Monday, February 23, 2015

A very organic approach to engineering, bamboo bicycles...

The back story, my Christmas present this year (from the current wife) was a two-day workshop building a bicycle, from bamboo! A pretty niche idea but I'd enjoyed making my fixie (click here for that tale) so much last year that Mrs Stuffy felt that I'd like this. 


Bikes made from wood? I admit that it took me by surprise but apparently bamboo is a very strong and light material and anyone who has seen it used as death-defying scaffolding in the far East knows how much load, stress and movement it can bear. The company, www.bamboobicycleclub.org, sell kits (for home assembly) and also coached sessions in their studios in increasingly trendy Hackney Wick. 

So I researched (well I googled 'bamboo bikes') various possible bikes and despite the obvious challenges, and the relatively small number of examples I  decided to build a mountain bike, no real logic other than the amount of MTB bits I had lying around and a fortuitous, for them, marketing email from Chain reaction cycles offering a half price groupset. For the uninitiated that's the brakes, gears, pedals, cranks and chain, all designed to work together. A few late night drunken internet shopping sessions later and I had a bulging box of bits, saddle, handlebars, forks, wheels and tyres. 

The workshop itself simply delivers (hopefully) the frame, 7 pieces of bamboo, custom designed to fit my bodily dimensions (normally a secret between myself and my tailor). These bamboo bits are bonded together with delightfully gloopy mix of hemp and epoxy resin to make a structurally sound bike frame capable (allegedly) of taking my not inconsiderable weight crashing down a hillside. Making it pretty and adding all the expensive metal and plastic to turn it from bits of wood into a rideable bike is phase two of the project.


Day 1

Thus it was that I arose at silly o'clock and schlepped on a Saturday morn to a chilly space filled with bamboo bikes, bamboo bike frames in various stages of construction, there I found two couples (dad&son and sister&brother) of similarly slightly bemused punters and James, our coach, instructor and bamboo evangelist for the weekend.

James had prepared aluminium jigs to hold the bamboo elements in the right place based on our physical dimensions and the type of bike we'd each selected. The other participants had opted for simpler challenges, road bikes, and James cheered me up by congratulating them on their wisdom in not taking on the technical challenges that I'd accepted. So far, so bloody typical,sorry, so good.





We picked out various lengths of bamboo, learning about fibre lengths, nodes, strengths and weakness and using various saws, knives, drills and jigs I then chopped pieces out of my fingers, thumbs and forearms until we had something that looked a bit like the pre-printed scale drawings we were supposed to be working toward. 

Maybe it's James' laid back approach, maybe my choice of bike but it turned out to be a far more flexible and organic process than a classic engineering one, solving challenges and redesigning bits of the frame as the practicalities caused a series of minor compromises. 




The others rushed on, unhindered by the need to consider fat tyres and disc brakes but by the end of day one we'd all assembled our frames, tacked together with glue, tape and in my case wishful thinking. Off home to shower off a bucketful of sawdust, stickiness and sweat, a sustaining supper and a good nights sleep.


Day 2
and a beautiful sunrise as I headed into London





So,here I am in sunny, chilly Hackney just a stones throw from the Olympic Velodrome, on day two of the bamboo bicycle workshop, the day which I like to think of as Gloopy Sunday. 

The areas where the lengths of frame join are to be held together and reinforced by strips of hemp cloth saturated with epoxy resin, the basis of fibreglass. This layering and wrapping is similar to the process of making bikes and cars from carbon fibre, similar I think in the same way that TeamBreakfastBike working up an appetite on a Saturday morning is like Team Sky attacking the Tour de France.  

The glooping, wrapping, slopping, sliding, slicing and taping was pretty much full-on all morning, but by late lunchtime we'd jointed all of our frames. We made a cursory attempt to lessen the amount of gum on clothes and skin and then strolled into the Arctic winds to a local Hipster hangout the Crate Brewery for some excellent pizza and engaging chat whilst the miracle of exothermic chemistry turned our squidgy matting into rock hard lumps of plastic and cloth ready to be sanded, smoothed, filled, sanded, filled, sanded, smoothed, polished, painted and lacquered.

The BambooBeast (as I've provisionally named it) is now back in my workshop, ready for the next phase...

I really enjoyed the two days with James and the team and I'm looking forward to the next week or two of organic engineering... 

Watch this space...

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posted by Stuffy @ 3:31 pm 1 comments

Tuesday, July 15, 2014

Self inflicted pain, lots of it

Some weeks ago I was out cycling with a few chums, I say cycling, we were sitting in a cafe enjoying, in my case, Eggs Benedict, the ideal mid-ride snack for the healthy cyclist.


As I moved to the waffles, pancakes and maple syrup someone suggested that "we should do a sportive".

For those of you sensible enough to keep away from the phenomenon which is middle-aged-man-cycling a sportive is, not a race, but an organised cycle event, a couple of thousand folk following signed and marshalled routes, with feed stations, medical and mechanical support staff, and a T-shirt and medal if you survive.

We, (Team BreakfastBikeBuddies) normally cycle 30-40 road miles on a Saturday morning, so the prospect of cycling between  70 and 125 miles seemed like a bit of challenge but buzzing from the fine breakfast and the 'yeah let's do it' noises from the rest of the group I came home and immediately signed up to do an 85 mile ride, the Wiggle Magnificat.

A couple of interesting things happened then, pretty much everybody else seemed to have forgotten a prior appointment, organised holidays or family commitments which rendered them unable to turn out. I however, having impulsively shelled out my £30 entry fee was going to get my money's worth.

Two alone from Team BreakfastBikingBuddies stayed true, Winston, who chose to take on the 125 mile circuit and Anna who said she'd accompany me on the 85 miler.

The route started at Newbury racecourse and took a big loop through Ball Hill up Combe Hill, (couple of clues there) then down to Andover around and below Winchester and eventually back to Newbury via Kingsclere and Brimpton. As it happens I know most of those roads but driving around them gives a very different perception of the up and downs from cycling the same tracks.

At around 7:30 Anna and I set off, I'm a slow starter and it takes me 30 minutes or so to get warmed and loosened up, now, she has many fine qualities Anna but she's not blessed with patience, and it took her about a mile to suggest that I'd probably be OK if she buggered off.

I'm a wise old bird and I assured her she should sprint off and go at her own pace. She did so and it was a good three or maybe four minutes before I came upon her by the side of the road swearing like a trooper and taking off the punctured wheel she'd managed to acquire in remarkably short order.


Being a gentleman I sailed past giggling. I didn't really, I stopped and helped her fix the tyre, well aware that in an 6-7 hour slog, five minutes fixing a tyre was going to make minimal difference to my snail-like performance.

Onward we rode, taking it in turns to share the lead and as we warmed up and started to get comfortable we even overtook some people, obviously the instant I got to a hill and slowed to my traditional "turtle climbing a tree" pace all those people overtook me again but my descending skills (excessive weight and hysterical screaming) swung the balance back my way on the downhills and the ride, although arduous continued through some lovely countryside, up hill and down dale, (mostly up I reckon).


I've cycled further than this in France (see the Tuxedo Tour) but this is the longest ride I've done without halfway beer and hourly coffee, still, despite that sacrifice I can't pretend that I didn't have fun.

We enjoyed another mechanical failure, (Anna briefly lost her chain, (and temper)) but it was a mostly enjoyable excursion and I'm sure my friends will all really wish they hadn't concocted lame excuses to avoid turning out.

Kudos to Winston on his time over a hell of a long day and very best wishes to Anna who sailed over the finish line with me and is really looking forward to doing the Ride-London 100- miler in August.


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They do say that a man should know his limits, based on this 85 mile ride I reckon mine kick in at about 84 miles.

Next challenge, "Team Tuxedo do Corsica" in September, I'll keep you posted.



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posted by Stuffy @ 3:00 pm 1 comments

Friday, November 11, 2011

It's Health and Safety gone mad I tell you ...

It's Health and Safety gone mad I tell you ...


I'd always believed that BT had a very low opinion of the general public, ie:  customers

I was out plugging through the mud on the mountain bike on Saturday when I came upon a little area of greenery, close to a tiny private road but remote from anything one might conceivably consider to be foot traffic, there was a BT van parked nearby, complete with hard-working engineers enjoying a cuppa after, presumably,digging a hole and complying with all the relevant health and safety regulations. I was so impressed by what I saw that I stopped and took a photo...





One can't help wondering, in these circumstances what evil befalls those who choose to walk the path less travelled ...



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posted by Stuffy @ 11:40 am 0 comments