Are lugs easier to build a frame? Are there pros and cons to using lugs? I am seeking advice and suggestions on the simplest first steel frame build (to build experience and learn for the second more complex and elegant build). Thank you in advance!

The hardest part of building with lugs is knowing that you have full penetration of the brazing filler. Bascially you can't know if the frame is safe to ride without sawing it in half to look!

So, the usual way of learning is to have a seasoned teacher hold your hand (sometimes literally) as you braze practice lugs. Your practice joints should be cut up to look at the penetration, and some should be broken in a vise with cheaterbars to learn about strength.

Heaven help you if you don't have the seasoned teacher. Some people have done it without, learning on their own, but lots of those guys have made unsafe frames that break out on the road too.

I have gotten some flak for my negativity on this, like I'm being a "gate-keeper" or trying to scare off newbies. So take it with a grain of salt. But if you want to know for sure your frame is safe to ride, either take a framebuilding course, or as a MINIMUM, braze and destructively test as many joints as you can before making one to ride. Start collecting cheap lugs for practice, any way you can get them.

You can make your own lugs, sort of, with caveats. Assuming you're in the US, Cr-Mo tubing comes in .058" wall, which makes it an OK fit for brass brazing on the next 1/8" smaller size tube. E.g. get 1-1/4" x .058" to fit over a 1-1/8" tube. But as fake lugs for practicing, they're not great because the joint is so much simpler than a real lug, and the tube wall is too thick, so the heating goes more slowly than on a real lug. And the fit is too loose for silver, which needs a tight fit-up for strength. Strength of a silver-brazed joint goes down rapidly for gaps that are larger than a few thousandths. So real lugs are best for learning how to braze lugs. Maybe start with just tube scraps at first, to conserve your supply of practice lugs, but don't make a frame for a person to ride until you've mastered brazing with real lugs.

OK I'm belaboring the point. If there's one take-away, it's "take a framebuilding course!"

I agree with what Mark said. Lugs can aid the fabrication some might say and they lend themselves to jig free building as they sort of locate the tube WRT each other. No replacement for skills and practice though. Andy.

As discussed above, they aren't idiot-proof, and you should definitely practice a bit and cut some open. But I think it probably is still an easier process to get started with, if not to master, than either fillet-brazing or TIG. Have never tried fillet brazing (or lugs but have done a bit of silver soldering) but I know that it took me many many hours of practice and making other projects with the TIG before I was ready to try making frames. The difference is TIG happens very fast and goes wrong very fast. This means you need the practice because there's no time to think on your feet.

There were recently a couple of videos on Henry Wildeberry's channel where he made a pretty decent lugged frame. I think he probably had a bit of training from John Fitzgerald, he dropped a lot of silver on his feet, and a few joints he actually took apart and re-did. But it all worked out pretty good in the end (and he did a really nice job on the ends of the seat stays). I recommend watching those, not as a how-to guide but to get a sense for what it's like as a beginner.

I truly think the execreble Wildeberry videos should be avoided at all costs. Watching how to do something completely wrong is not an aid in any way to learning. Seems like a nice guy, but the videos are simply painful.

I think he deserves the credit for putting it out there and sharing the process with us, and it gives a sense of what it is like when you start out. I also really like his channel generally. There are of course also great videos by experts (Paul Brodie of course, and there is one on the "welding tips and tricks" channel of Mike Zancanato making a lugged frame).

I was once asked, “The most difficult aspect I seem to have is seeing that the filler material hasn’t made it to some part of the shoreline. <cut>”

I replied…

It’s not about seeing, it’s about sensing. It comes eventually. A solid and completely filled joint is the goal rather than what it looks like. If you focus on brazing the lug to achieve the former, the latter simply falls into place. Trying to self-correct a shoreline, or even paying attention to it as if it alone is the task, will only result in extra passes of the torch as well as prolonged heating cycles. But if you don’t go through the steps repeatedly and ad nauseum, not only will the process take longer to realize – it may never come at all. Since you won’t or don’t work in production, make the investment in practice materials, line up 50 lugs and tube sections, start brazing, and take notes. Then do it again. Make the routine a gift you give yourself since you’re essentially your own apprentice.
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Thanks for the recommendation on the Henry Wildeberry's channel. It is great to watch his lugged frame building videos. Very helpful.

The first frame I fabricated I used HJ lugs as they were a real good fit to the tubes (Reynolds 531) I did it without help outside of the Paterek Manual and some basic knowledge from 30 years prior in a high school shop class. I kept in my mind the idea is to flow the filler (silver 54%) from one side of the lug to the other side where the flame was located. This is a simplified explanation, but it is the essence of what to do. On the first lug I saw how the silver flowed to the flame, and it made sense as to how to do it. The flame can also be used to "drag" the filler deeper into the lug, which I discovered on the first lug. Yes, a little bit of overheating occurred, but nothing detrimental to the durability of the frame.
Still riding that frame 20+ years and 20,000 + miles later. It is still a real pleasure to ride.

He says "I think I'm going to..." and "I don't know if..." too frequently for me to trust him or his bikes. If he doesn't trust his process, I don't know why I would try to learn from him. I hope I don't come across as an ******* (again!).

EDIT: impressed that the forum " * " bad words...

Did you trust your process the first time you did it? But I think to be clear it isn't mean to be a teaching video (and I'm pretty sure he says as much). More of a vlog and just sharing his experience. That can be very helpful too. I first got into framebuilding after watching Pithy Bikes. He was a complete amateur, made lots of mistakes, and I didn't copy his processes at all (some people just have different styles of doing things-- I'm certainly not claiming mine is better!) but it was very inspiring to watch and planted the idea.

West County videos showing how he built a frame is good entertainment but doesn't have any instructive value. Actually it was a bit difficult for me to watch fearing someone in the YouTube video age (where you can find out how to do almost anything yourself) might think they could get some building tips.

No, I didn't but that's why I practiced a lot, got feedback from professionals and cut up a lot of joints, crowns, lugs up before making anything. I'm just saying they are more like America's Funniest Home Videos than instructional.

Regarding whether lugs are easier, I'd say YES. Learn to pin your joints, because that assists with alignment, and assuring the tubes fit tightly together inside the lug. The miters should be just as tight as if TIG'ing the joint, only the lug encapsulates the joint.

When heating the joint, do it all the way around before adding filler. Assuming 56% silver, target a dull red. Use gravity to feed the filler, to the extent possible. Position your shoreline up, and pull filler into the joint using heat and gravity. With some joints, you can watch the penetration, the bottom bracket for example. Work all sides of the joint, not just one side. Or at least, start on one side, then jump to the other. Being somewhat of a novice, I tend to add too much filler, which results in some remaining on the shoreline. That's sort of a gauge of sorts. For dropouts, I recommend external socketed type, sort of like a lug. These are much simpler to fill than an internal plugged in blade-type drop out, which commonly uses brass, and requires more skill. Again, feed the silver until the joint until you see it pooling up on the shoreline, despite your best attempt to pull it inside. You can always file/scrape off any excess. That's a better option than underfilling.