Building a new bike part 13

Previous Set of Handlebars

Hi

As discussed in the previous blog entry, work on the bike is not quite done.  Although everything now works fine, I am tweeking and modifying and improving some things.  Handlebars are on the list and I'm motivated to do them this weekend.

So why change the handlebars?   Well there are 4 things I thought of:
* Make the bars lighter
* Make the bars more aerodymamic by running brake and control cables down the tubes.
* Have the bars split to simplify carrying the bike inside a car or on a car roof.
* Remove the need for cable ties on the handlebars.  See here for the way the bike was before.  

The next few photos show the result.  The materials I needed were 1" x 1.2mm wall cro moly tube, 7/8" thin wall steel tent pole, 7/8" steel tube and lock mechanism from kid's scooter handlebars. The way these handlebars are set up, the split in the bars is essential if the bars are to be removed from the bike at all as the zinc plated tentpoles would normally make the bars captive.  The build process could be automated by having the cro-moly tube laser cut.  Here are the photos, any questions please ask!

Regards

Steve Nurse