All these bloody framebuilders eh

Thanks!

Yes! On that note I'll drop u a DM :)

Yeah I learnt this stuff at uni however all of it can be learnt on YouTube. Actually I'm not really sure how much I learnt at uni most of it was learnt from YouTube.

Basically the other end then, must also be quite good.
Was just so impressed, but then maybe all the small rivers in french mountains are as nice.

Ok well progress is being made. We have found a flat to rent and it comes with a garage. 25m^2!! So I will soon have a workshop, very exciting, moving in early march. Slight problem in that I left my expensive tools in London at my parents with the intention of them driving down at some point.

However my mum managed to fall and fracture some vertebrae a few weeks ago, them driving down is not looking hugely promising, so not entirely sure how I will get the rest of my tools here just yet. If anyone happens to be driving from London to Provence soonish please let me know, will pay for fuel. My tig welder doesn't make good conversation, be prepared for a quiet drive.

So yeah overall reasonably good progress, can't wait to have a garage soon and all my tools in the same place, then will start on an MTB asap.

Also I found this time lapse of me welding my girlfriends road frame, which I forgot to post here. I thought it was cool.

ok too large to upload, here it is on insta

https://www.instagram.com/p/CzWDoP7MFul/

Ok good news, we have almost completely moved into the new flat and I have put all my framebuilding things in the soon-to-be workshop. I've attached pics. It's so big, very exciting. It used to be somewhere where they're stored cattle I think as there's a trough like thing and some hooks. It's under the building in a passage. It has very cool ancient wooden beams in the ceiling. There are two sinks but neither work, however there is power.

I'm syked, I think it'll be great, it's at least 3 or 4 times the size of my previous space. We're currently unpacking, but in the next few days I'll get down there and hoover then start spreading things out and see what the plan is for what things where.

Pics

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Swinging my arms to demonstrate it's possible to swing your arms. No arm swinging was possible in my previous workshop

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Looks amazing max !!!!!

Massive workshop you say? In Provence you say? Not envious at all...

Space for a Bridgeport in there for sure

:)

I'm feeling very lucky to have found somewhere like this. I'm extremely excited to get up and running.

Hah that's would be great, can't afford right now but in due course who knows.

Thanks Sam! Hope Ur doing well.

We spent this morning cleaning and dusting. It's looking way better now. There was a reasonable amount of dust. There is also a shelf already there and a desktop which should work great as a workbench for now. I also unpacked a bunch of my tools. So great to see my jig again, I missed it alot.

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Spider hoovering

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Workbench and tools laid out

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Progress has been made...
I now have most of my tools, so im now 99% set up, i only need gases. I attached my vice to the workbench and have made some progress on my mtb, I have mitred up the front end, and am waiting for the dropouts to continue, very exciting. The down tube is 853 DZB, which ive had collecting dust in my tube box for years. Its cool to use and the butt profile is great for an mtb, but its noticeably quite hard, as in much more difficult to cut/file than any other tubes ive used. So it took a bit longer, but worth it for the cool sticker if nothing else.

There are still a few tools in the UK, my big vise, tube notcher and a few other heavy bits, which will end up here at some point hopefully. Whenever my parents come.

The last thing to figure out is getting argon, i've set up a contract with Air Liquide, which is an air products equivalent in France, and should be able to get some soon. Fingers crossed.

The workbench was a bit high and so i managed to get some pallets and have created a platform to stand on. Its also a quite nice soft surface to stand on, which is nice for standing on for a while.

Ive never had so much space before, its fantastic. The photos sort of compress it a bit but its about 3 times my previous workspace. There's quite a lot of storage but i could do with another shelving unit or something. There's a monthly brocante in the village with random furniture and stuff so i will keep an eye out!

Ive accumulated insane amounts of cardboard from our boxes so i need to get rid of that and it will make a bit more room.

I'm aiming to build a stand for my jig soon as well, i quite like the chop source rotisserie stand design so i think i will copy that, itd be good to get the jig off the makeshift bench i put it on, and being able to rotate it to tack is very appealing.

This is what i will aim to build roughly, https://www.chopsource.com/frame-jig-rotisserie-stand.html

I also put up a light, which looks dodgy in the photos but is actually a really nice colour temp and illuminates the room evenly. I bought two and have only fitted one so far, i will put the other one up soon and it'll be a really even light across the room i think.

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more

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The frame i built my girlfriend has also made it here, so we will get it painted and built up asap. If anyone has recommendations for nice painters or powdercoaters in south east France please let me know!

Progress being made! I have now got everything for framebuilding, finally sorted some gas out about 2 weeks ago and im good to go. I couldnt get quite as large a bottle as i had in England but thats ok, still pretty large. Interestingly gas bottle rental is way cheaper here, which is nice. I did have to buy a new argon reg as the bottle outlet is different.

So with that sorted i cracked on with bits and bobs on the hardtail, ive got the front end fitting very nicely, brazed bottle bosses and reinforcing rings on the headtube. Today I welded the seat collar into the seattube and dropouts to chainstays. Next up is mitering the chainstays and then welding the whole thing together. Its great to be back to it, it felt so far away for a while.

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I made this extremely handy tool recently. Its not very high tech and i didnt come up with the idea but its been really useful. Its for measuring the actual distance between the shortest point of mitres on the front end. It means i can mark the exact distance i need to cut to on the tubes which is nice, technically these values can be drawn from bikecad, but its nice to have the true value pulled straight from the jig. I got the idea from Devlin Cycles, he posted it on custom frame forum

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Also, im keen to take on some forumenger frames at the moment, ive got a lot more time to build frames and would love to get some frames out for people on here. So if anyone fancies a frame, drop me a message!

Was just going to ask if you’re taking commissions!!