While the responsibility to my webular presence on this corner of the internet has been flagging since I began, it isn’t to say that lots of exciting things haven’t been happening. The workshop is essentially finished, I’m just one dump run away from having it cleared out and ready for fire. PTBOrides.com has been launched [...]

It’s been a while. After the Newfoundland trip mentioned in the last post, I’ve spent the last number of weeks adjusting to major changes in my life. I left my job as a sustainable transportation “ambassador” and took up the director position at B!KE, the community bike shop I’ve been volunteering slavishly and lovingly at [...]

First, a couple weeks back I did the 90k bike leg of a half ironman triathlon relay. I did the race on my trusty handbuilt steed and learned that being in pretty good shape + constant utilitarian bike riding + steel sport touring bike does not equal competitive athelete ! I was dusted like I [...]

The workshop grows tantalizingly closer. Through the heroic help and guidance of two supremely awesome people (my partner Sarah and our builder friend/awesome gal Jen), we successfully made a concrete rectangle! Here was our process: When we last left off, there was half a hole in the ground. I did get around to finishing that! [...]

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Workshop Stud walls: built Pad surface: prepared, filled, tamped and levelled. Sarah made the world’s heaviest DIY tamper by sinking a mop handle into a plastic bucket filled with premix concrete. The end result creates a small sonic boom every time you hit the ground with it. Concrete: pouring on Wednesday with superstar strawbale builder [...]

Progress report! Workshop The grade is prepped for an 8 x 14 slab. We dug it extra deep to bury all the field stones and random scraps that had accumulated in a pile over the years. Next, I ordered one cubic yard of “A” gravel (small gravel with sand) delivered to the house. Since it’s [...]

So. Thanks to the heroic efforts of two good friends, I got the table. Picked up from the perfect chaos of George Vettor’s shop in Guelph. He got it from Marinoni (it was Marinoni’s first table, apparently) and used it to build the odd frame on over the past few decades. Included: bottom bracket post [...]

There’s the romanticism of handicraft, and there’s reality. Like most things, cash underscores the options available. Framebuilding is not accomplished merely through grizzled artistry and an anvil. It’s damned expensive, time consuming and finicky work. There’s the first few builds – the learning process, the portfolio boosters. This is where I’m at. At a cost [...]