New bike day – just need to build it….

Love it! Such a good job.

Cheers, Steve

Looks great!

Just get a couple of chain tugs OP and keep those tyres, suits the bike.

Thanks.

Some Chain tugs are in the post as are some 28c tyres (I was hoping they’d arrive today so I could get out on a proper ride). I’ll keep the 35c’s for when the new fork arrives.

First 25mile shake down complete!

And 8months without a road bike has made me massively unfit! Really should get out more.

I went for a quick loop Birdlip > Painswick > Stroud and back again. This gave me the chance to stick in a bit of single track (Cranham Woods), and a bit of gravel through Painswick Beacon.

It was a bit strange on the first few miles as the bars put you on the drops most of the time. My initial thoughts are that bamboo makes a great endurance / gravel frame material – very little Road buzz. However predictably it’s not the best sprinter – but this could be improved with a different chainstay yolk design and wrap as well as component choice.

Ill reserved judgment on the single track until I have 35c tyres on but initially on hard pack stuff it’s great, on damp roots and rocks not so much, 28c slicks at the moment.

When I got to Painswick Beacon I took the opportunity to go up and over the gravel path. There’s a golf course next to the beacon and 300yards up the road I had a blow out on the rear – a ‘shotgun like’ BANG just as some one was teeing off!!

Took a little longer to change than normal due to the set up and had to take it easy on the grass afterwards.

A little break and I took the road down to Stroud. I didn’t want to push it on the decent as the roads aren’t great, but it’s quite a solid bike.

On the road from Stroud it really showed how little buzz gets transferred through the bamboo. The thumb shifter was good too – I can change gear without move my hand position using the heal of the palm of my hand.

Can someone stick a link to this thread in the comments section of the story on the home page?
Thanks

Cx mode initiated.

Still having issues with hard braking dragging the rear wheel in to the stays..

Right – properly sorted now. Swapped the rear qr with a Halo Hex Lock (picked from Slam69 Yesterday) and it’s sorted.

Quick 10mile blast this morning with a bit through Cranham Woods.

Right it’s been four months so I thought I’d do a quick update….

Not been out on the bike as much as I’d like as I’ve been on the fat bike a fair bit this year and not had a big Road trip planned. It’s only done around 100miles or so as a result.

It’s by far the most comfortable Road bike I’ve ever swung a leg over – although I’ve not tried that many. The bamboo soaks up vibration like no other material, but this inerrant ‘twangyness’ has a down side – I’ve settled on 30c cyclo-cross tyres and even with these when stamping on the pedals I can get the tyre to rub the chainstay. But it’s rare that I need to ‘put the power down’ on this bike, as I’m using it as a gentle excuse for a Road ride mixed with the occasional gravel/bridal way link.

Now for the big issue, if I lock the rear wheel with the back disc brake the forces twist the wheel in the horizontal dropouts. This sometimes jambs the wheel against the non drive side chain stay. I’ve used Halo Hex Lock qr’s to rectify this and some chain tensioners but it still happens every now and again.

I do have plans for a mk2 still, but a bit of a life style change this month means it’ll have to wait for a while.