So turned the big Four Zero and my wife has surprised me with a generous offer of a hand built steel frame.

I have to be truthful, I’m very much in two minds.

I’m absolutely chuffed with her thoughtful idea and it’s a really very pleasant surprise…but….I’m struggling to justify the fact that I would want a custom steel frame.

I have a cross bike which fits me just right and I’m happy with.

I have a full bouncer which again fits just right and does exactly what I need.

I’m very much a normal size so the off the peg works for me.

I have a hard tail which I use during the winter and shorter local rides, which to be fair, fits just fine, but could do with some new bits.

So I’m thinking perhaps having a hard tail 650b made up….but again, I don’t have any real design wishes other than a slack head angle that can take some long travel forks.

Right then STW massive, edjumicate me and give me some food for thought please.

Give Tom a ring at

http://www.sturdycycles.co.uk/

Nice young bloke, just starting out. He used to be full time bike mechanic at one of our LBS. He will be happy to talk to you and give you some ideas.

Interested how this pans out as I have been starting to lust after a cross/do-anything bike from Saffron or maybe Field….but at the same time keep comparing the cost to more mainstream stuff which then seems more sensible.

Clearly you are missing a nice custom steel road bike.

Shand? Custom quality in stock sizes and refined designs, if a true custom isn’t needed. Great all rounders that you could have small mods made to, or simply a personal colour. The finish is stunning.

I’d the same problem, for years I’d said I’d get something custom for my 40th but realised that I changed bikes so often as I’m always looking for the next magic bullet, that something bespoke might end up at the back of the cupboard in no time. In the end I went on a biking holiday instead and I reckon that the memories from that trip will stay with me a lot longer than I would have kept a bike.

Custom was included in the price with my Independent Fabrication, but similarly to you, I’m a very normal medium. So I just have their stock 17″ geometry.
Still a very special bike though. and I made up for it a bit with custom paint. I’ve loved mine.

I reckon I will get one (maybe for my 40th!) but only because I commute so do a lot of miles on my CX bike plus I reckon I could replace that and my road bike with a really nice custom 953 bike! However if I thought I wouldn’t get a lot of use out of it I wouldn’t bother. YoKaisers idea ^^^ of an awesome biking holiday with the money sounds pretty good.

I’m a sucker for a traditional steel road bike. However, if you don’t have a burning desire for a certain bike it might be a waste of money.

There are plenty of off-the-shelf frames which will be great to ride.

I suspect that some custom steel frames might not be particularly great to ride – you’re often at the mercy of a builder’s idea of a good bike.

Also, some builders could be a nightmare to deal with – if you choose unwisely there’s a possibility you wouldn’t get your hands on the frame until your 50th!

Local might be better in that the builder can measure you, and you can discuss the design face-to-face, but it’s probably more important to choose one who regularly builds the type of bike you want.

If you’re handy you could consider going on one of those frame-building courses, and make one yourself.

There must be soemthing you’d want.

Mine would be:
Racey geometry road bike, but with 32c tyres and guards (an 853 kaffenback)
650b+ hardtail with a very long top tube and short seatube (25″ & 16″)
A bikepacking bike. Like my El-mariachi, but with more bottle cage mounts, lighter tubeset, integrated loops for bags, etc.

All with tapered headtubes, EBB and hourglass stays.

For me, I’ve always wanted a fillet brazed frame (ever since seeing Overburys adverts in very early MBUKs). Designing my own frame was rad too. A riding buddy who trades under the name Whishart in Vancouver builds a few frames in his basement and I got the opportunity to have one made. It’s pretty awesome riding a bike that you designed yourself and had made a few minutes from your hours 🙂

or me, I’ve always wanted a fillet brazed frame (ever since seeing Overburys adverts in very early MBUKs).

I use to ride that fillet brazed dream bike

until the forks sheared of at the base of the steerer pitching me head first into the ground. This was undouptedly due to crap construction

To the OP I think a trip might be better

Or not custom posh cx bike like a tripster

If I were to be able to have a custom steel frame, I would be looking at the benefit of knowing the tubeset had been selected and manipulated for how I like and wanted my new bike to feel. Whether it fits is standard.

This was undouptedly due to crap construction

Maybe. As a workshop manager, I’ve seen every type of material and every type of joining process fail. Crap tubing, crap brazing, an unspotted previous failure etc could all cause ‘sudden’ failure.

Brazing induces less heat into the tubes and minimizes stress risers, so in itself is a solid way of building a frame. It’s just really labour intensive and a bit heavier than a welded frame.

Have a look at the bespoked bristol website and also the NAHBS. You’ll find the cream of the crop there. I bought a Kent Eriksen a few years ago and it will never leave my side. Plenty of other bikes have come and gone since but aside from my ’95 Kona Kilauea its the bike ive had longest.

My shortlist for a new custom frame would be:
Indy Fab
Moots
Seven
Breadwinner
Donhou
English
DeKerf
DeSalvo

Having said all tht if you can get away with a stock size then Chromag bikes have some of their frames built by Chris DeKerf. A good few hundred cheaper than DeKerfs’ own frames.

I’d also add matt at 18 bikes to list to look at for customs. They also do a steel disk road/CX/light touring off the peg frame called the Monsal which is lovely!

Top blokes the bowns brothers.

I’d have Shand build me a 953 version of my SIR.9, with room for a 29+ at the back. Mmmm.

I had an 853 bike built by Argos racing cycles in Bristol many years ago (before kids!).

There is something very special about the bike and the whole process of being measured up, choosing colours etc. Plus it will be a one off that you will cherish for many years.

Go for it!

book onto Dave Yates course and build your own ?

I do like http://www.44bikes.com/

Was just going to say build your own, I’d really love to build a bike.

Check out Farrer Cycles on Facebook. He make a slack 650b long travel hardtail called the LoamRanger! Prices start at £600 with any custom colour!!!!!!!!!!!!

Walleater

As I’m sure you know there is a big stress riser where the steerer is brazed into the crown

every fork I have ever examined has an internal a reinforcing tube inside the steerer at that point. Certainly my mates Overburys bought within a few months did. Mine didn’t so a crack started to open up the back and inevitable it failed

No long term damage but it was appears i was knocked unconscious on my own some where. My first memory is of walking along carrying a broken bike trying to work out where I was, trying to find a phone and remember my phone number

OP the build your own option would be tempting for me

Is your current hardtail steel?

Steel rides very differently to aluminium. But then steel bikes can feel different too.

I have a Cotic Soul, having had a Sanderson Life (bent hanger), various Inbreds (still have a ss DN6), Ti- (snapped) and Aluminium hardtails (worn out or too harsh).

I’ve loved all the steel frames and intend to keep the MK2 26″ Soul forever. But then I might buy a MK3 to take a Reverb.

(I also said I’d keep the Life but kept twisting the derailleur hanger).

Want I think I’m trying to say is get a replaceable mech hanger and future proof the build.

Personally I’d buy a Cotic off the shelf, because it’s so much fun it should be illegal. But if your wife insists you could look at Shand, Curtis or a Dave Yates framebuilding course – which would be well cool.

Oh – and read “It’s all about the bike” by Robert Penn. There’s more than the frame to consider!

Have a 26 and a 29 Curtis, both are just perfect, for me, as a custom bike should be.

I suggest you come to Bespoked(I am show manager, so very biased!) and have a good look and chat. It’s very important that you like the builder I think, not just their welds. For instance I know whose building mine because they totally enthusiastically get my ride and have some great input.
http://bespoked.cc
Loads of great pics and vids on there to wet your whistle!
It’s my 40th on the Saturday of the show in April!

If you have the money to consider a custom I would put another vote in for building your own with dave yates, or if you have access to a workshop build your own. Nothing compares to riding your own bike that you designed AND built, fact.

As has been said on here before, you can make bikes feel very different with something as simple as axle standards, wall thicknesses, tubeset, OD’s etc. So either you need to know what your doing or work with someone who does. I manage to make my 29er stiff as hell with a 142×12 rear and 853, when you put your foot down it just goes, not a featherweight though but it does track like a beast.

Or the bicycle acadamy, Robin Mather and Ted James are propper tubesmiths.

It’s tricky – if you don’t know what you want, then a framebuilder like me probably can’t help you much 😉

So there are two suggestions I have:

– Pick a bike you really like riding, but aesthetically it’s not all that great, and have a similar frame hand-crafted for you. It’ll ride the same, but be lighter and a work of art – fillet-brazed instead of TIG welded perhaps, with those little hand touches that make it individual and yours.

– Go on a framebuiding course, and build your own bike, there’s nothing like riding on a bike you’ve built yourself.

English cycles? Lovely bikes!

Buy an Inbred. Go somewhere amazing

I started building my own because I knew the fit I liked but wanted a bike with what was then considered unusual / difficult geo. So I started with the reason rather than the dream (and a desire not to explain what I wanted to someone else).

Ampthill (hi John) – your experience is exactly why I’ve built a few frames but still nervous about tackling forks. Also extremely cautious of head tube details / attachment for similar reasons.

I build loads of forks, but definitely need to over-engineer them – with a frame you have a bit of leeway, if a steerer snaps it’s veey, very serious. I think it’s interesting (and probably sensible) that lots of framebuilders use off-the-shelf forks especially on lightweight bikes. Companies who are making thousands of carbon forks can do a lot more testing than a framebuilder building a few.

Field cycles that’s all you need I can build frames and id actually pay that guy if I wanted a steel road frame

Mick Gary helfrich who’s often regarded as the godfather of the Ti bike once said he’s actually scared to ride his own bikes incase one of the welds went, even he said it was completely unfounded but its one of those things I suppose

Hi Mike

I don’t think the day job helps my paranoia…..

So far the only thing I’ve had develop a tiny crack was a very heavily stressed seat tube joint where I hadn’t sleeved, got it a bit hot and then reamed out an already rather thin tube (so I always expected problems there one day). And I’m still riding it – the crack smiles and keeps me company 🙂

I’ve cut up a few brazed frames (Peugeot internal brazing and a couple of lugged ones) and always amazed at what actually holds together without any problems (one lugged one was awful inside).

I’d agree with you about Harry and the other Field collaborators – a very interesting group of guys doing rather nice work.

http://www.fieldcycles.com/

I build loads of forks, but definitely need to over-engineer them – with a frame you have a bit of leeway, if a steerer snaps it’s veey, very serious.

I see that sort of thing quoted quite often and I don’t buy into it. If a headtube comes off a bike it’s no less serious than if a steerer snaps. And I know you don’t really mean this Ben but there’s an implication there that suggests you (the builder, not you personally) aren’t completely confident in what you’re doing and you’re willing to take a risk on a frame but not a fork.

I hate building forks. I find it dull and repetitive. There’s also a disproportionate amount of work in a fork when building a full bike (at least with our forks anyway) which makes it appear to be less worthwhile financially. I suspect that’s why a lot of builders spec a carbon fork, it saves them time/money and they can make an additional margin with the fork sale.

Victims of accidents are probably terrible people to have opinions on these things

I’d say that the difference between a fork and a head tube is that you’ve got alot more chance of spotting a problem with a head tube before it fails. My steerer had a crack that had been there long enough to show corrosion. But it was under the crown race of the headset

I’ve not really seen many head tube failures but in my head I find it hard to imagine the whole lot going at once as its to separate junctions

I see that sort of thing quoted quite often and I don’t buy into it. If a headtube comes off a bike it’s no less serious than if a steerer snaps. And I know you don’t really mean this Ben but there’s an implication there that suggests you (the builder, not you personally) aren’t completely confident in what you’re doing and you’re willing to take a risk on a frame but not a fork.

I’ve seen quite a few repair jobs where one head tube joint has failed – the rider has had a chance to stop and wobble off without injury. Because there’s two tubes, unless they fail simultaneously (big crash scenario) there’s a decent chance for the rider to spot the problem and stop.

But all the people I know who have had broken steerers (usually cheap carbon forks ironically) have had serious crashes.

I agree with you about forks being dull to build – not looking forward to the batch of 5 I have to get started on 😉

Dario Pegoretti explains steel