The Making of a Back to the Future Road Bike

View of a shelf in my workshop. October 16, 2016

During the lean times of intermittent freelancing and the even leaner times of unsuccessfully trying to turn a cargo bike passion into a paycheck, I was fixing junk bikes with junk parts. I deferred all kinds of maintenance. I patched tubes that should have been replaced and let tires wear down to levels that flirted with perilous. And once, upon finding a set of discarded, generic weightlifters gloves in the road, took them home and washed them because they were better than the cycling gloves I was wearing.

But I also would sometimes find a few items here and there that I kept for a future build: a road bike. Yes, my Bike Friday New World Tourist is a great bike that has been to over a dozen countries with me and up to Lick Observatory and back, but part of me wanted to use it for its intended purpose - a travel bike made for flying - and another part of me just wanted to build another bike. 

So I took a small plastic tub, labeled it "Road Bike I Can't Afford to Build Yet" and began tossing things I'd find on sale at bike shops, items my cousin would gift me, and other accessories.

This went on for almost three years. 

About two-thirds into that span I began working part-time which soon turned into full time - and I finally reached the point I felt I could move on the road bike project a little more aggressively. 

Like, say, for instance...actually buying a frame. 

I wanted a titanium frame but didn't want to spend a lot of money. By this time, I had "money" but it was, and still is, in lowercase. I didn't have MONEY and I certainly didn't have "fat stacks" - and even if I did, my brain just won't allow me become one of those people who own bikes that cost more than the down payment of a small house. 

Luckily, I had my cousin come to help - just as he did years ago guiding me through building a mountain bike - recommended XI'AN in China. Even though the web site looks like something from the Geocities era, they looked like they knew their stuff. I emailed a query and connected with someone there named Porter. Several back-and-forth emails - including one with an attachment of what my bike would look like - took place before I finally made the plunge: a titanium frame and fork would arrive nearly two months after I ordered it. 

I had it sent to me at work and it was even lighter than I had imagined. Since I take a bike and VTA to my job, I took it out of the oversize box it came in and brought it home home in a manner that would definitely be described as on-brand.

I brought it into my shop and unwrapped it. I had truly bought something special.

I knew what I wanted to make. I've seen road bikes move by me in a blur of indistinguishable lumps of colorful carbon fiber and decided to ride in a different direction: I wanted to make a theme bike - specifically a bike that carried the theme of one of my favorite movies of all time: Back to the Future.

Yes, I know I'm over forty but that's part of the point: we had 'theme bikes' when we were kids, remember? Dukes of Hazzard. Star Wars. Barbie. Knight Rider. Today you can even buy - much to my considerable dismay - a Kylo Ren-themed bike for a child.

Kids have theme bikes now. We had theme bikes then. Why was that something we grew out of? 

I wasn't having it, so I set out to build a Back to the Future-themed road bike.

I figured with the titanium frame, I was already ahead. With the frame and the fork, it looked a lot like brushed stainless steel. I went with a color scheme that consisted mostly of gray and black and even found cables that looked like they'd fit the part. Before long, I needed a bigger tub.

Even though I couldn't - and still can't - bring myself to spend an insane amount of money, I quickly saw how easy it was to go absolutely nuts with the 'Buy it Now' button on eBay. And there are very few parts that are not titanium, carbon fiber, or otherwise made from material that can be described as Incredibly Expensive. Titanium axles. Titanium bottom brackets. Titanium bottom bracket bolts. Titanium stems. Titanium seatposts. Titanium bottle cages. And titanium bottle cage screws can be yours for $6 a pair. 

The list goes on.

Now I did not buy everything I just described. But I bought just enough to make what I was building be considered a serious road bike - until it came to choosing wheels. Instead of dropping thousands I didn't have for some built from the same material as Wolverine's claws, I spent about $80 on a strong, 36 spoke set at Good Karma Bikes - simply because I, as you know, like that place and they happened to carry a set of matching rims that were black and silver - similar to the wheels of the Delorean time machine. 

An HO scale model of the Delorean time machine (and a scuba diver - don't ask. It has something to do with a librarian friend of mine in Florida but beyond that I will add nothing.)

I first tried to focus on the practical side of the build before getting to the decorative touches. For starters, I had to install a headset, which is something I've done quite a few times. Since a croquet mallet wasn't available, I pounded it in place with a rubber hammer, set in a sufficient number of headset spacers, and put on the stem.

Ahhh....no.

The titanium fork was very long - so much so that the number of headset spacers I needed would be a little on the out-of-control side. I texted this picture to my cousin in Connecticut. After a long wait - probably because he needed time to wipe the laugh-spittle off his phone - he told me to do what I knew I needed to do: I had to saw off the top of the titanium fork and make it shorter. 

This wasn't easy. Not the sawing part, it's just that I keep forgetting if it is measure-once-cut-twice or the other way around...and I was really nervous since there'd be no room for error. I figured out how to saw away enough to lower the height of the handlebars and still make it work for my body type and also do it once: what I did was I fastened on two old stems - one on top of the other - leaving just enough space for a hacksaw blade to pass through in a perfectly straight line.

When I finished, I filed it down to make it smooth. When I put it in place, the stem looked a lot less comical and the bike looked a lot safer. 

My cousin had given me a used set of carbon fiber handlebars years earlier to use on my then-untitled roadbike project, and I naturally took them with me when I moved from Connecticut to California. With these in place, I installed a set of modern brake and shift levers. That took a little time since the openings where you have to insert the cables are a lot harder to see on road handlebars than mountain bike ones.

That also meant I wasn't using old school downtube shifters, as are found on older road bikes. The funny part was that my titanium frame came with mounting points for downtube shifters and I didn't even notice that when going back and forth with Porter (you can see them in the photo of the fork installed before I sawed it off).

What I decided to do here was to wire-tie the rear brake and the derailleur cables to the downtube. My reasoning: Doc Brown's time machine had cables running the length of the car, and the gray cables I bought would look the part as well as perform an essential service.

But when I attached the cable with the wire-ties, it blended in too much with the frame. So I added some accents - namely a red, a green, and a yellow wire I stripped from a decades-old phone cord. 

You'll also notice the black rectangular object on the frame with a blue/green switch on it and the telephone wires attached. There's one on the other side too, and they're bolted to the downtube shifter mounts. These are Atlas brand HO scale track switches from a train set I had in the 1980s. In high school I wasn't popular, had few friends and didn't date much so I spent a lot of time building a little model town in my parent's basement. Very little of it survived (just some of the cars, mostly, that I still use today in some of my displays and animation) but these switches did. They're now on the frame, and they are there to stay.

Even though Part II is my least favorite of the trilogy, I liked the look of the Mr. Fusion Home Energy Reactor rising out of the back, so I bought a piece of white plastic hose at a hardware store and covered the seatpost with it. 

Next, came the part I was most excited about.

I collected clocks - lots of them - when I was in my early teens because of Back to the Future. Mostly yard sale finds, I loved the way they all sounded when they were all together and ticking at the same time. Almost all but a couple are gone now, but one that I kept was a tiny, broken alarm clock that had been made in Yugoslavia. The photo may be giving some poor collector a heart attack but, hear me out: a key moment at the end of Back to the Future part 1 was when Doc was giving Marty instructions as to the exact moment he should start the time machine. "When this alarm goes off you hit the gas!" he yells...before placing a tiny clock on the modern dashboard of the car. 

I thought it was cool.

I figured out how to add a clock to my road bike by hollowing out the old Forestville clock.

Next, I managed to locate a bicycle computer that would fit inside - which actually wasn't that hard to do since most bike computers are really quite small. A tip of the hat to The Off Ramp in Santa Clara for having this Sigma computer on sale.

What I did was I cut a piece of yellow foam PVC - leftover from my failed cargo bike business, just like I had used when I made the Alameda Bike Trailers - into a circle where I attached the mount for the Sigma computer. This put the display in view of the clock's face - here's how the yellow piece of foam PVC looks without the computer on it. The screw in the middle is what holds it in place and attaches the entire assembly to a plastic reflector mount which I modified to angle the clock up towards me. 

The last thing I did was use some black rubber bands - you know, the kind that come with a Garmin GPS so you can put a mount on your handlebars? I used two to wrap the two top bells of the clock to the 'feet' of the clock to eliminate any chance the vibrations of the road could make the whole thing come apart. 

I was very happy with the result. I reasoned I didn't need any of the functions but wanted the current speed and the distance - as of now, the total distance the bike has ridden since it came into existence. I reasoned Strava could handle the rest.

I didn't abandon the idea of welding something for this bike - and ended up welding a very important piece: because of my decision to run the cables along the downtube I couldn't use a traditional bottom bracket cable guide for the front derailleur. Reasoning that the front derailleur would never work completely perfectly anyway* I welded a tiny mount with a little L-bracket and a steel cable stop - also from the failed cargo bike business.

I know it's not pretty to look at, but it's mounted under the bottom bracket where you can't see it anyway.

Another new item for me - even though you've seen it in a couple of the photos already - is a Redshift suspension stem. I am a fan of suspension stems (my city bike has a cool one) and decided I'd like a little more comfort on my hands when riding. So far it's done the job well. 

I knew there was one more thing I needed for this bike: a flux capacitor. To be honest, I didn't even know that it needed one until I saw that ThinkGeek actually sold little decorative flux capacitors as car cell phone chargers a few years ago.

Cue the 'Buy it Now' button. 

A few weeks after placing the order, I got it in the mail and took it apart almost immediately. The black plug in the back was the first thing to go when I noticed that a simple nine volt battery was enough to make the flux capacitor...flux. 

The on/off switch was a bit of a hassle though: For what I wanted to do it was not only awkward, but it was momentary on/off so it wouldn't work if you'd detach it from power. I discovered where the circuit is complete and soldered - with an iron bought decades ago from Radio Shack, God rest its soul - a tiny piece of red wire so it would always remain in the 'on' position. You can see it on the lower right side of the picture. 

With that done, I set out to create a place to mount the flux capacitor. No better place than a plastic Cage Rocket.

As a big fan of the Camelbak, I like the idea of using a frame bottle cage to carry something other than water. So I took a Cage Rocket case and sawed off a chunk of it the approximate size of the flux capacitor.

I took a piece of plastic from the packaging the epoxy came in to fill the gap on the bottom of the flux capacitor so the Cage Rocket could still be used to store a spare tube and a few road bike specific tools, like a titanium tire lever**.

I carefully smeared epoxy to attach it firmly. I also used more very old parts from Radio Shack - like a push-button switch and a 9v battery mount - and soldered everything in place.

And, on a Saturday morning, coming on the scene on the Raiders of the Lost Ark DVD when Marion wins a drinking contest in Nepal, I...had...this.

The little red button is rated for 120 volts and it makes a satisfying click when you push it. If I wanted to cut down on some weight, I could remove the battery or even the entire Cage Rocket but why would I want to do that?

So there you have it. Other cyclists are faster than me, stronger than me, have more money than me, have bigger followings on Strava, have better equipment, are better looking, and...where was I going with this? 

Oh yeah: other cyclists may have all of these things but I am the one with the Back to the Future bike. I did that. From time to time, on a satisfying downhill, I can almost hear the music by Alan Silvestri and the words "Vaya con dios!" screamed by Christopher Lloyd while he fires a pistol in the air.

The bike works great. As of course I pointed out in the Cycle of Hope ride the front derailleur is problematic, which is on-brand...but then again so is the rest of the bike. Hope you all can build something for you that sparks something in you - even - no, especially - if it takes a long time to spring into being. Thanks for reading and thanks for riding.

*since I was the one installing it. I have terrible luck with front derailleurs. 

**those are real.

See Box Bike by DIYBIKING.COM at the Silicon Valley Bikes Festival on Sunday

The 3rd annual Silicon Valley Bikes Festival is coming to History Park in San Jose on Sunday - and not only am I going to be there, but a Box Bike by DIYBIKING.COM is coming with me so find my booth

Underneath the booth you should find me, a bike, a table, some of my artwork (both photographs and welded artwork). I'll also have a fun thing like the 2x2 matrix I had for the Cargo Bike Festival last year. 

I will also be taking the time to remind you to like Cranksgiving San Jose on Facebook because we're going to be planning the next one - and we're going to make it bigger. I'll explain later (or at the festival, if you have time).

See you Sunday - Thanks for reading and thanks for riding.

#MyMakerYear: TIG Welding

                      At a TIG welding class at TechShop San Jose

Welcome to another edition of #MyMakerYear by DIYBIKING.COM. Brought to you by Cherry Hill, New Jersey.

(Turns to Camera B with a Smile)

Cherry Hill. A jigsaw puzzle with pieces missing in town form.

(Turns back to Camera A)

How is your bike joined together?

That depends on where it is made and who made it. In the UK, when I toured Brompton's headquarters, I saw the beauty of brazing (and you'll see it too if you buy a Brompton folding bike). All of my welding that you've seen me do for this site - including the folding cargo bike I made from old bike frames last year - is MIG welded (Janet Lafleur made this video last year on Bike to Work Day).

But when I bought a cargo bike business (which will be seen at the Silicon Valley Bike Festival May 7th) I discovered all of the bikes are TIG welded.

I didn't even know what the 'T' stood for. Here's a handy answer key if you forgot too:

Metal

Inert

Gas

Tungsten

Inert 

Gas

Also, while we are on initials: KGB stands for Komitet Gosudarstvennoy Benopasnosti but it is easier to say "Committee for State Security" in English.

But back to welding.

Modern MIG welding works by attaching a metal clamp to your work and touching it with metal attached to your gun. The metal is fed from a spool of wire in your machine which allows you to weld for very long periods - all with using just one hand if you wish.

TIG welding, as I quickly found out, works differently. You still attach a metal clamp to your work but instead of a gun, you have a special thing that resembles a really fat fountain pen attached to an unwieldy umbilical cord. An electrode made of tungsten* sticks out of it. You put the electrode close to your work without touching it, activate the welder with your foot and use your other hand (which you of course don't need to hold your work in place or do something important) to feed the wire into the arc - and thus join two metals together.

At a TIG welding class at TechShop San Jose 

After I learned this I wondered why anyone would TIG weld when they could MIG. 

But about ten seconds after I learned this, I found out why. I remember putting on my welding mask and watching Alex demonstrate how to build a cargo bike. Instead of smoke and white-hot sparks that can set fire to the papers piled on the surface of your MIG welding instructor's desk** there were almost no sparks and - this part was particularly eerie - very little noise. Just a brief sizzle as the arc started up and then a very bright light (which I learned later, can give you a sunburn if you don't cover all exposed skin).

Also instead of a weld that, as is often the case for me, looks like a semi-smushed metal caterpillar, you can more easily get a weld that looks like this.

Admit it: if this weld was on Tinder, you'd swipe right. 

But I didn't get that result right away. Practice came in two stages: the first was about an hour spent in Alex's workshop in Santa Cruz (thank you, Alex).

At that time I had a small pile of identical steel scraps I could practice with and try to weld together the exact same way so I could focus on technique, amperage and other variables. I also had a tiny piece of whiteboard that I used to write down what I had done so I could take pictures like this:

Welding while sitting down isn't something I did much - if at all - when MIG welding since my shop never had a table large enough to weld on and I was constantly repositioning myself to make sure the sparks or smoke would blast directly into me. But this is where TIG shows a quirk (you pretty much have to be sitting in order to use the foot pedal) and its value: without a ton of smoke and none of the violent sparks associated with MIG you can actually see more of what is happening with your work. You can see the arc melt the steel, you can finesse where the puddle of molten steel goes, you can control the speed you add the filler (since you're doing it with your other hand).

As I practiced I upped or dropped the amperage, used a short electrode, messed around with the amount of argon gas flowing, accidentally touched the tip of the electrode to the work (that is a no-no), dragged the electrode toward me or away from me, and so on. And I kept a record of it with my little whiteboard - always starting with a number at top (as in, the number of times I had welded the same two pieces of metal together).

After my hour at Alex's shop, I took advantage of my membership at TechShop San Jose (which recently reopened after their move) and reserved a TIG welder to continue practice. A box of the steel pieces and my little whiteboard came for the ride.

As you can see, Attempt #28 was a real bust. 

The mini white board technique did help me become more self aware as I worked. At the end of the day, the attitude of the person doing the welding is an important variable that I missed the first couple dozen times. When I flipped up my mask on Attempt #34, I realized I was the problem because I wasn't being patient.

I was clearly overdue for a long bike ride or a yoga class.

I went through it again. And again. And again. Weld, write, adjust, repeat. 

I began thinking of the poor woman from the X-Files episode Monday who tries to change the outcome of a horrible day she is reliving over and over. I could hear the words she desperately said to Mulder: "Until we get it right." 

Until we get it right.

By Attempt #44 I had begun to isolate what things were leading to good results, and I was sticking with them. 

Eventually, I ran out of those little steel pieces. I figured out how to hold the TIG gun and move it more smoothly. And other things too - like being patient. 

I've done more TIG since and have begun making cargo bike frame number three (you can see the first Box Bike by DIYBIKING.COM frame - which was welded by Alex - at the Silicon Valley Bike Festival on May 7th).

Before I forget another interesting thing about TIG is you can weld stainless steel together. So for practice I welded some old brake rotors. It made a pretty cool candle holder. 

So that's TIG welding. If you want to learn how to do it I recommend the classes TechShop San Jose offers or look for their other locations and just get as much practice as you can until you get it right. Failing that, strong. Thanks for reading and thanks for riding. 

*Tungsten is used because it has a ridiculously high melting point of 6,192 Fahrenheit. Also the symbol for tungsten is a W - you can see it go by in the extended opening credits for 'Breaking Bad' when Anna Gunn's name goes by. 

**That really happened at the welding class I took in January 2014 at the Silvermine Art Center in Connecticut. The instructor was really cool about it but kept his papers in his desk from then on. 

My Maker Year: Building A Bicycle Wheel

Welcome back to another installment of #MyMakerYear by DIYBIKING.COM. Brought to you by Cherry Hill, New Jersey.

(Turns to Camera B with a Jon Stewart-like smile)

Cherry Hill. Because putting pedestrians in front of a firing squad is illegal.

    Cherry Hill, New Jersey. 2017

(Turns back to Camera A)

Back when I had the money to buy expensive tools before knowing how to use them, I purchased a shop grade truing stand from Park Tool. For years the words: "Clockwise to loosen/Counter-clockwise to tighten" were written on a piece of paper and taped to it so I wouldn't forget.

I am pretty good at truing wheels if certain questions are answered. Is the truing stand at a comfortable height? Is the room completely quiet except for the Mythbusters, Justified or Firefly episode playing on the DVD player? Am I wearing comfortable shoes? Is there coffee in a Back to the Future mug within arms reach?

And so on. 

If I'm go-for-launch I can straighten every bent bicycle wheel I put in my stand except for the ones I can't. But until very recently, I've never made a wheel one spoke at a time. It's always been a mystery to me. My cousin - the Mountain Bike Jedi Master himself - never had a chance to teach me when I lived in Connecticut. And I never took a class or watched anyone make one. 

Then I bought a small cargo bike company and discovered - after I knew I wanted to buy the business - that the wheels are made. At that point I realized this needed to be a skill I should pick up.
  

I know this is a picture of the bike bell I made from my late grandfather's old typewriter, but the pattern your wheel makes on the pavement is what I want you to look at. 

If you're near your bike look at one of the wheels. It's pretty to look at. But look at one spoke near the rim and follow it down to the hub. Notice that the spoke on either side is facing the opposite direction. And each spoke is screwed into a special nut - called the nipple - in the hole in the rim. 

All the years I've spent around bikes I never really forced myself to look at a bike wheel to see the pattern. But that wasn't all I did. I engaged in Google searches and flipped through books. I watch some YouTube videos. I got a rim with 36 holes, a hub with 36 holes, 36 spokes and 40 nipples - just in case I dropped some. Also a tiny brush so I could put a bit of of oil on the treads of each spoke. 

Finally, I decided I was ready. I sat on the couch of my living room and did the first step in making a wheel: I placed the rim on my lap and, holding the hub, I dropped a set through every other hole in the top of the hub and put one spoke into the hole just to the left of the valve hole. Then I put each subsequent spoke into every fourth hole.

I then flipped the wheel over and dropped in a new set. Then I inserted each one; starting at a hole near the first set and, again, counting every fourth hole. 

When done with this step, I dropped the third set into the rim and, spreading the spokes with my hand, flipped the wheel over in one daft* move.

As I worked I felt myself hitting a peaceful zone. Spoke, nipple, twist, repeat. I began to wonder what all the fuss was about and realized I was going to...oh wait. I did something wrong.

I was well into the fourth and final set when I realized what had happened: I wasn't crossing the spokes underneath which was why they were bowing out awkwardly. I didn't know where I went wrong. I disassembled the entire wheel and started again. 

This time, I paid more attention to what I was doing until I finally got a wheel that looked the way it should.

But something unfortunate happened: I didn't know where I went right, so I took the wheel apart once again.

I was more determined than ever to finish a wheel before nightfall. I just needed to get into The Zone again with the confidence I was doing the job proper. 

Then my wife came home and reminded me she was heading to a friend's house for a "Drink and Draw" - this is apparently when sketchers get together and do taxes while eating Skittles if I understand the title right. 

At the tail end of a busy week, she wasn't sure she'd stay long and wanted me to come with her. Even though I was once again living the occasional unfortunate byproduct of having one car between us I decided not to let it get in the way of my evening plans. I told her I was bringing wheels to build during the evening. I've seen women in my family knit in social settings. This seemed no different. 

And that is how I, on a recent Friday night, wound up sitting in a chair in a stranger's home, with a plastic toy aircraft carrier at my feet, building a wheel while several women before me drank wine, chatted, and sketched. It was like being on the set of The View but with more sketching and fewer commercial breaks.

While I was busying myself with my craft, my wife as well as the other women sketched anything that was lying around the kitchen: spatulas, wine bottles, vases of flowers - things like that. None of them brought their husbands - probably because they didn't realize a wheel build lesson would be involved. 

I went through the build steps again and slipped up again: I crossed a set of spokes the wrong way. I took it all apart and, in doing so, wound up spilling my tiny plastic box of nipples into a child's toy bin. I gathered as many of them as I could find - reasoning that the children whose house this is were big enough not to consider these things choking hazards.

Finally, I managed to get all four steps right.

It looked like a wheel. I spun it in my hands - it turned like a wheel too (even though I obviously still needed to put it through its paces in the truing stand).

I looked at my watch. It was just after 9:00pm. My wife had mentioned to me earlier that she didn't think she'd stay long but when I glanced up she seemed to still be sketching with extreme energy. 

So I built another wheel. This one went together faster but the clock pushed past 10:00pm. One of the sketchers had left for the evening. Did my wife want to leave too? I avoided eye contact at the moment as I wanted to get the second wheel done.

And I did.

With two wheels ready for the truing stand (which I did not bring) I proudly showed the ladies at the table what I had done. I couldn't tell if they were amused, impressed or both - but it was clear I'd be welcome back to the table again.

I've built more wheels since - and I do have the equivalent of "Clockwise to loosen/Counter-clockwise to tighten" saved on my phone to make sure I get everything right. The truing step still has some demands but all building a wheel needs is materials and a lap. I recommend you study how to build a bicycle wheel and, if a sketcher is present, allow yourself to be sketched. Thanks for reading and thanks for riding.

           Me building a wheel Friday, March 24, 2017. Sketched by the artist Suma CM



*It is supposed to be 'deft.' It is a typo but if you watched me do this the first time it could go either way.