Who Or What Is Nuts?

 When I became a dedicated cyclist, nearly all bicycle frames were made of steel.  The differences between frames lay, in part, to the kind of steel used.  The best bikes were made of steel that had other elements added to make it stronger, allowing the frame to be made with thinner-walled tubes and therefore lighter in weight.

A few frames were made of other materials commonly used today:  aluminum, carbon fiber and titanium.  But these materials were used mainly in “experimental” frames or bikes built for the “gee whiz” factor.  Since builders and manufacturers didn’t know how to use those materials, the frames either had unsatisfying ride qualities or didn’t last.

Before and since, a few bikes have been made of other materials, sometimes as experiments, other times as jokes.  None, however, can compare to the one I’m about to describe:  one made from nuts.

I’m not talking about the kind you add to your yogurt or cereal.  Rather, I mean the type that thread onto bolts.

So how many nuts did it take to make the frame?  147.

They are joined to make something shaped like a conventional diamond frame.  The head tube and bottom bracket shell, however, are formed from steel tubes, as they are conventional frames.  And the fork ends and dropouts are cut from sheet metal.

After being welded together, the frame was painted Gray and outfitted with mountain bike tires and other gear.  The bike looks tough but I’m not sure I’d want to run it over too many bumps or jumps:  I’d worry about one or more of the spot welds failing.

If nothing else, the bike is a unique conversation piece.  I wonder, though whether it or anyone—or its creator—who’d ride it is more “nuts!”

Accessorize!

I've known a few people who started riding their bikes to school or work when their cars broke down.  Two, I recall, couldn't afford to fix their motor vehicles, and one returned to driving after his car was up and running.   The other stuck with cycling to work but wanted to have as many comforts and conveniences on two wheels as he had with four.

What made me think of him for the first time in decades?  I think I've encountered (online, anyway) his distant cousin:  Robert Sept of Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Mr. Sept's car needed $2000 worth of transmission work. That motivated him to fix up his bicycle.  But he didn't stop with inflating his tires, oiling his chain or adjusting his gears or brakes. His wheels now roll with the weight of a DVD player, cell phone, cup holder, umbrella holder, storage boxes, wallet keeper, LED headlights and tailights--and other things he attached to his frame, handlebars and rear stays.

He seems quite happy with the results.  "It was a relatively cheap investment," he notes, "costs nothing but pedaling to operate [and] gets me from point A to point B." His bike is "noticeable" and "different,' he says  How different?  It "helps keep me out of the sun and weather."  I guess nobody can accuse him of being a fair-weather cyclist.

Now I wonder:  What kind of music does he play?  

Well, Every Framebuilder Has To Start Somewhere...

Some have defined "creativity" as using whatever is at hand to solve a problem.

I guess if you are trying to build a bike and you don't have access to steel, aluminum, titanium or carbon fiber tubing, you have to get creative.

I'd like to know what the creator of that bike will use to make his or her drivetrain and brakes!

A Columbia Folding Bike--From England?

I came of age as a cyclist during the '70's Bike Boom of North America.  Ten-speeds were the bikes of choice.  Of US bike manufacturers, only Schwinn had been producing derailleur-equipped bikes in the years before the boom.  Other manufacturers--such as Columbia, Murray and AMF--began to offer "lightweight" bikes made of flash-welded gaspipe tubing with derailleurs and hand brakes.  To be fair, Schwinn's "lightweights"--with the exceptions of the Paramount and Superior--were also tanks with derailleurs fitted to them.  

AMF Hercules three-speed, made in England

A similar scenario played out during the 1950s and 1960s.  While the number of adult cyclists--and the demand for adult bicycles--were nowhere near as great as that of the 1970s, both increased gradually during those two decades.  And American bike manufacturers were not ready to produce the bike requested by adults:  three speed "English racers".  None--not even Schwinn--had ever made such a bike.

Schwinn responded in the way they would to the demand for ten-speeds in the 1970s:  they fitted their heavy frames with Sturmey-Archer three-speed hubs and called those bikes "lightweights".  On the other hand, other American bike companies did something that would have, in an earlier decade, seemed unthinkable:  they imported bikes and re-badged them.  

So, English three-speed bikes were sold under the brands of AMF (Hercules), Huffy and other American companies.  Strip away their decals and they are indistinguishable from Raleigh, Rudge or other English three-speed bikes of the time.

Columbia was another American manufacturer who imported English three-speeds.  That fact leads me to believe that this Columbia might also have been made by one of those British manufacturers:

The tell-tale signs of a Raleigh folding bike are there:  the brakes, the Sturmey-Archer hub, the cottered crank (at least in the style seen on that bike).  But the frame doesn't look like any of the folding or "shopper" bikes Raleigh was making at the time.  The frames of most such machines had, in essence, a down tube but no top tube.  The reverse is true on the Columbia in the photos. I wonder how that affects the ride.

I watched the bike on eBay a few months ago. No, I didn't buy it!  I admit, I was tempted: It would have been an interesting project.  Apparently, not many of those bikes were made, and from what I could find, Columbia offered them in only one year:  1966.

Fifty years later, no bike like it--or, for that matter, the old English three-speed--is made today.  And, of the bike brands mentioned in this post, only two exist today:  Schwinn and Raleigh.  Both are owned by conglomerates and their bikes are made for them in China or Taiwan.  Which means, of course, that it's unlikely that any bike like the Columbia folder will be made any time soon.

Ex Cathedra, Sine Sella

Anyone who rides a fixed gear regularly will probably say, "Coasting is bad for you!"

It may well be. It seems a near-certainty, though, that sitting--too much of it, at any rate--is bad for you.

That must have been on the mind of whoever designed this bike:

Now comedians aren't the only ones doing "standup"!

Cycling On The Water?

Whenever I ride to the Rockaways and Point Lookout, as I did the other day, I notice new signs of recovery and rebuilding after Superstorm Sandy.

At the foot of the bridge from Broad Channel (on the Queens "mainland"), there used to be bayside restaurant and club on the Rockaway Beach side.  It was totaled during the storm; the McDonald's next door was flushed out during the surge and looted of whatever was left afterward. The other day, I noticed that some sort of waterside cafe or restaurant had opened.  Attached to it is a dock where one can rent Jet Skis.  I wasn't surprised to see a couple skittering across the choppy bay waves; after all, the day was nearly perfect.  

I've never ridden a jet ski, and it's been a while since I've been in any kind of boat that runs on human power.  However, I couldn't help but to wonder whether such aquatic vehicles could be combined with bicycles.   When I was a kid, it seemed that every amusement park had some sort of artificial pond with little pedal boats shaped like ducks or some other creature.  Why not make something like that for grown-ups?, I wondered.

Might the result look like this?

Or this?

Mounted

On my way home today, I passed a mounted police officer.  That got me to wondering how many horseback riders are cyclists, and vice-versa.

Of course, you can't do both at the same time. But I'm sure some have tried.  This may be the closest anyone has come to combining both activities:

From Woot!

A Bicycle Table For Your Coffee Books

Many, if not most, of us own at least one coffee-table book about bicycles or bicycling.  We even open them now and again; perhaps our non-cycling friends peek into them out of curiosity.

But I'll bet none of you has a proper coffee table for such a book.  (OK, I don't, either!):

From Sweety Design