Strong Frames

Bear! It must be Fall

Carl — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 13:09:05 +0000

So I walk out my door this morning to come to work and there is a 400 pound black bear standing right in front of me. In Montana you see bear all the time but not often do you see them this big and rarely in the middle of town. Bozeman is a small town but it’s still miles to the forest edge. He/she must have come down the creek bed to fatten up for the winter on all the garbage down the allies and fruit and berries that are in peoples yards. I’ve been seeing sign in the yard and there was a bear treed in the neighbors yard the other day so I knew they were around but this guy was right in my face. The scariest things was that the bear froze and my dog started to approach it. I called the dog back and thankfully he responded. When I yelled for my dog the the bear took off. Had it been my other dog who never listens and is very aggressive when it comes to her yard it may have been another story. As it is the bear left and I’m sure when I get home all my neighbors will have seen it too. It stayed down just a little too long and once the people are up and moving it’s probably pretty hard to get back to the bush. We get this every Fall when the bear start to fatten up for the Winter hibernation but this was my closest encounter yet.

On another Note, I finished Arch’s bike this weekend putting in a little OT. It’s a really cool carbon fiber road bike. It’ll go off to paint today and I’ll post images of the final product once it’s back.

Cyclings Future

Carl — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 12:58:36 +0000

I’ve talked about him before but I have to brag about him a little more. Local Bozeman kid (not a kid anymore) and son of a friend I raced with for years Tejay Vangarderen who once worked at Strong Frames as the “shop boy” is killing it in his young pro race career. He’s racing for HTC-Columbia and scored a third in the Criterium du Dauphine behind Contador. He did so well in the Dauphine his team manager decided to test the waters in a grand tour. Last Sunday he started the Vuelta a Espana and after six stages sits in 6th in the GC, Go Tejay! In the August issue of VeloNews he made the cover and has a full page picture with the caption “Future of GC racing”. That’s a lot to live up to but Tejay is a good kid and if anyone can do it he can. Looks like we may be going to the Tour De France next year.

Jeff M’s Dirt Road

Carl — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 12:46:25 +0000

Here is Jeff’s Dirt Road frame. It’s a Custom Blend steel using a mix of True Temper OX Platinum and Columbus Life. It will get an Edge Cross fork painted to match and really cool white and blue custom paint job. Jeff is also the owner of frames by Dave Kirk, Sacha White and Mike Zanconato so it will be in good company.

Campy Lovers

Carl — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 13:04:33 +0000

I was just sent this cool Campy tech pamphlet on the 2011 Gruppos. If you are a true Geek, you’ll love this. It highlights a lot of the features of the kit that could easily go unnoticed. In recent years Campy has lost a lot of ground to Shimano and Sram and it appears as though they are working very hard to get back on top of the heap. I haven’t seen any of the 2011 stuff yet but it will be shipping soon and I look forward to hanging it on some bikes. Also, believe it or not, Campy prices have actually gone down. You can see my Campy build kit prices here.

2011 Campagnolo Range

Dave G’s Mega Steel

Carl — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 13:02:28 +0000

Here is a killer steel frame I just finished up for Dave G., a fireman out of California. I actually built almost this identical frame for him about 10 years ago. He sold the original and never found anything he liked as well so we built him another. It’s built with Columbus Mega toptube and downtube, along with Life stays and an externally butted seatube. It has a fairly average length but a very tall headtube. Dave is a tall guy but mostly inseam. The frame will be built up with a Sram Red and custom King R45/DT wheels. It’s also getting a really cool paint job.