
-Two 3/8″ washers preferably 1 1/2″ or wider.
-Two 3/8″ Nylon or Neoprene 1 1/2″ or wider washers.

I try to create more layers separating the bolt and the headset so I either add more washers in between the stack or nylon and Neoprene washers for cushion.

Lastly,for the bees knees:

-Two copper female adapters that you can find in the Plumbing Department of your local hardware shop.

Bring your headset with you to the store to make sure it fits wider than your headset. (Thus it should taper to be wider than 1″ or 1 1/8″).

When setting the crown race, I typically do one side at a time.  For this particular instance, I set the bottom first and made sure to face the “King” at the front of the bike.  Even though these female copper adapters makes centering the cups straight very easily, it is always still easier to center the cups when pressing one at a time.

Crown Race Setter

Instead of spending $40 on a crown race setter (essentially a metal tube), I also decided to make my own crown race setter with a PVC pipe.  Here are the materials required:

(For a 1 1/8″ steerer)

-1 1/2″ PVC tube (preferably longer than the steerer tube).

-Scissors

-Electrical tape

-Your fork and crown race

Following this, I taped the bottom edge of the PVC pipe as to provide a bit more cushion between the plastic PVC and the crown race.  PVC is nice because it’s strong enough to knock down the race, but gentle enough that it will not damage the race.  On top of wrapping the bottom lip of the PVC pipe, I wrapped a few more strips of electrical tape at the base of the pipe to keep it from splitting (not that it should, because crown races should set in pretty easily).

I typically grease the lip of the base of the steerer tube before setting the crown race.  There’s enough friction there to keep the race int, but it is nice to lubricate it a little so when it comes time to remove the race, the race and the steerer tube will not have seized together.  Important:  When you’re knocking down the race, do not set the fork with the dropouts just against the ground as you will be prone to damaging the dropouts or you may risk splitting the steerer from the fork crown.

Use a rubber mallet to knock the PVC pipe straight down onto the crown race.  Use a bit of force, but it shouldn’t take more than 10 knocks to get it all the way down there.  In the case that the base of your PVC pipe gets smashed, simply peel off the tape, saw off the bottom and re-tape to use for next time (assuming your PVC pipe is long enough).

Here are some pictures of the end product:

Frame, fork, crown race, lower and upper cup and upper race (yet to be mounted).

Cork Grips, Woundup Composites and Monoplaners

The combination of the rainy season approaching us and me riding my geared bike more often had prompted me to add a front brake to my fixed-gear.  Remember that white track bike that caused me so many problems?  That’s the one.

As my stock track fork has nearly no clearance between the fork crown and the top of the front tire, it forced me to get another already drilled fork with minimal rake.  The stock fork had an incredibly small rake of 30mm.  I was able to custom order a Woundup Composites track fork (35mm – with the dropouts reversed) at wholesale cost.  I was always curious about these forks.  They look aesthetically pleasing (well, for carbon forks) and I was curious to see how they rode.

I chose Nitto Jitensha handlebars for comfort.  I realized that recently I’ve been really in love with wide handlebars.  I’ve been religiously riding Nitto moustache bars that provide me multi-positions (all relatively wide).  Nitto Jitensha bars are flat and sweep back towards you for comfort.  26.0 clamp and are only made for Jitensha Studios in Berkeley.  Jitensha is a store that I highly recommend.  The owner of the shop, Hiroshi is a master frame designer of his own shop brand Ebisu and also a little higher end, Shulas.  They are very well known in the Bay Area (and beyond) for mainly their all-arounder (touring) bikes.  Check it out if you get a chance.

I chose Campagnolo monoplaners to use as a front brake setup.  I don’t really have a preference on what model monoplaners, but the ones I got were (95′?) Veloces.  They provide VERY good stopping power and are very pleasing to the eye.  In the same generation, the Record equivalent was the C-Record Delta brakes which, while looked nice and bulbous, provided very weak stopping power.

I’ve always been a big fan of cork grips.  They look good, they feel good in your hands, they absorb road vibrations well and they are cheap.  If you do a search online on how to mount cork grips to your handlebars, you’ll find lots of different methods.  My two methods, depending on the girth of your handlebars, are either just using cloth wrap and/or using Hogar’s Household glue.

Conveniently, the Nitto Jitensha bars I was working with this time were thick enough that the cork grips already fit snugly on there.  My theory is always to avoid using glue if you can because cleanup and removal can be a pain to deal with when it finally comes time to change or replace grips.  If you find yourself having handlebars that already are snug against the cork grips, then just wrap your handlebars with Velox cloth wrap first over where the cork grip would go over.  BE SURE not to overlap the cloth wrap otherwise the cloth wrap will come out to be too thick.  Single wrap it over that portion.  After this, directly fit the cork grip over the cloth wrap by twisting in the SAME direction as the cloth wrap.  When you get to near the end of the wrap, finish the job by just pushing the cork grip towards the center of the bar instead of twisting otherwise there will be bunching of the cloth underneath the cork.

If on the otherhand, your handlebars are not thick enough that there is still gap between the cork grip and the handlebar, wrap the handlebars as with Velox wrap as I previously mentioned.  After this step, apply Hogar’s Household glue onto the cloth wrap in lines perpendicular to the direction of the wrap job.  Do not apply too much glue as this will just lead to more cleanup in the end.  Do not get the glue on your hands because it is hard to get off.  After applying some glue on top of the Velox cloth wrap, slide the cork grip over the wrap just by pushing it directly towards the middle of the handlebar.  Use a piece of Seran wrap to wipe off excess glue if there is any at the end of the job.  By not gluing the handlebar directly, this makes for much easier cleanup because it is much easier to peel off glued cloth wrap than to scrape off glue from alloy handlebars in the end.  Please avoid using Gorilla Glue for this application because the glue expands a lot as it dries.  It expands so much so that it is hard to predict how much to use initially.

NOS Casati Monza build

For the past two previous weeks, I’ve been trying to sell a NOS Casati Monza.  I am unsure of the year of the frame, but my guess would probably be late 80’s/ early 90’s due to the color and frame graphics.  I would guess that it was originally meant to be built up with 8 speed C-Record groupset.  I am glad to say that I got an email today from a girl named Carmen who sent her friend out to look at the frame today.  I turned out to know this friend, Dustin (of course, like many Craigslist interactions) and we settled on a good price.

Since this will be Carmen’s real first ‘nice’ bike (her previous bike being a double DT Peugeot mixte), it would have pretty decent parts.  I am to help Dustin and Carmen to decide how to build this bike nicely.

Here is the said frame.

To match the era-properness and the femininity of the frame, I was thinking of going with mainly a black/pink theme as to match the outlines of the decal lettering.

Parts are as follows:
Headset: Tange 1″ threaded or Campagnolo Nuovo Record (as to keep the polished lug/polished fork crown transition).
Wheelset: Record hubs with and cassette hub body to accommodate an 8 speed Campagnolo Cassette. Rims will be either Vento or Shamal depending on what we can find.
Crankset: C-Record (w/ the 5th ‘hidden’ arm) maybe with a compact inner ring
Stem: Cinelli 1R black 85mm
Handlebars: Cinelli Mod 64 40/38cm(wide top section, narrow drop)
Shifters: 8 speed ergo levers
Seatpost: C-record or Athena aero seatpost. 27.2
Front Der: C-record 28.6 double
Rear Der: 8 speed C-record
Bottom Bracket: Campagnolo/Italian threading/spindle=70-SPc

Pedaler’s bike swap is this weekend in El Sobrante, should be a good place to look for some C-record vintage parts.

Air compressor hubs

One of my friends from an online forum mentioned today about how the head mechanic from his work has developed a new prototype set of hubs that will inflate your deflated tire.  When you have found that one (or both) of your tires are flat, you simply open up this silver valve that is connected to the hub body and you spin the wheel and air is pumped through a small air line that is connected to the valve.  I will copy from his website because he so eloquently describes the technology:

The pump is built as a cartridge/module that slides into a matching wheel hub and locks onto it.  The cartridge includes the wheel axle and one bearing and adds about 4 ounces to the wheel weight. Air is pumped from the end of the hub through a small polyurethane air line that connects to the tire valve stem.  The outer diameter of the hub (center) is about 1.3″,  which is similar in size to current bicycle hubs,  and the outer surface of the hub (center) is smooth and cylindrical.

Desired tire pressure is set by the user via an adjustment screw. A small silver ‘button’  on the side turns the pump on.  Typically, riding the bike  inflates the tire until it is fully pumped up,  at which point the pump shuts off.  If the tire is flat, the wheel is spun by hand (or for the rear wheel by turning the crank) until there is enough pressure to ride.  This usually takes less than a minute.  For a standard road bicycle tire (700 x 23),  a good approximation is  1 1/2 miles of riding to pump a tire up from flat.  There is a light drag while spinning with the pump on, which goes away when it shuts off.

Their one minute marketing video.

Pump Hub website.

My most difficult customer.

Now that I’ve formally introduced myself, you should also meet my significant other. She is very temperamental and difficult to get along with, but I love her so I have to put up with her time and time again.

When I was attending summer school in my 3rd year of college, there was a ‘goldfinger’ Waterford 1700 series track frame that was parked outside my classroom. I met the girl who had so eloquently equipped her bike with a full-Campy groupset. I was in awe and was certain that was the most beautiful track frame I had ever seen. For 2 months, I got to see this Waterford shimmer its golden skin under the warm summer sun and by the end of summer sessions, I was determined to own my own custom Waterford.

Fast forward one and a half years. It is September and I am anxiously on my way to Bicycle Odyssey to place my order for my own custom Waterford. After extensive research about what model frame I want, what each model’s proprietary tubing was and colors/feature, etc. I placed my order with Tony Tom at Bicycle Odyssey. He originally quoted me “4 months” which later turned out to be 8 months. The frameset finally arrived at the end of April and I was ecstatic.

My Waterford 2800 frameset constructed of True temper platinum OX in the rear triangle and 853 in the main triangle is my most stubborn bike. It has gone through too many transformation since a year and a half ago. I am most known for this bike because of how I’ve stubbornly put up with this bike while others had encouraged me to sell it.

The main problems:

- The chainstays are too fat, causing the crankarms to rub the stays at each rotation of the cranks.

Campy

Dura Ace

I finally did get the crankset to work with the chainstays after giving up on Campy cranks. Dura-Ace is the way to go, and you’ll see in following posts that although Campagnolo is nice, Shimano components never fail me and seem like the more practical and economical way to go about a build oftentimes. The nice thing about Dura Ace track cranks is the octalink. Many will argue that riding brake-less with octalink tends to wear out the little spindle “teeth” on the octalink spindle. I will say that that is true, ONLY IF your crankbolts are not properly tightened down. I have ran DA cranks for quite some time now and have never had any type of problem with them. For situations like mine where you have clearance issues, octalink spindles are so much easier to work with, simply because you cannot overtighten your cranks. Traditional square taper spindles allow for the crankarm taper to spread if overtightened.

My Waterford originally started out as a “Sunday rider” that I would baby and be afraid to get it scratched. A friend once told me that since it is my custom frame that it should be the frame that I ride the most. This made a lot of sense to me, so as of right now, the Waterford and Bridgestone are my daily riders.

Formalities and an introduction.

When the idea came to my mind about this website, I thought it might start out as just a cyclist and bicycle enthusiast expressing his style and ideas to his readers through various types of bikes.

I love building bicycles.  I’ve always thought half of the fun was in deciding what type of bike you’re after and what you are going to use it for.  After you’ve decided those two factors, the components and accessories you choose for your bike, just seem to follow.

A little bit more about myself:  I’ve always celebrated the sole idea of getting more people to ride bicycles.  I studied environmental economics and regional city planning.  I worked with the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition doing bicycle advocacy specifically by raising awareness in motorists of cyclists in SF.  I’ve always wrenched on my own bikes and I was a mechanic at a shop in San Francisco for a little while, but I found working on bikes always as more of a passionate hobby that should be not be mixed with work.

Like everyone else, my ideas and bikes have imperfections to them.  I strive to build a bike that is precisely pictured in my mind in shape and function, but I am also still learning. I got into the cycling primarily from road cycling with a late 90’s Cannondale with Shimano 105 components.  During my college years, I spent a lot of time getting to know the fixed-gear community around me just by talking to people at school, going to various bike shops and through friends.  The minimalistic approach to track bikes appealed (and still do) to me a lot and the idea of a pure form of energy transfer from moving forward to braking solely all from your legs seemed so simple and practical.

Lately, I’ve gotten back into the geared mode.  Not only gears, but practical bikes.  Comfortable bikes you can ride though various terrains on, racks and baggage to carry things with instead of using a bag on your back, lights and tires for the winter and fenders for the wet weather.

In my blog, I will feature what I am currently working on (or what I have worked on in the recent past).  I will update you on bike-related events I (or my friends) are holding. I will give product reviews of products I have self-tested and I will also provide the service of building you a bike.  I want to remind you that I don’t know everything there is to know about various types of bikes, but I come with an open-mind and I am always willing to help and to learn new things with you.  If you see something you like on this website, feel free to email me about it or leave me a comment and I will get back to you promptly.  If you see something here you like and really want a specific type of bike and do not know where to begin, I will also offer the service of building you a bike [just let me know what type of bike (make/model/year/do you have component groupset in mind?/etc.)]

Welcome to werkhorse bikes and my name is William Hsu.