lightshade

just made myself a customisable, morfable lightshade from an unused construction toy that was lying around the house.
it works well and it projects a nice pattern on the ceiling too.

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badge

it was easy to reuse the headtube badge, i stuck it back on with superglue. shame the tires cannot be polished or repainted.

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wheel lacing

for some reason i found 36 double butted stainless spokes of exactly the right length lying around my workshop. i think they were rescued from a bent wheel a couple of years ago. i remember feeling stupid for spending energy saving spokes i didnt need, but now it felt like bike-mech-magic!

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colour

first there was the light green chain, then i found some extremely cheap dark green paint for the frame, british racing green for a nottingham raleigh seemed right. however, the project was about the drivetrain and rear hub. this needed to be light green, so went out and spent some money on expensive light green paint.

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coasterbrake

a friend had recently given me an old folding bike with a twisted hinge. i thought the tires might be of use one day, but now i was actually lpoking for a coasterbrake for the first time in my life, and the folder provided. it was a good looking centrix, made in western germany.

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components

polishing alloy components is fun! all the bike needed new was a chain. this is where the colour green entered the project; green is by far the coolest colour for a bicyclechain!

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frame

i found a discarded raleigh racingbike with reynolds 501 tubes. this was perfect for a coasterbrake experiment. a colleage helped me remove exces braze-ons and we applied a new paintjob.

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greencoaster

i never understood the fun of an urban fixie. simplicity and low maintenance yes, but why not use a coasterbrake? seems to me that that this would give a safer and more comfortable ride, without adding much weight; more in the hub, but less in heavy duty chain, sprokets and toestraps.

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coasterbrake vs fixie

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