Got bored, made sumthin'

[Danneaux]

Hi All!

A bad head cold has stoppered my plans to camp-tour on the Carradice-equipped Nomad during this weekend's fantastically good 27°C/81°F weather. To temper my disappointment, I mowed the lawns and then retired to the garage to play with my tools.

I milled a new shifter pod from billet aluminum. While I loved the original shifters and have them on a couple other bicycles, I wanted to use modern indexed shift levers on one early-'80s  bicycle. It had an "aero" top-mounted downtube boss incompatible with anything but the proprietary friction-shifting levers designed for it ( http://www.bikeforums.net/classic-vintage/514867-test-your-wits-suntour-symmetric-reassembly-challenge-pics.html ...and... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyR9Sezf1PM ). Worse, the large square brazed-on frame boss was threaded M6 x 0.75 (fine), not the usual M6 x 1.0 thread pitch. The frame boss is too shallow to rethread and is a blind hole, so I had to reuse the original mounting bolt, as no replacements are readily available here with a socket head.

I wanted to maintain as much of the original appearance as possible, so no quick-and-easy clamp-on adapters for me; my pod is modeled after an mid-'80s SunTour design. The shift lever posts were made using a small holesaw to make plunge cuts to the desire depth, then milling away unneeded material. Now, all I have to do is finish removing the tool marks and polish the aluminum and it will be ready to install.

Figuring someone might be interested in making their own parts, I've attached a few photos showing the shifter pod in rough finish and about half polished. Aluminum is pretty soft, so it is not too difficult to "carve" with simple tools as you might whittle on a block of wood with a knife. In fact, I sometimes encourage people to first carve their part out of wood as a prototype. Soft balsa works well. In this case I made a drawing, then used a few electric tools to spare my hands -- electric bandsaw for roughing out the shape, drill press with drill bits and a holesaw, a Dremel Moto-Tool and some good, sharp hand files (mill, bastard, and fine cut) and an M5 x 0.8mm hand tap -- but it could all have been done with hand-powered tools.

There have been lots of fun little projects over the years. I try to make one of these little milled-aluminum projects each quarter...rack light mounts, homemade versions of the Avid Microdapter, splined-to-threaded freewheel adapters, engraved stems and cranks, and periodic reprofiling of freewheel and cassette cog teeth to compensate for wear. The aluminum comes in small billet overruns from a foundry near my home ( http://www.oregonpattern.com/ ).

I taught myself to shrink and stretch metal with a hammer and dolly and have hammer-shaped mudguards from annealed aluminum sheet-stock and also have cast 'guards from liquid ABS, then milled hollow steerer-core mounts from billet aluminum.

The brazed- or TIG'D-steel projects are a bit more advanced and require more specialized tools -- long-layback seatposts, adjustable tandem stoker stems, suspension stems, tubular cro-moly brake boosters, forks and steerers, entire front and rear racks, braze-ons for bottles/racks/mudguards and canti- or v-brakes, and entire frames all built as a hobby, not for sale. My small-wheel, full-sus Folder awaits the addition of just a few cable stops and wet paint, and the small-wheel full-sus recumbent is in progress, about half done.

I think a Carradice quick-release mount for the Nomad may be in the works. 

Best,

Dan.

[julk]

Fascinating Dan, amazing what a headcold can instigate.
Looks very nice and will complement the bike it is meant for.
Get well soon.

Happy hobbying.
Julian.

[in4]

For a small consideration I'll sort out the world-wide licensing for you Dan  

[Andre Jute]

A very productive head cold!

[Danneaux]

Annnnnd....done! 

Best,

Dan.

[Danneaux]

Made sumthin' else...

...a Click-Stand cradle from aluminum, for a special project. The original cradle is nylon, dipped in a rubberized plastic coating.

The tool marks will be fully removed before a final polish and application of a non-scratch coating. I milled for an initial interference fit, then froze the parts to -18°C; thawing to room temperature made a nice, tight fit without need for bonding agents.

Best,

Dan.

[Bill C]

awesome stuff Dan    must be great to be able to knock up bits yourself
i'm an ex chippy never did get on with metal work (as it blunts your chisels  )
 but am starting to want to be able to do my own bits n bobs, do you know anything about stick welding?
as i want to have a go at a yak trailer, probably ought to start a thread as i doubt i'm the only one that yaks

[Danneaux]

Thanks for the kind words, Bill.

Yes, I can stick-weld but prefer TiG to Mig, even though I do it so rarely I'm not very good (or practiced) at it compared to lug and fillet brazing, as you can see in the photos below. Strong joints, but not so pretty as I like...no fanned-out "stack o' dimes" effect to the laps. I sold my Lincoln stick-welder last summer, as I just wasn't using it enough to justify keeping it. I thought about converting it to a TiG-rig, but the friend who was going to help me do the conversion died of heart failure before we could get it finished. He'd been a millright and taught electrician certification courses and planned to use the project as part of an instruction module. The basic conversion process can be see in the links shown in this custom Google search:
https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=convert%20lincoln%20stick%20welder%20to%20tig

Many of my frame and component projects use ovalized or elliptical tubes unsuited to lugs, so I fillet braze instead using one of my two oxy-acetylene rigs. The Victor is setup with a rosebud tip for pre-warming large joints like bottom brackets, and the Craftsman by Victor is setup with either a No. 4 or a No. 2 tip or finer for lugs, fillet-chasing, braze-ons, and brake bosses. I use GSM Type B paste bronze brazing powdered flux I mix with distilled water. I get it from Henry James Folson. I wouldn't mind a dedicated (gas cup shielded) gasflux setup someday ( http://www.henryjames.com/gasfluxer-model-69.html ) if I did more of it, but I can't possibly justify the cost and powdered flux works fine.

I much prefer to flame-chase my fillets rather than grinding them afterwards, so what you see below is how my fillets look after soaking off the flux and a quick swipe with production cloth to remove oxides and discoloration.

It is also possible to actually weld with an oxy-acetylene torch and keep the HAZ (heat-affected zone) surprisingly small with the appropriate tip; I've had good luck with this. If you're interested in doing so, look at gunsmithing sites for detailed instructions. This Google custom search will help: https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=gas%20welding%20steel%20tubing Using the appropriate filler, you can also gas-weld aluminum.

I made the rear brake cable hanger (photo below) yesterday from stainless steel and will silver-braze it tomorrow.

If you want to have a go at a Yaklike trailer, take a look at vintage Jack Taylor or Goëland trailers, as they are probably the easiest and most durable to copy. They use a bicycle headset as the main bearing and the bike portion of the hitch is particularly good at distributing weight and stresses while still being rear rack compatible. The effective "head angle" is the trickiest to get right so the trailer will track properly and not fishtail or wag. Here are some links to photos:
http://www.bikequarterly.com/images/GBwTrailer.jpg
http://www.blackbirdsf.org/taylor/images/camper_trailer.jpg
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3603/3557028323_d36b8d4db7.jpg
https://janheine.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/tandemtrailer2.jpg

It is not difficult to incorporate a "dry" suspension into the design if desired.

I'm real pleased with the two trailers I've made. They weigh 17lbs/7.7kg each and use demountable cro-mo steel frames that pack inside with the wheels. I used an etching polyamine-polyamide epoxy resin and roll pins to secure the joints and ended up with a pair of 16in wheels as I found 12in to be too small and 20in would not pack inside the cargo box for shipping and transport. The boxes are watertight to the point of floating and the lids can be securely locked. I made the hitches from stainless and the tracking is spot-on, great for tandem use and grocery-getting. Maximum weight limit is 125lb/56.7kg (a respectable 7.35x the static weight). It worked fine for gravel logging roads on a tour I took with a visiting Dutch pal as stoker.  For his first-ever bicycle camping tour, we took everything but the kitchen sink...oh, wait, we took that too (folding waterproof nylon) -- and his Dutch Army tank driver's boots so he could go hiking once at our destination. The bike, panniers, trailer, and both of us weighed a total of 600lbs/272kg on 26x1.5in road slicks. On gravel. Never put a foot or wheel wrong and had no problems whatsoever. I'm working on a single-wheel cargo-box trailer now, but it has been back-burnered to pursue more immediate projects and things like "work".

If you're looking to carve things from aluminum, I'd suggest starting with a drawing and then balsa wood, carving with a sharp knife and then sanding smooth with abrasives. It is basically the same job using aluminum, which is just a harder and more consistent material. One you've done the job in balsa, the experience makes it pretty easy to do the same with aluminum.

All the best,

Dan.

[Danneaux]

Bill,

Here's the Folder seatpost before brazing...this shows the concept before the execution.

I have just made another piece in a similar fashion for the Nomad, and will feature it in my Nomad gallery in a few days when I have it fully finished.

Best,

Dan.

[Danneaux]

Bill (and others who may be interested in making their own little parts),

Some easy first projects are rack and mudguard mounts.

The first photo below shows a headlight mount I made for a front rack that also incorporates a forward mount for an extended (randonneur-style) front mudguard. The clamp includes a captive wire tunnel and strain relief.

The second photo shows a small piece I also made that converts a seatstay bridge from horizontal to vertical mounting for a rear mudguard. Like the first mount, it is milled from billet aluminum and is double threaded to allow the 'guard to be attached with a bolt from below, as Thorn so thoughtfully provides on all their bikes.

Best,

Dan.

[mickeg]

Whatever you build to hold your Carradice saddle bag will likely be the envy of all of us.

[Danneaux]

Many thanks, mickeg. I've put on my thinking cap for this one and the propeller is spinning! 

I should probably update my profile photo after recently joining the Naked Lip Brigade. My moustache of 22 years' duration is now missing. 

All the best,

Dan.

[Danneaux]

Hi All!

I now have my Ortlieb Medium underseat bag mounted nicely to the Nomad's Brooks B.17 saddle rails, thanks to a new adapter I made. It will soon be painted black to match now the photos are done.

See: http://thorncyclesforum.co.uk/index.php?topic=4523.msg86243#msg86243

Best,

Dan.