Here is Marc’s coupled stage race frame. It’s a Custom Blend of OX Platinum and Columbus Life. It has a classic “stage race” geometry with a steep sloping toptube. It is the second of three coupled steel frames in a row. It goes out to paint today.

Here is a link to Red Kite Prayer http://redkiteprayer.com/?tag=velocipede-salon, there is a quick little article on the Velocipede Salon’s Smoked Out section. When I clicked the link I was flattered that they had used a picture of a titanium coupler frame I built. If you haven’t already visited Smoked Out you should. It gives a lot of insight to the different type of personalities that are out there building frames, what compelled them to pursue Framebuilding and their philosophies. There are builders from the budding young upstarts through the newer generation and all the way to the vastly experienced professionals.

Here are a couple of funny old videos I dug up on VHS and finally got converted to a format I could post. I thought it might be fun to show how things have changed here at Strong Frames Inc. over the years.

The first video is a local news segment done around 1994. I was in my “Hayes” shop. I worked full time and built nights and weekends. I was still mitering the frames by hand. At the time of this video I’d guess I’d built around 25 frames so I was just getting started and had a lot to learn. Sorry for the poor video quality, it was taken off an old tape that had been sitting in a drawer since the day I taped it.

This second video was done around 1998 by some U of M students for a PBS show that features local businesses. For those who don’t know, the guy with the beard is Tony Smith who was my business partner for around 6 years. He was a very large part of  Strong Frames Inc. and to this day his legacy lives on here in the form tooling and processes. I think the funny thing about this video is hearing what our goals were at the time. I obviously hadn’t taken my “Business of Framebuilding” seminar yet because I was getting ready to make every mistake in the book. Oh well, I guess that’s how you learn. I’m sure I’ll look back on the things I say and do now with the same horrified response that I do when I watch these old videos. When this video was done I was mitering all the front triangles on a Enco bench top mill/drill and mitering the rear triangles with files. At this point I probably had about 300 to 350 frames under my belt so I was starting to figure it out but still had a long way to go.

Here is Tim’s compact steel road frame. He has an aluminum bike which he loved the fit and geometry on so we pulled the specs off the existing frame and used it in a Custom Blend steel. “If it aint broke, don’t fix it”. If I have a customer that has something they love, I’m not one to change it. In a lot of cases customers will come to me wanting something that fits and handles like an existing bike and when that’s the case I don’t mind mimicking that bike. In most cases I’ll get their body measurements so I can understand what it is they like and why and if I there are any suggestions I feel I can make I will, otherwise they’ll get what they know works.

I haven’t been very regular about posting VOW’s so I thought I’d get back after it. Matt E. a customer of mine sent me a link to this vid which I thought was really cool. Check out some of the exposure!