what did you use to slot the stays?

A hacksaw.

heh.. you ain't no ass-clown...

GO GO CATANO!

you're a DIY hero, yo! :) :beer:

word.

Very ellegant mcanto! It looks so nice, without being flashy.

my hat is forever off to you.

you and bill watterson.

****, now i want to do that too.

thumbs up, mcatano. i'm impressed. without a jig, how were you able to make sure that everything was properly angled? my biggest worry would be in getting the did you just go off of the fit from the bottom bracket shell and seat cluster?

Neat. I wonder if my friend Mike could build me a frame...

incredible

now you have to build one for yourself!

Thats really pretty.

I'm extremely impressed with you and the frame. Such a fantastic gift as well!

Very sharp :). Much respect man.

ffs, thats the sex right there. good job.

not to beat a dead horse here, but awesome job. it is really inspirational to us bike geeks to see stuff like this.

one question though, do you have any pitfall warnings? something you did as a rookie that you would never do again? give us some "never do it like this" if you can.

Good job,
you just inspired a bunch of people.
and made loads of guys look like lazy slobs.

You should post this in the Framebuilders Forum...nice job!

so tiny-rrific! awesome build!

and if mcatano and his ladyfriend ever split, i got dibs on him so everyone else back off!

I've heard it used that way before, and so has the OED:
However, he will be going to grammar jail for ending his sentence in a preposition.

To stay on topic, that's an awesome build. I can't wait to get more details.

Again, thanks so much for compliments. My head grows fatter by the moment...

shants: After doing the first two joints (the lower head tube lug and the seat tube/bb shell), I took the two pieces to the only LBS in my city with an alignment table to make sure that they were properly aligned. Once those two were straight, the main triangle went together pretty easily. I made sure the fork and rear triangle were spaced properly and (again, relatively) straight by checking everything with string and then brazing them with the wheels in. When the whole thing was done, I took it back to the table and had everything aligned again. Aside from one of the fork tips going in a little crooked, it didn't need too much jiggering once it was finished.

CF4L: My situation was pretty ideal, as I had a friend who had enough knowledge to be helpful but not enough experience to be intimidating. Charles had built one frame, but never done a fork, so between the two of us we managed to plow through the process. There was a lot of shoulder shrugging and head scratching, but we managed to muddle through it together. As far advice goes... uh, measure about thirty times before you cut anything. Watch your flame. Don't set anything on fire. If you are in any way, shape or form concerned about the reliability of your torch, get it checked out before proceeding. Other than that, just order the Paterek manual/videos and dive in. It's surprisingly easy, once you get the hang of handling the torch (which I still have yet to do...).

Why so much gap between rear tire and seat tube? Did you happen to measure the wheelbase, I'm currious what it is. Very good job it seems, what brand are the lugs and dropouts?

The wheels don't actually have tires on them in that photo, so there is actually a bit less clearance than it looks like. The longer chainstays/wheelbase will hopefully allow for a bike that handles and rides a little more comfortably. She's not going for the hour anytime soon, so I figured I would err on the side of comfort. I haven't measured the wheelbase, but I definitely could. The lugs are Long Shen and the dropouts, fork tips and BB shell are Kalavinka.

Thanks!

I was under the impression that Kalavinka didn't sell frame parts to outsiders. I guess I was wrong.

Did you go directly through his website?

BTW, nice work there M-.

What a beautiful job. You should be very proud. I thought I recognized those Kalavinka dropouts.

As for the BB height that someone mentioned (and the resulting C/S angles) here is a pic of one of the new 650c wheeled Marinoni bikes at our track.

excellent work. congratulations. please post pics when all finished

Thanks - you can order Kalavinka framebuilding parts directly through Mr. Tanabe's website. Just follow the link to "Materials" and everything is there. Email him directly for a price list. His English is excellent and he does a lot of business with North America.

Awesome job mcatano. Now I need to learn how to weld just in case I get the energy to do all that.