Or ... you want a bike that can do things outside the norm. The design criteria for my Peter Mooney was that it have the ride and fit of my racing bike (a Fuji Professional - basically a very high BB criterium bike that fit me wonderfully), be rideable in the lower 48 states 12 months of the year (specifically back-country Maine) and be able to self-sufficiency tour.

With that set of requirements, it would have taken me years of shopping to find that stock bike. (I did find one by chance. A mid '80s Miyata touring bike with a weird high BB. But by the time I came across that bike (purchased as a frame for my recently crashed commuter), I had 11 years and thousands of mile on the Mooney.

12 years ago I started putting together bikes that would do their specific jobs better than the all-arounder Mooney and it took a back seat, becoming my (world class!) farmers market bike. It has come back to front and center in my stable because I signed up for a ride for which it is near perfect and that none of my other bikes can do. (Cycle Oregon, which features an ideal mountain elevation profile for a fix gear but also 45 miles of mountain gravel. The Mooney? High BB, clearance for fat 27" tires and horizontal dropouts. (Remember, back-country Maine in January. 700c at the local shop? Really? In 1979?) I can run 35c tires easily. Fix gear? No problem.

My second custom is just a ti road bike that fits and has ideal weight balance between the wheels. (With my best position, I have my weight too far forward on most bikes. plus I usually need an unusual or even custom stem to get better than a class "B" fit.) My third custom is another ti bike, similar to the previous but designed from the start as a fix gear, one that I can put any cog on without messing with chain length. It has a unique dropout that makes roadside wheel flips a 2 minute job, unscrewing cogs 5 minutes. Finding that bike in a shop would be a several lifetimes endeavor.

There are real reasons for custom bikes and they aren't all just vanity or for weirdly sized people. But, as I said above and in previous posts, it helps a lot if you have done enough riding that you really know what you want and need. (And there is the danger you end up like me; a guy who has a frame builder almost on a retainer! In addition to the ti two frames, he has built me 3 stems and two seatposts, repaired a seatstay cap failure, re-brazed all the lugs on an old Raleigh that apparently missed that stop in the assembly line and is now making me completely custom parts to modify the fix gear drive train on the Mooney so I can have three separate, very different gear ratios.

Ben