The fix?

      I have had a good look for some replacement forks second hand, and there are some nice ones out there but I cant use them because I have made the head tube on the plycycle longer than average. All the second hand forks are cut down. I don't want to 'fork out' for a new set, so I am going to work with what i have.

How did the front get so out? Well... The head tube is longer (for strength binding to the wood) and therefore lifts the front of the frame, and the forks are slightly longer (off the shelf and cheap) and although individually these extras don't seem like much in the end it is about 3.5cm of lift. Enough to radically move the front of the bike away from what I had in mind.

I put the photo of the bike into photoshop and measured and analysed and this is what I think.
with the forks I have I will never get the top of the frame horizontal with the ground, I can handle that, just. As for the relationship of the front wheel to the main frame, I can play with that a bit. Luckily there is plenty of room to adjust the angle and position of the head tube mounting. So I propose moving the head tube back and steepening the angle. This will take the top of the frame further from the horizontal but I think will bring the bikes proportions back together.

Looking at the angle change in photoshop.

Hopefully I can make the tweak easily enough, and then it really is put it together time.

Final off the shelf parts.

The order from Ceeway came in this week. Some great stainless steel dropout blanks and stainless faces to be braised on. Also the 22mm cromolly tube that the drop out will be welded to and the wooden rear stays will slot into. All I have to do now is shape the wood to fit, then braise the joints together. Ha, simples!

Drop-out blanks, faces and 22mm tube.

So now I have all the bits I need to complete. I just have to find the time to make it happen. Just as before I will be stealing an hour here and there between work and family. I really want to get this finished by my original target, August. I think that is achievable. 

Also thanks to everyone who is giving helpful comments and advice via twitter and this blog. Much appreciated.

Wooden bike - in miniature.

It is not a great thing of beauty, but this model has really helped my see where this is going. I cobbled it together in lunch break at work and then shot it on a green screen set down in one of the studios, on my phone. Perhaps I should have spent more time on it and shot it with a proper camera, but really at this stage that is not the point. I really wanted to see the shape of the frame in 3D. I tacked a print out of the bike design onto some foam core card and set about cutting it out. The foam core is not quite to scale, too thin for the main frame and too thick for the rear stays, but it is good enough to get the idea. Oh yes and I used square section brass for the forks...... Remember, cobbled together.

I made the forks too long on the model and it really makes a huge difference to the intended design. The bike now looks unbalanced, squat at the back and lanky at the front. I dont think it is worth changing the model at this stage. I like the model and I think I may make another, proper scale version at some time in the future. 

Bike design progress.

I was just looking at the Renovo site in more detail and noticed that they have the curved frame line around the rear wheel to shorten the rear stays as I have proposed I'm my last design. I am quite pleased as it means that I am doing something right in my bike design process.
There can't be many bike shapes that have not already been put out there, especially in the standard frame geometry that I am following.
Yesterday I thought it would be a good idea to make a model of my wooden bike design. Just made out of foam core and bits and pieces, it will be near as possible a scale representation of the design below. It's nearly done, I will post pics when it's ready.

Using Bike CAD

Having been all excited about materials and getting started, it dawned upon me to focus a little more on the actual design of the bicycle. Bicycle design can be just a few sketches on paper, like I did below, but I thought I would have a crack at Bike CAD an on-line bicycle design tool. It is set up with some basic templates for most bicycle styles that are then 100% customisable. So I went with a road frame and entered my hight and

chose some parameters, below is what came out. I have a geared bike and a fixed gear bike and I enjoy both for different reasons, but as you can see here I have gone for a single speed design, mainly because for my first complete build it will be easier.
Bike CAD is set up for steel framed bikes so I am looking at this for basic measurements and geometry. I found it really useful to be able to type in different seat post angles and see the changes to all the other angles straight away. No doubt this will evolve, but I like the basic simple shape of this bike and I hope it will be possible for me to adapt this into wood with out too many changes to the frame geometry.