Yo Eddy, meet your maker

The Team Violet Yo Eddy that I restored late last year has made it into the hands of Chris Chance. The word on the street is he was impressed.

1993 Moots Mountaineer

I thought I'd share another project in the works, an early 90s (1992-93?) Moots Mountaineer. For those not familiar with Moots, it was the brainchild of Kent Eriksen out of Steamboat Springs, CO. Kent starting hand making bicycles in the early 80s and seems to have focused his designs on versatile, comfortable and well balanced bikes. One of his innovations included the moots mount (brake mount) which allows the user to configure the bike to run roller cam or cantilever brakes as well as to run 26, 650B or even 700c wheels simply by switching the orientation of the brake mount - a very neat feature.

The bike came to me with a host of problems, but all the right parts were there (original fork, moots stem, Cook Bros cranks and Ti BB, Chris King headset, and the very-very nice WTB rear roller cam brake.) The seat post was stuck and pushed all the way down, the BB was hopelessly frozen (had to be cut out), wheels were mismatched and beat, parts were fairly abused and frame showed a general lack of care.

After a few days of soaking with PB blast the post finally yielded and was free. The original Cook Bros BB was beyond saving and had to be cut out, unfortunately the BB shell suffered a little nick as a consequence, sometimes that's the cost of doing business.

The Moots design has soooo many wonderful little features, custom lugs, multiple tack mounts, rotating brake stops, etc.. Although most of them are intended to be functional they are all executed with flair that adds to the bike's overall appeal.

At this point I've managed to get the bike mostly back together. I happened to have a nicer XC-PRO front and rear derailleurs and some nice XC-PRO wheels. I even had a spare black CBR bottom bracket, but am unable to find the correct bearings (modified 6002RSR) to complete the build. I may use a XC-PRO instead and get it done.

The bike originally had Mavic wheels (front was missing and rear was in bad shape.) I happen to have a set of nice Mavic wheels on mismatched rims that I can rebuild and use on this bike, but for now I'll stick with the XC-PRO. I still need to install the XC-PRO chain, a real seat (only used that one for the purposes of seat post removal), BB and the nice CBR cranks.

Stay tuned!

Grove Innovations Hard Core Sneak Peak

A quick sneak peak at two Grove Innovation Hard Cores in the works. These bikes have been a long time in the making. With only a hundred or so made per year over a period of 2-3 years these bikes are very-very hard to come by. I am very-very lucky to have these two bikes and they are STUNNING!!! Thank you Bill for making this possible.

More pics to come when I finish the second bike...

Long time in the making... Grove Innovations Hard Core

Here are a couple sneak peaks at a couple very-very special projects... Too bad it's so dark, otherwise I'd get some really good pics.

Number one:

Number two:

More to come...

The ABCs of shipping

So how do you get something as big and awkward as a bicycle into a box small enough to meet the strict USPS overseas shipping requirements, and ensure its safe arrival? It helps to have a lot of experience, a good box to start with and some basic math skills to optimize the box size.

It doesn't seem possible to shoehorn that bike fit into that box, but time and time again it works...

It may be a lot of work, and it may take a long time but in the end the feeling that your prized ride will arrive at its destination safe and sound and at a reduced price is worth it. I usually remove the fork, bar/stem, cranks and remove the rear derailleur and chain, bag them and tape to frame behind the BB.

Removing the tires / tubes and using them instead of packing peanuts or other fill material saves weight and is a smart way of using something you have to ship anyways.

In the ten plus years that I've been involved with shipping bikes across the world I have not had a single one damaged and have never had to file a single claim.

Blue is in...

Any one want to guess what these are for??

Yeti ARC post repair before paint

I got the ARCs back from FTW last week and snapped a few quick shots before sending the larger frame off to Spectrum Powderworks for paint. Here are few more shots of the frame showcasing FTW's awesome skills and reminding the readers what I started with on this project. Hope to have some after pics soon!!

Ignoring the cracked headtube, this bike was in pretty good shape and probably didn't really need a respray to remain usable. Sure the parts were beat and it needed some work, but it was a good rider.

I hope that the finished product will be much-much more than just a pretty bike to look at, but that it provide the new owner with another 10-15 years of riding like it was meant to.

Quick update on the M900 refinishing saga...

Well, it turns out the mass polishing using vibratory tumblers is definitely more of an art than science. There has been few steps forward and many-many setbacks. I recently tried some new media (little plastic triangles) and have been slowly edging forward. Here are the results from the last few attempts.

I was able to overcome the pitting problems associated with the round media and too many parts in the tumbler. Now, I finally getting a smooth finish surface, but still have a little ways to go on achieving the finish. Another 6-8 hours with the plastic media should be enough to progress back to the white ceramic media to hopefully even out the surface and have it be ready for etching and clear anodizing.

Taking a little time out to enjoy the weather

I've been trying to get out and ride more. I recently changed jobs and started working in Pasadena. Now, I finally have access to some trails. Going for a quick ride after work sure beats sitting in traffic and it's nice to get out to some familiar terrain - I used to run all over the San Gabriel Mountains back in my Marathon running days. It's a lot different barreling down the Brown Mountain fire road on a fully rigid Klein though!

 

Ugh - crappy cell phone pic...