When Things Fall Apart

Literally...

Changing the configurations of your bikes is a lot like juggling vials of nitroglycerin. If you manage to handle them gingerly enough, you might escape injury and look good in the process, but more likely something is going to explode in your face, causing a chain reaction that levels everythnig in the room--in this case, one filled with bicycles.

It's been over a month since I began the process of switching race bikes, (your bike is fine. KEEP IT. You'll thank yourself later.) a process that has cascaded through every single one of my other bikes in one way or another, leaving me greasy, tired and somewhat under-trained.

There was something useful to be learned in this mess, however, other than sometimes good enough is good enough. That thing is how to braze frames.

Of the horrible atrocities that befell my stable over the last month, the most saddening by far was the catastrophic failure of my commuter bike's frame.

Losing a commuter bike is not unlike losing a spouse. You spend more time with it than any of your other bikes, yet when the crap hits the old windmaker it's the first one to be neglected. You let her get rusty, her tires run low and her drivetrain get all stretched out and you ignore every bit of it until one day she won't let you ride her any more. "Enough is enough!" she says, and she snaps--at the seatstays.

Being a sentimental sort of guy, I couldn't bear the thought of losing my 1984 Shogun 300, and though it might have been cheaper, faster, and more elegant to simply replace her with something younger and more nimble, I opted to get out a MAPP-Oxy torch and take her to counseling:






And while I was at it I threw in some cable stops...




...for a nice mix of the classic and the modern:




With highlights provided by a Markall paint marker:


...and I almost have the mess cleaned up.

Full gallery here.