Hi, My wife and I enjoy riding together and after riding an old Schwinn around a bit we have decided to build up a tandem for road riding.
I make bicycle frames for a living and have some of what I need to make build a tandem frame from 7005 aluminum. I don't care for the EBB solution for chain tension so I will make some type of tension or guide system. Mostly because of the time it takes me to position my saddle.
The strongest/largest head tube platform I have available in 7005 is a large 2" diameter tube to fit the 44mm cups (1-1/8 flush). I have cutters for onepointfive but no tube is available to accommodate those cups. A very large 65mm tube will be used for the down and boom tubes. I am not sure how much shaping I want to do on the boom tube (perhaps just shape the ends rectangular to fit BB shells) but the down tube will be bi-round and 75X50.
I am going to use paul brakes at the rims and a BB7 mounted to a triangulated seat stay (actually an MTB chainstay used as seat stays).
I have the front drawn to match my current road bike and stoker Lanie is short and likes an upright position so the back is 28"
The parts
Middleburn cranks
Paul brakes
29'r wheels (135)
BB7 dragger
Thomson stem/custom
3T bars
9 speed 105/XT
(proposed gears) 53/38/28
11/26 rear
proposed frame
tandem by
frankthewelder, on Flickr
More pics as some progress is made. Thanks for lookin'