News and Events

Keep up to date with the latest news and events of Modular Bikes.

Sunday, June 29, 2014

Almost on the road!

During Last Week's Be Spon.
Melburn Roobaix in progress

Melburn Roobaix

Today's Rained out B-Spon....

With Robert Cook and Graham In Attendance

Recycling bins which are the source of most of our Video Entertainment.  Successive layers of discarded VHS tapes are placed on top of each other like minerals in some Paleolithic swamp.  If you are lucky you arrive at a time when an interesting layer is exposed.  Last night I found a few Spike Milligan videos....

Some of my dilemma......  3 working bikes and another one on the way.  1 has to be sold for the whole lot to be under shelter and not starting to overtake the spare room.

And this is the one.....

That is almost finished. It has a rear monostay.

Assembly and testing before painting.....

A lock mechanism for the top fork bearing housing.

Last week, sunshine and plenty of time for a chat with the neighbours including the ever style conscious Edith, 102 years old from 2 doors down.

On the trike, I cropped off part of the v-brake assembly to make the brakes not bottom out.
Last weeks Be Spon
Hi

Haven't updated thinks for a while, here is a selection of photos from the last few weeks.

In Melbourne in May, we had day after day of beautiful mild sunshiny weather, but now Winter is well and truly upon us.  Tuesday had the wildest weather we'd had all year, and a high tide in Port Phillip Bay coincided with a big blow from the south and the resulting high water flooded parts of the city.  Its been raining or windy or both just about all the time since, and it takes a bit of willpower to ride to work.

So today was a bit cold, windy and threatening rain, but I headed off for a B-Spon ride anyway.  Near the Hawthorn Bike Track, a very large crowd of cyclists had gathered and it was the start of the Melburn Roobaix .  I plugged on past them to East Malvern Station, where a few hardy souls had gathered anticipating slightly dryer weather.  Had a chat to Robert Cook and Graham Signiorini, checked my Myki card worked and then got on a train to (call me a wuss if you like) avoid riding in the rain.  I lucked on to a bit of dry weather when I got off the train at Richmond, and rode home from there.  Some of the Roobaix riders had spread out from Hawthorn and I saw them riding through Clifton Hill on the way home.  I followed some of them and took a few photos.  Last years equivalent video is here.

On the bike building and riding front I am enjoying riding my iLean Trike on the weekends.  It is more stable than the other bikes I ride and its tempting to ride no hands.  A lot. And I do!

With that as my funnest bike, and finishing another one which I'm yet to commission,  I am slightly overloaded with bikes, so the bike described here and here and here and here is for sale.  No official ads up yet but asking about $1900.  It has quite a few expensive bits, and there is not another one like it on the planet that I know of. Phone (03)94818290.

The bike I'm finishing has a hollow main beam and a monostay for the back wheel.  Still cobbling together bits for it but the frame is done.  Haven't built a seat yet but can borrow one from another bike.

Ok, thats it.  Hopefully on the road on the Monostay bike by next post.

Bye

Steve Nurse

Sunday, June 1, 2014

Making a Front Wheel Drive Derailleur

1. Start with a steel frame bike and remove the back wheel, deraileur and associated cables.  Hacksaw out the rear right hand side dropout  / derailer hanger as shown.  (This frame has a built in deraileur hanger)

2. Shape the hanger part of the frame you have just liberated.  It needs to be brazed on or attached to the bike fork as shown in photo 4.

3.  Slip steel tubes over the legs of the bike fork.  Stand on one of them and pull up on the other one to spread the legs of the fork to accommodate the wider (quick release) drive wheel.   The completed assembly is shown in photo 5.  It may take a few goes to get this right.
4.  Find a bolt (and matching nut) with a diameter the same as the wheel bolt.  Use it to attach the deraileur hanger to the fork.  Attach the deraileur to the hanger, it should point forwards on the right hand side of the fork and be in a position to work on the bike!  This position puts the deraileur in its "standard position" relative to the wheel centre.  Once it is attached in this way, the deraileur can be removed and then the hanger can be attached (brazed, welded or bolted) to the fork dropout.
5.  This shows the quick release wheel in place.  (In this case no cluster is fitted) Note that the bolt end can't protrude past the existing fork dropout, otherwise it will hit the derailleur hanger.  This set of parts has not gone into a bike yet.
6.  But here is one that has!  The chain, quick release skewer and gear change cable are all present.  Note that the quick release skewer must be completely removed to take away the wheel.  (This is a deraileur with a built-in hanger.  Installation steps are slightly different for this type)
7.  Vehicle with derailleur fitted, photo 6 is a detail of the deraileur of this machine.

Hi

This shows the sort of work I do to adapt a steel front bike fork and deraileur hanger for use on a front wheel drive bike.  I've never put this down in writing before.  Hope you can make some use of it.  Regards

Steve Nurse

Monoblade fork bike progress

Kids! You Just can't stop them.


Slow but steady progress on the new....

Monoblade Fork Bike reveals the purpose of the laser cut plate shown in this post.

Family Gathering at our House.
Hi

Its been a fairly quiet weekend here in Clifton Hill.  Fine yesterday (and typical of our mild Autumn ) and rainy most of today (1st day of Winter), and I spent a bit of time on a bike build.  Quite a bit of detailed work goes into making the parts, most of which are not ready made for the job but come from steel tube, large washers, bronze bush and steel rod from the shed.  Anyway hopefully something recognizable as a bike is starting to emerge.  This afternoon, Mum, Dad, my son Ewan and Christine's brothers and their families all came over for afternoon tea.  My nephew was quite keen on our rickshaw and did a few laps of the street.

Regards

Steve Nurse