Branding. That word used to describe what ranchers did to identify their cattle. These days, the word has been adopted by the marketing guys to describe an intense competition to get their company name in front of the consuming public. Bicycle manufacturers, with a long tradition of including names and logos on frames, have embraced this new branding ethic in a big way. Walk around most modern bikes and you'll be able to read the company name from almost any angle. Does a bike frame really need to have 8 to 10 decals that all display the same word?
My own sense of style says that the frame's metalwork and paint should define the look, and that look should be an understated elegance. I have no desire (or need) to plaster my advertising on your bike.
All creative works, bicycle frames included, deserve to be signed by the artist. To that end, my frames carry a single, small copy of my builder's "signature" on the top tube. In the full-frame photos on this site, you'll have to look hard to spot this small graphic.
My frames are painted by Keith Anderson, whom I consider to be a valued partner in this enterprise. Keith places his own artist's signature in an out of the way location on the left chainstay.
From the beginning, I have adhered to this understated styling, not worrying if it might turn off potential customers. Recently, to my delight, I am being contacted by customers specifically because of this styling. They've never met me, and likely don't know anybody who owns one of my frames, but they've been searching for a builder who will hold off on the decals. Through the power of the internet, they've found one!
When you find a truly great component, you want to keep using it forever. Sometimes, however, that requires a little creativity.
When Randy and I started discussing what he wanted in a new frameset, he was definite about wanting to modify a rare set of DiaCompe 700 centerpull brakes to mount via braze-on bosses. The photo below shows this brake model as it was originally produced, with the beautifully designed caliper arms mounted using a universal-fit yoke and center bolt.
In contrast to Mafac centerpulls which are readily convertable to braze-on bosses, the center-mount DiaCompe 700 uses a spring shape which doesn't allow the original spring to anchor to the boss as it should. In addition, the dimensions of the DiaCompe's pivot are sufficiently different from current brake standards that this brake doesn't mate with stock bosses. The solution was to fabricate a set of hand-wound stainless steel springs. After several prototypes, I arrived at the spring profile shown in the photo below.
This photo also shows the custom braze-on bosses that I made for this project. The dimensions on these bosses are optimized to mate with the DiaCompe 700 brakes' original pivot bushings. And, since bosses and springs were designed in concert, the single spring anchor hole is all that's needed.
The photo below shows the DiaCompe 700 brake arms mounted to the braze-on bosses. Those are 50mm fenders mounted with 13mm of clearance over 35mm Pasela tires. These brakes are both beautiful and well designed, and I'm happy to give them a second life on this new All-Road frameset that I know Randy is going to ride hard.
Update ... After updating these brakes with modern Kool Stop pads, pulley-style hangers and shorter straddle cables, Randy reports "I've never ridden with brakes that stop so well and modulate so nicely. All that work was well worth it."
I've been building interesting custom racks, and it's time to highlight a few. In a world where sturdy aftermarket racks are readily available, having a custom rack built for your bike might be viewed as something of an indulgence. When you get down into the details, however, you'll find that a custom rack is a much different beast. Being designed to mate exactly with your frame's mounting points, a custom rack eliminates the clutter of bolt-on adjustable struts found on "universal fit" racks. Clean looks, lower weight and fewer fasteners to possibly come loose. Among my customers, however, the compelling reason for a custom rack seems to be the availability of an infinite variety of dimensions and configurations, and the ability to have all of the "bells and whistles" (light mounts, wire guides, fender braces, etc.) that your heart desires. When designed in concert with a new frame/fork, a custom rack can take advantage of braze-on mounting points which otherwise would not have been designed into the frame/fork
The photo above is of a 3-piece modular rack system, with a small fixed top rack and two detachable lowrider pannier frames. This rack system was designed to go with the low-trail fork in the photo, and the pannier frames attach quickly using three M5 bolts each. The top rack is a little wider than common, which allows the crown struts to fly around the new V-O Grand Cru standard reach dual pivot caliper brake, and provides better triangulation to brace the detachable frames' mast. The customer wanted to be able to attach/detach the pannier frames without disturbing the attachment of the top rack, hence the second mid-fork mounting point. Additional views and details may be found in a photo set on my Flickr gallery.
Commercial rear racks typically are dimensioned for the large-footprint trunk bags that all bag vendors seem to make. Gilles Berthoud also makes a beautiful scaled-down trunk bag that's sized just right for your jacket and lunch, but which looks silly when perched atop a full sized rack. The photo above shows a small-format custom rack that was designed specifically for this little Berthoud bag. The rack also has a braze-on for attaching the quick-release bracket for the LED taillight.
And, finally, here's a simple rack designed for a small touring bike. On small frames like this, the shallow angle of the seatstay positions the rack braze-on quite far forward of the rear axle. You still have to position the panniers back far enough to avoid heel strike, and "universal fit" racks end up with very long adjustable struts/straps to span the gap. On this custom rack, the long reach to the seatstay is still present, but the span now is integrated into the rack's basic structure. With a comparable capability, this steel rack weighs about 2/3 of the aluminum rack (plus steel fittings!) that it replaced. And it looks so much nicer, too.
All of my custom racks are fillet brazed using thin-wall, aircraft grade 4130 CrMo steel tube.
ROSWELL, NM (AP) Following a visit to one of the nation's leading scientific institutions to review the state of the art in Space Age materials, Tom Matchak Cycles is pleased to announce a new line of high-end framesets fabricated using tinfoil and paper maché.
Chris has been dreaming of a custom frame since the 80’s, when he fell for the classic steel frames of that era. His body type (long legs/short torso) doesn’t work well with production frames, and he told a familiar story of riding for “too many years on stuff that didn’t fit right”. It finally was time, he said, to obtain a made-to-measure frame, with a classic sport touring geometry.
Chris is tall, so working out a suitable geometry was pretty straightforward, without the interference issues that can crop up with short-torso’d short people. Built using the Columbus Spirit for Lugs (SFL) tube set, the resulting 62cm frame incorporates the geometry and features to support the style of recreational riding and light touring that Chris envisions. The frame and fork are dimensioned for Tektro R538 standard (47-57mm) reach caliper brakes at full-slot, and there is a full compliment of fender and rack mounts.
Beyond form and function, the dream included a vision of the styling and paint scheme. After I set out lug samples on the workbench, Chris selected the Nuovo Richie set. For paint, he selected a beautiful Cherry Red pearl for the base, with contrasts in a metallic Black Cherry. In these photos, the contrasts appear as black, but, in real life, bright sunlight turns on the imbedded sparkly bits and really brings out the dark cherry translucence. The result is a classic look, with a contemporary twist.
My favorite part of building frames and forks is getting to see the finished products in use. Sometimes I get to see my work rolling down the road next to me, but more often I just get to see photos. I’ve been receiving photos from distant customers of their installed Frame-Neutral Replacement Forks, so I thought that I would share a few.
These customers share a common story. They all had nicely built, good fitting bikes, outfitted with carefully selected components. They all had tried carrying small-to-moderate loads in a front bag, and were unhappy with the resulting handling of the high-trail steering geometry. Each wanted to obtain a low-trail replacement fork, either as a long term fix, or as an experiment prior to committing to a full new frameset.Randy rides his Rambouillet (shown below) on all surfaces with 700Cx30 tires. The FNRF was designed with a 62mm offset, yielding about 40mm of trail. This fork has lighting wire guides up the right blade, and separate under-crown mounting points for the fender and the VO randonneur front rack. Matching the original orange pearl paint finish would have been a bit pricey, so this fork was painted in the cream color used for Rivendell’s contrasting head tubes. As the lovely young Maia shows us, the installation was completed with a big front bag, and a nice centerpull brake to handle the new 67mm reach.
Bill recently bought the new Surly Traveler (below), which is the well known Cross Check frame with S&S couplers. He also owns a Kogswell P/R with a 40mm trail fork. While he generally liked the Surly, he found that he really preferred the way that the P/R handled with a front load. Bill decided to modify the Surly with a FNRF with 68mm of offset, which yields about 41mm of trail with his favorite 700Cx33 tires. He also requested an under-crown fender mount, and special through-hole bosses on the fork blades for the Tubus Duo lowrider rack. Bill selected a color from the DuPont paint chip book, and reports a “very close to perfect” color match. The fork carries a Nitto M12 front rack, and Jitensha medium bag.
Orin also rides a Rambouillet, as a randonneur and urban commuter, and wants to carry things in a front bag. His FNRF (shown below) was built with 62mm of offset, yielding about 40mm of trail. He also requested a full set of rack/fender mounts, generator hub up-and-over wire guides, a dedicated light boss low on the left blade, and a switch to a threadless steerer. With the photo, he noted that this light wire previously had been wound tightly around a support, and needs to relax to look neater in the fork’s guides. Although the fork was built to use the VO randonneur front rack, Orin later decided to design and fabricate his own stainless steel rack. This bike already was using a front Tektro R556 long reach (55-73mm) caliper brake, which was able to handle the longer reach on the new fork. 
Several years ago, Shimano’s introduction of a dual-pivot standard reach (47-57mm) brake was well received as a tidy solution for wide(er) tires and lots of clearance. In practice, however, there were some small, but nagging, deficiencies. The quick release didn’t pass tires wider than about 28mm, and the maximum usable brake reach was really about 55mm.
Now comes the Tektro R538 caliper (above), which is a near-perfect implementation of this brake format. The novel long-throw quick release design is wonderful. When adjusted to work with a 19mm wide Mavic Open Pro rim, this release opens up the pads to a generous 33mm of wheel removal clearance. Wider rims yield an even wider opening. This makes a world of difference for users of Shimano brake levers. Couple the R538 caliper with a Campy-style release in the brake levers, and you’ll have clearance to remove any tire that you’d reasonably run underneath this brake.
As a frame builder, I’m excited about the fact that the R538 actually reaches to a full 57mm. I know this may sound a bit silly, but those extra 2mm are meaningful. On a carefully handcrafted frameset intended for standard-reach calipers, I’ll design to use every last millimeter of functional brake reach, and let the owner benefit from the maximum clearance. The photo above shows the R538 over a 700C x 32 Pasela.
I’ve used the Tektro R538 calipers on three bikes recently, and I find that the orbital washers behind the cartridge-style shoes make pad alignment a cinch. The brake’s high quality, graceful styling and lustrous finish compliment a beautiful frame. It’s now my "standard" for standard-reach calipers.
The frame pictured with the brake is Maggie’s new low-trail All-Rounder, built mostly with light weight Dedacciai Zero tubing. The lugs are Nuovo Richie, which are cast with the styling seen below. Once again, color was personal and important, and Maggie selected a gorgeous Medium Iris pearl.
My frames are painted by Keith Anderson, whom I consider to be a valued partner in this enterprise. Keith places his own artist's signature in an out of the way location on the left chainstay.
From the beginning, I have adhered to this understated styling, not worrying if it might turn off potential customers. Recently, to my delight, I am being contacted by customers specifically because of this styling. They've never met me, and likely don't know anybody who owns one of my frames, but they've been searching for a builder who will hold off on the decals. Through the power of the internet, they've found one!
