NAHBS 2015 - part 4

Here's a final post from my visit to the 2015 North American Handmade Bicycle Show.  Once again, it was my first time to attend this event after following it in media for the past five years or so.  I was excited, overwhelmed, and inspired by the display of all things bike.

Beyond the tangibles, everyone I met was very friendly and eager to chat.  Many times I was five, ten minutes into a conversation about nuances of a bike on display or talking riding style and local trails, then finally stumble on the question of, "oh, where are you from?"  I was always amused to learn my new bike friend was from Fort Collins, Southern California, Idaho, Atlanta, and beyond.  I quickly learned I was the local guy who only traveled about five hours to the show.  No matter, we were all there for the same fun and passion of two wheeled, hand crafted machines.

Now the final batch of pictures...

I lined up to head down an outer aisle and found

this tough looking 29er from Savvy Cycles. 

With thoughts of wood framed bikes brewing in my head

from stops at previous booths, it was good to talk to these

guys.  "It's strong as any bike, I huck it off jumps all the time!"

There's some CNC work going into these frame members.

A fat tire bike completed their wood frame collection on display.

Following are some bikes from the New Framebuilder tables. These are single bikes on display from builders that are not yet making a large volume of frames.  Next time I attend the show I plan to spend more time researching the new builders before attending, and it will be interesting to talk with them and understand how they got started and where they think they're headed.

A very well executed fattie from Wiseman Frameworks.

The Kansas City Bike Collective had a cool booth

with several artisans displaying goods, including

Andrew and his custom frame bags.

One of my favorite bikes of the show is this

one from Vibe Cycles of Boise.

It was a pleasure talking to Dave and hearing his path

to becoming a frame builder.  He was eager to explain the head tube

junction, paint, and other fine details on this bike, the Knarr.

Julie of Pedalino Bikes and here fillet brazed frame on display.

Lots of artisan touches on this bike,

an impressive display of craft and function.

Here's some more fun from Peacock Groove.

Unfortunately I missed the opportunity to talk details.

Matter Cycles had some really nice bikes

on display in the back corner of the showroom,

including this blacked out cross bike.

I enjoyed talking with Collin about the development

of this bike, the SlayRide.  This bike just calls to be

ridden... slacked out and short chainstays.

Another one of my favorites from the show is

this Black Cat Bicycles cross bike.

I have followed Todd's builds the past couple years and

I favor his understated yet intricate graphics as well as

the matching forks and stems on his builds.

I enjoyed talking with Todd and learning more about

his approach and inspiration for bikes like this.

A great display of his stem work.

A KickStarter campaign has brought back

Fat Chance Bicycles.

Another Yo Eddy on display, this one with some

squish up front and a dropper post.

Four posts and nearly 100 pictures later, I've failed to capture the display that is NAHBS.  Sorry, you're just going to have to attend in person.  Even then, you will wake up the next morning, like me, thinking "oh man, I missed checking out Alchemy and ___ and ____ and ___... and I never looped back around to talk to Eric Noren!"

It was a grand experience and I look forward to another show within reasonable travel distance for me.  Next time I will research the builders even more before attending and have a little more of a game plan before walking in.  Ah, it's going to be the same overwhelming experience no matter what.  I'll call that part of the fun!

And a final thought for next time... I will save up and bring at least $100 to blow on t-shirts.  ;-)

Nearly everybody had decals and soft goods.  I bought

a Shamrock Cycles shirt for my Irish wife, a NAHBS jersey

and shirt for myself, coffee for my buddy Ryan, and a bunch

of decals for my basement workshop sticker door!

NAHBS 2015 - part 3

So many impressive bikes to see...

Oh, I love orange and here it is on a very cool fat bike

from Inglis Retrotec. This bike went on to win the

best mountain bike award.

Tough as usual to photograph orange bikes, it looks

a different color from this angle.  But, from this angle,

the twin top tube is visible. 

A nice cross bike from Retrotec on display.

 This offroad bike from Sycip caught my eye with its

twin, vertical top tubes and seat stay bridge.

A coupled cross bike from Sycip.

Moots!  I was excited to look these over as I remember

seeing a couple of their road bikes in the past.

Now this was unique.

 This booth from Mosaic was nicely put together.  I wanted

to check out their bikes just cause the light was better.

Oh yeah, their bikes were really well done too!

Way down at the end of an aisle, Moonmen bikes.

They have a unique style with the BMX style handlebars.

 Boo Bikes uses bamboo to make it happen.

 Diggin' the front and rear racks.

When I first saw this I thought one of Groovy Cycleworks

bikes had been misplaced, due to the paint job.  Looks fun!

 Columbus is an Italian manufacturer of tubing.

 This was typical of my visit, I was walking by the Dean booth

and paused for a pic of this mountain bike.  The presenter

was friendly and pulled the bike out for the picture.

After getting excited about the wood frames earlier in my

visit, for some reason I didn't spend much time checking

out Conner Wood Bicycles.

The bikes looked great!  I just got in a hurry to keep

moving after snapping several pictures.

This mountain bike looked ready to rumble.

 I've checked out Shamrock Cycles work via

the web in year past. Excited to see this booth!

 A super clean looking road bike.  I like it.

 A bling, bling striding bike!

 Very crafty.

 Lots of time went into this paint and it won best finish.

 This one from Shamrock was eye catching as well.

I don't know the builder of this one,

but it looks like a sweet utility ride to me.

Okay, one more post and another twenty pictures or so will conclude my trip report.

NAHBS 2015 - part 2

So we left off in part 1 with me continuing around the NAHBS (North American Handmade Bicycle Show) exhibition hall, taking lots of pictures, talking to some friendly bike folk, and geekin' out over the bikes.  Let's continue...

This bike from Cykelmageren went on to win the Best Artisan bike.

I talked to Rasmus, the Dutch builder, about the inspiration for design.

He said five years ago he sketched the design and now it's come to life.

One of the other bikes in Cykelmageren's booth.

Lots of handmade compontnes on these bikes,

including the brakes.

Check out the wood handgrips and "pullcord" style brake lever.

Third bike in their booth.

The vast majority of booths were bike builders, but there were some suppliers, clothing folk, and component makers in attendance as well.  It was a nice mix.

 Paragon Machine Works supplies frame building supplies

and machined components.  The had several nice displays

of dropouts, brake mounts, etc.

 Several nice bikes from Calfee were on display,

and I wish I'd spent more time examining these.

Carbon fiber is Calfee's specialty and

they also work with bamboo.

Kent Eriksen specializes in titanium.  They won best tig welded

frame with a tandem frameset.  It was stated the judges were

not able to find a single imperfection! And, there's lots of

welding on a tandem bicycle.

I was really diggin' this road bike with its

super clean lines and orange accents. 

 Seatpost and saddle from above bike.

A full suspension Eriksen.  I didn't spend a lot of time

studying the full squish bikes, maybe I should have.

The tubing manufacturer Reynolds.

I had a good talk with Seth Snyder of Snyder Cycles.

He built this bike for buddy to cross race.

My picture doesn't show it so well,

but this paint caught my eye. 

Seth said this cruiser is a standard bike

he builds and it sells for just under $1k.

Some fun threads from Endurance Conspiracy.

 A big missed opportunity was not better checking

out Speedhound Bikes.

From their web site I've learned this is the Only One Frameset.

The Speedhound Dropout System allows the type of rear

dropout and spacing to be changed to morph the frameset

for road, touring, trail riding, singlespeed, fixed, geared.

Cool concept.

 I've always liked Thomson bike components.

 Silca was there showing off their Ultimate floor pump.

There were numerous customized pumps on display.

Apparently some of the custom builders are offering

these pumps with paint and graphics matching

a customer's custom bike.

Co-motion may not be thought of as custom builder,
but their bikes are indeed handmade in Oregon.

 I like this racked out, high tire volume bike.

 Perhaps best known for their tandems, Co-Motion
frames and paint always have a clean look.

Their booth was large but simple, a good

display of their offerings.

Wow, this is going to take a couple more posts to cover, and in some ways, I wish I had taken more pictures. There was so much to see!