I might even have one in stock – give me a call at the shop tomorrow, 0141 942 2552. Otherwise no problem to get one from HPVelotechnik.

I’ve been getting dodgy redirects for a day or so – not smut, but fake “you’ve got a virus” things.

Unfortunately as any business owner will attest, dealing with the British public is one of the most hateful experiences in life, they really are **** that deserve zero favours.

95% of people are lovely. the other 5% drive me spare :D

That’s much better, a perfectly nicely done seat cluster. And as I said before, there’s a head tube on their Instagram which is also competently done.

I also follow you on Instagram. Your posts are enough for me to know should I need any work done you would be my first call. Your “marketing” has worked.

You’re the second person in two days who’s said they follow me on Instagram – I don’t think I’m on Instagram!

Jordan, don’t be so touchy – I’m trying to help you out.

Although I find it very surprising that a fellow builder would criticise another in such a public way to be honest.

Don’t have a look at any frame building forum, then ;-) It’s constructive criticism, I’m trying to help him out – because for every person on here who says that the brazing looks amateurish, there could be 100 people who think it but don’t say it. So best not show it.

Comments that they are a clothing company and marketers only is patronising to say the least.

You’ve added the “only” to what I said. There’s nothing wrong with being good at marketing – in fact it’s arguably a more important skill than being able to braze. I’m rubbish at marketing.

I actually think it’s a pretty good idea – we all know, secretly, that lots of bike frame design is fashion-led anyway so it could be argued that the actual design you buy matters less than the fact that you believe you’re buying something really fashionable.

People often put themselves on the list to buy the latest iPhone or sports car without seeing it first.

They’re a marketing company, really – the ‘drop’ idea is an interesting one, get people enthusiastic about buying a frame from you because you’re you, without telling them what the frame is. Then make a batch of them, and release them on a fixed date to the eager hordes.

I’ve never seen it in the bike industry, but some other niche craft businesses do it very well. There’s a guy who makes little titanium tools who does this, and his stuff is ridiculously sought after: http://www.atwoodknives.com

Or was pr0n just an alternative to a fish tank, my bank uses BBC News 24, keeps me amused in the queue.

“Hello, I’d like to make a deposit.”

I don’t particularly want to get into an argument with you, or slag off a framebuilders I don’t know – but when you make images public, then you have to expect that people who do know about this kind of thing will comment on them. The brazing frame shown in the first link is quite amateurish – the fillets aren’t regular, there’s pitting and gaps. If you ask other framebuilders they’ll say the same. That’s okay, my brazing was like that a decade ago, nothing I built then ever broke.

If I were you, I’d delete those pics and not put any more process pics online.

Where could we be now?

We have rockets that can launch, reach orbit and deploy a satellite, then reverse thrust at hypersonic speeds and land again on a floating platform. That’s pretty awesome.

That is amazing.

I’m certainly not commenting to put you down or to be nasty – and I’m not competing with you either. But you put pics of raw brazes online, of course other framebuilders are going to comment. You should see some of the comments I’ve had!

I think most framebuilders would want to constructively help. There’s another pic on your Instagram of a head tube which looks perfectly decent. But some of these joints are a bit sloppy. Probably not dangerous, but there’s pitting and gaps in the fillets. Slap filler or a thicker powdercoat on and no-one’s going to know or care, but if you want to showcase your fillet brazes then you need to get a little better at fillet brazing.

Yeah, that’s just made me feel totally inadequate ;-)

If you want to see good undressed fillets, have a look at a raw lacquer Brompton.

True :D

Laying down good fillets takes a lot of practice – but you can lay down rough fillets, file them down, and still have a frame that’s structurally fine.

It’s all the gaps and pitting that’d bother me.

That pic’s technically a URT – but it was more an example to show that suspension frames have been around almost as long as the bicycle itself. If I get bored at work, I’ll look through my library and find a single-pivot.

Various designs were patented not long after the safety bicycle was invented – for example:

He’s got unnaturally skinny legs. Not the most important observation I know.

I eat toast at my desk which I doubt bothers anyone

CRUNCH Crunch Crunch Crunch crunch crunch
CRUNCH Crunch Crunch Crunch crunch crunch
CRUNCH Crunch Crunch Crunch crunch crunch
CRUNCH Crunch Crunch Crunch crunch crunch
…

Guess sometimes you just have to let the facts speak for themselves

Facts like basic physics? Or are those facts less important?

Common Wheel in Glasgow has a Humber with those – it’s lovely to ride…

Given Bin Laden is one of about 40 odd brothers it’s probably about 2 degrees.

I’m 2 degrees away from L. Ron Hubbard. Makes you think.

That’s a lot like the 6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon game – you can connect anyone to just about anyone else in a surprisingly small number of steps. And when you include multinational companies with thousands of employees, it makes it even easier.

Invest it in a sure-fire moneymaking scheme – open a bike shop :D

Okay, you’d probably lose it all, but have fun doing it.

"Soup's, Bovril's, Coffee's" by Ben Cooper[/url], on Flickr

Actually plenty of Scots did vote leave.

“Plenty of” is still a minority – are you denying the fact that a sizeable majority of Scots voted to stay in the EU?

There are people alive – real adults who presumably can feed and dress themselves – who think the item of furniture that you keep your socks in is a “chester draws”.

It’s funny how Brexiters act exactly as if we’re being forced out of the EU, not leaving voluntarily*. You’d think, with all the amazing opportunities to come with Brexit, they’d be happy to settle the leaving bill quickly, be completely happy to be out of the City of Culture, be delighted to sort out the leaving issues quickly so they can get on with gambling in the green fields of Brexit freedom.

Instead, they keep whining that we won’t be able to keep using all the EU things they said we didn’t need, and were better off without.

It’;s almost as if they know it’s going to be a colossal, decades-long mess, but they just don’t want to admit to themselves quite how badly they’ve screwed up the country.

*Of course us Scots, among with the Northern Irish, Londoners, Gibraltarians etc aren’t leaving voluntarily, we’re being forced out because the largest partner in this partnership of equals tells us to.

‘Your’e not a member of our club anymore & we want our ball back’

‘We don’t want to be in your club, we’ll stop paying the fees, and we’ll make life hell for your people – can we still use the facilities though?’

How can anyone be surprised by this? As soon as the brexit vote came in they should have stopped working on their bids

The referendum was to leave the EU – we were all told that we wouldn’t leave the single market, we’d still be in the EEA. So it was perfectly reasonable to continue working on their bids – they weren’t to know that a narrow vote to leave the EU would be transformed into a cast-iron mandate to leave everything vaguely European.

In retrospect, spending my early 30s doing crazy urbex stuff was probably my midlife crisis ;-)

Cool story. “I’m in the industry and I’ve never heard of them.. I’m not missing much” is a surprising and arrogant statement imo

Possibly, yes. But ‘the industry is broken and we’re here to fix it, we’re sticking it to the man’ is also a rather arrogant statement. I’ve heard that before too ;-)

I still haven’t worked out what is broken about the bike industry that they’re going to fix, and how.

they’re doing something about the issues in the ‘industry’

What issues?

Sounds like you need to refresh your industry sources.

Nah, I’ve just seen dozens – maybe hundreds – of companies come and go. If they stick round for a bit and do something interesting, then I might start to notice them.

how great they are and how the industry is complete shite and doesn’t understand them

Well, I’m in the industry and I’ve never heard of them. Doesn’t sound like I’m missing much.

Counterbalanced with an old sash weight.

Cheers :D Not photographed, the counterbalanced opening clear roof on the den to give access to the flying bridge, and the gas-spring-opening emergency escape door to the slide…

Converted a climbing frame and swing into a den…

And built a giant multi-level coop for my dad’s chickens:

This isn’t a phenomenon exclusive to the UK. I see it everyday here in Munich, one of Germany’s richest cities. Go to Frankfurt and the problem is worse, or at least more visible.

The UK is a much more unequal country than Germany, though – that has to have a big impact.