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...
Captain America, a bit of a ring doughnut, if you know what I mean,
Captain America, The Winter Soldier, it's a bit of a ring doughnut, if you know what I mean,
You don't?
OK let me explain, it's a veritable coruscating cornucopia of action, car chases, plane rides, jumping, crashing, car crashing, plane crashing, fighting, kicking, bashing, banging and crashing.
It's a Marvel comic book story but, (and here's the analysis during our drive home), the chap who plays Captain America (Chris Evans) is just not engaging.
I'm told he's pleasing to the eye of the ladies but he doesn't have the charisma (or the well-written amusing lines) of Robert Downey Jr as Iron Man, Chris Emsworth as Thor or even Christian Bale as Batman, they've all got charisma in bucket-loads but as the key figure he is out-acted and outshone whenever he shares the screen with Samuel L Jackson or Scarlett Johansen.
Hence the analogy, it's a well executed, thickly glazed, satisfying sugar rush, a delicious treat with a bit of a vacancy in the middle.
For many years I've enjoyed the occasional long weekend of very fine wines, excellent food, great hospitality and a little over-enthusiastic skiing with my chums, Roy, his astounding and supremely hospitable wife Elaine and my long term colleague and occasional excessive-tequila-buddy Richard. It became a bit of an annual fixture until, in an act of pure selfishness Roy and Elaine sold their lovely house in the Alps and decamped to another lovely house in Vence, about 30k north of the Cote d'Azur. So last year, Richard and I packed our bicycles and descended, our aim, to try and eat and drink them out of house and home (and do a bit of gentle cycling).
The cycling, on roads, (I like cycling in the woods) was a newish thing for me, it seemed (not unlike our skiing) to involve periods of frantic activity, discomfort and pain to move ourselves from one comfortable place to another, usually resulting in beer, wine, food, coffee or all four. I couldn't help noticing though that, unlike skiing, everything seemed to be uphill. A fundamental flaw of the sport to my mind. As we made ready to depart, exhausted but well cared for, someone, I'm not sure who (Richard!) suggested that on our next visit we cycle from France to Italy. Now I was aware that getting from France to Italy could easily involve a journey of a mere metre if planned correctly so I raised no objections, easy to look back in anger but, nevertheless, the Tuxedo Tour was born. If you'd like to see the edited highlights do please feel free to click on the beautiful red handlebars in the photo below.
If you're interested in statistics forget it, it was a ride, from Vence to SanRemo and back of about 180km, over a couple of days, we stayed in SanRemo in an agreeable hotel staffed by disagreeable people. With the notable exception of Chris, (by far the fittest and fleetest of us) the ladies were manning (womanning) the support vehicles, support, hah! we never saw them. It will come as no surprise to my legions of supporters that I was slow, oh so very,very slow but I survived, got up everything, and now have a brace of Corniches and a La Turbie under my substantial belt. It was a delightful four days of friends, fun and frolics only slightly compromised by the dolorous trudging up spectacular mountains in the baking sun by four fine cyclists and me. I think I might take them rock climbing next year...
So, my little lass, now has a boyfriend, He's called Jordan, so, not such a little lass any more I guess, he seems to be a nice lad, a musician, he wrote a song, for the missus and I, and she, my little girl, sang it... and it's here feeling fine (coffee and wine)
Those of you, my loyal readers who've been paying attention, will recall our visit last February to the 'World Capital of Bleak', Iceland.(if you need reminding click this <link>) Those of you least prone to Alzheimer's may recall that although the 'Jeeping across the glacier' and the 'Freezing cold scuba' were great experiences, the primary goal of the trip, to view the Aurora, failed to materialise. Iceland apparently had a great display on one of the nights we were there, unfortunately that coincided with our overnight stop at the top of a mountain, in a hut, in a frozen huddle, in a blizzard, with zero-visibility and a distinct absence of enjoyment from herself.
In fairness, as our wheels touched down on Gatwick's hallowed tarmac her ladyship was immediately on the case and had, almost before our baggage cleared customs, booked us a week in the very,very,very North of Finland, well within the Arctic circle, surrounded by snow, pines, reindeer, Russians, Lapps, wolves and bear, in short, probably the best Aurora spotting place in the known world. She's a star.
Early March and with bags full of thermal underwear, (sorry no photos of that) we fled the chilly Surrey spring for the icy hell that is Helsinki, enjoyed a fairly liquid transfer wait in the exec lounge then bundled onto a flight with some of the most warmly wrapped airline passengers I've ever seen for the 90 minute hop to Ivalo.
We were en-baggaged and taxi-fied then set off for the hour drive to our hotel, the delightful Wilderness lodge in Nellim, a thriving metropolis supporting a population peaking around 150 people on the shores of Lake Inari and a few km from the Barents Sea and the Russian border. We knew this was going to be a great trip when the taxi driver pulled up in the woods and invited us to join him outside the bus for a fag (him) and a first view of the Aurora Borealis (us). We discovered that the lights are rarely are as vivid as photos show, (insert scientific explanation here) but frankly, seeing the aurora before even arriving at the hotel meant we started the holiday with a sense of achievement and a lack of tension, we were on a high which never really went away.
The hotel, the Wilderness lodge, has a central building for feeding and organising, some rooms, more in a couple of separate blocks and for a few lucky early-bookers, like ourselves, cabins in the grounds. We found that we'd scored a self contained cabin with our own sauna, fireplace and (not used except for a cuppa or two) kitchen.
The regular and substantial buffet meals were all that one could ask, they were substantial, filling, very palatable and with plenty of choice. To generations of UK citizens (raised on horse-meat) reindeer is a pleasant low fat alternative. Inevitably (as I fell giggling from my February no-drinking regime) wine and beer were very expensive and it would have been nice to keep Mrs Stuffy out of the souvenir/arctic-clothing-supplement shop. Despite being supplied by the hotel with more than adequate cold weather gear she still managed to buy hats, gloves and more hats, and some gloves, and some chocolate, some biscuits and some gloves, and a scarf, and gloves.
Part of the appeal of this trip for me was the almost relentless activity, it's a full-on very active holiday, snowmobiling one day to visit reindeer herders, fish through the ice, snowshoe around the woods for four hours, cross country skiing and driving huskies across a frozen lake. Every evening after supper we'd garb ourselves in layer after layer after layer and trudge, mush or skidoo our ways to a variety of campsites where we'd invariably be entertained by fabulous aerial displays of incandescent solar flare activity while our Sami guides prepared very necessary fires to thaw our frigid toes and fingers. Sleep, in the brief intervals between mushing and noshing came quickly and deeply.
I had two real highlights, the Huskies were enormous fun, desperate to run and a joy to guide across the lakes but also delightfully flatulent at just the right level for my lovely wife bundled in the sled at the perfect dog-vent height.
Secondly,one evening, Julie chose to be sledded to a camp on the lake rather than snowmobiling with me to the woods. Result! boy-time on the snowmobiles!!!!. This led to an excruciatingly cold but delightful 30 minutes where I found myself all alone on my snowmobile at the very top of a hill in an arctic forest whilst our guide and the rest of the group extricated the remainder of our team of unlucky pilots from the bushes and snow where they'd inadvertently parked the machines at the bottom of the hill.
I enjoyed an exclusive, private, silent, skylit display, it was enchanting and it kept me smiling for days, and occasionally, it still does.
Would I recommend this trip? They've plans to expand the accomodation and I (le misanthrope) enjoy the relative intimacy of small groups and rare silence. Next year is supposed to be awesome as a result of serious solar activity, so go soon, before all of Japan arrives and asks you why you're sitting quietly looking at the sky instead of squealing like a colony of rockhopper penguins on speed and creating more light with your assorted electronics than that appearing magically in the absolutely glorious night sky.
Seriously, go soon...
There's a video here, click on the old fool with the husky, please make allowances, we weren't really bothered about photos and so didn't take the tripod that's needed to take high quality photos of the lights.
I should mention the previously unplumbed depths of depression, the peaks of angst, the highs and lows of emotion occasioned by ones daughter, a mere lass of seventeen summers passing her driving test.
Pride ? Oh yes, pride that she has finally attained the government measured minimal level of ability that enables thousands of frickin' halfwits to venture, every day, onto the Queen's highway in partial and occasional control of a ton or so of killing machine with the sole apparent intention of driving me into either a ditch or terminal apoplexy. So a little pride but also an all-consuming terror that my little girl will now be out there amongst the aforementioned halfwits, so vulnerable without my all-encompassing and paternally powerful protection. Then there's the conflict around independence of transport, if she can get around without reliance on public transport or my chauffeuring services then maybe I'll see more of her? Hang on, wait a minute, what am I thinking, she's a teenager, with a car, obviously she'll be ferrying her chums from gig to movie to bar to club to beach to ???? And I'll never see her again, until she runs out of petrol money, obviously. It's tough being a dad.
Chicken update, an inspirational tale of remorse, retrenchment and rebirth
Sadly our resident vixen chose to celebrate the Jubilee with a daring daytime raid on the chicken run. Within an hour she'd dug into the run, captured and executed our four surviving fowl and carted the corpses off to feed her den of mewling cubs. I was, it's fair to say, pretty grumpy, particularly as I'd spent a week of post prandial evenings lurking around in the rain, full of wine and shotgun primed, ready to dissuade with extreme prejudice the malicious vulpine.
It wasn't to be, the moment the sun came out and we headed off to the pub to toast Good Queen Liz, she (the fox, not the royal) swooped like a swoopy thing and carried off the girls.
So, what to do, well, with an empty run for the first time I took the opportunity to execute a through disinfection and mouse frightening regime, chuck a load of grass seed down, give the land a month of recovery and set about a fox-proofing programme. Step one was trenching, digging a foot-and-a-half-deep,foot-wide trench around the perimeter of the pen, that's about 50 metres of ditch, and the wooded location makes it impractical to get a digger in so that was a very painful afternoon with shovel and spade for myself and our chum Nigel. To be honest Nigel's obsessive attention to detail delivered a very precise trench with vertical sides and neatly finished edges, my half looked considerably less polished but was dug and filled with scalpings before Nigel had finished stage 1 of his earthworm re-settlement programme. In the spirit of teamwork I sat and drank beer until he'd caught up.
Scalpings are golf-ball-sized lumps of flint and granite, delivered to me as 1 cubic meter bags (4 of them) and then distributed to the trench, with shovel and wheelbarrow, then thumped with a cast-iron weight to compact and compress them. Sadly Nigel never recovered from the emotional trauma of my cavalier approach to ditch digging so this was a solo exercise. Which took about a week.... Well I do have real work to do as well.
Final stage was to lay chicken wire stapled to the base of the fence stretching over the trench and about 1/2 a metre into the surrounding countryside. Back breaking work stapling the stuff and then pegging the edges with 100 aluminium tent pegs around the edges. There's an Ebay camping shop that must think I'm really careless pegging out my tent.
So after a month of trauma, travail, trial and trench I set off to my chicken dealer in leafy Leatherhead. Chicken dealers work like crack cocaine vendors, luring you in but knowing once you're hooked you'll keep coming back, each time, a little poorer, a little more realistic, a bit more resigned to the inevitable, a little better prepared, better informed and sharing new anecdotes about bloody foxes.
Here they are then, three new girls at the Barn, I try maintain my pragmatic objectivity and insist on calling them the grey one, the red one and the white one but even so they're already showing their own characters and attitudes. We've had eggs from the white for a week and the first from the grey yesterday, still half-size eggs but it's a good sign, despite a new life which thus far, (it's been a great summer hasn't it?) has been pretty much completely underwater they do seem to be settling in.
And fingers crossed, no cunning incursions from Fox force five (pulp fiction reference for the tarantino fans amongst you).
... an aimless wander through the dusty and moth-eaten corridors of a once beautiful mind, alternating between grumpy optimism and cheerful misanthropy...
Ramblings from the dusty and neglected corridors of a once beautiful mind, alternating 'tween cheerful misanthropy and grumpy optimism, enjoy, or enjoy not, as you wish ...
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.
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.
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 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.
