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Since September or October - I forget.

Long time since I've posted here, but I think I can help.

Freewheel on Hayes Street - small, but surprisingly well-stocked.
Freewheel on Valencia Street - bigger, but more road-oriented.
Box Dog on 14th Street - occasional gems, but mostly 'my first track bike's, lots of Iro and such. Nice parts selection, though.
Pedal Revolution on 21st Street - mainly used, but decent stuff. Some track parts and accessories.
American Cyclery on Stanyan Street - good selection, but high prices and shitty attitudes from 90% of the staff. Although, if you look like you have money, they may treat you better.

Now, if you can make the trip over the bay to Oakland, get thee to Montano Velo on Piedmont Avenue. For starters, I work there, for seconds it's the home of Broakland Bikes, for thirds, we have a fair stack of track stuff on hand, for fourths, we have a dog named Cipollini.

I'm working all this week, but my mum's coming over to visit next week, so I'm taking some time off. If you can get across before Sunday (we close on Sundays) come in and ask for Jonathan - I'm the only Englishman there, so I'm a little hard to miss.

Seriously tho', good luck Barack Obama... Whether he's gonna make any difference or not it's still a step in the right direction for the US if they elect him... I never thought I'd see a black Presidential candidate in my lifetime... That's a very, very good thing...

Hollywood can be very prescient sometimes...

I have to agree with both the hope that Obama gets in and, sadly, the fear that he'll be another Tony Blair. The similarities are striking - young, fresh-faced, former lawyer, seems on the level, promises change etc. etc.

Well, I guess my adopted home is about to decide.

Ok "dude", I will break it down for you: Stevo is one of the nicest, least objectionable people on this forum, and if you ever had the pleasure of having a beer with him, you would know that his comments are light hatred, and well-meaning, as that is the kind of person he is. You, being wound up tighter then a homophobic squirrel's asshole, for reason possibly relating to the size of your genitals, when compared to other men, have deiced to stat a fight with him. This action, when viewed alone, is hardly understandable, but given that this particular forum is full of more objectionable individuals, my self for example, whom no one would be particularity shocked, if you attempted to engage in a bout of fisticuffs, your action is unjustifiable. I sincerely hope that you sir, are not the tattered cloth, that an urchin has used to clean himself after defecating, and then discarded, that you have made your self out to be.

Also, I highly doubt your ability to overcome Stevo's prowess at the test of strength and wills that is a bout of modern fisticuffs, and if you engaged in this endeavor, I sir, would wager heavily against you. Furthermore, after Stevo, gives you the most humiliating, defeat, of your, presumably young life, I and many other members of this forum would have to follow to the ditch on the Welsh frontier, where you body would be lain, and relive our bladders upon you, after dining on fine local ale, and asparagus.

That is all.

It's the commas.

I'm about to get slated for this, I'm sure - but you, my friend, sound like the exact person that the OTP track bike was invented for.

Buy a nice, basic, complete bike (I personally recommend the Fuji Track, based on my own experiences), throw a front brake on and be done with it. Not only will you have something that handles more like a 'proper' track bike, but you'll have something that will hold a lot more of it's value than a conversion for when you come to sell it because you either get bored with fixed or get the upgrade bug.

Seriously, I really think that this would be the best course of action for you.

http://www.biddlebikes.co.uk/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=321&products_id=162

Less than 300 bones.

Rickshaw! http://www.rickshawbags.com/

Turpe, I love the pipebomb, one of my favorite frames from new frame builders, but I bit step for my pocket, any how amazing piece of steel
:)

Why, thank you. I decided to go for the Street Fighter for my own personal bike. The geo on the PipeBomb is designed for a 650C front, and I'm a bit more of a traditionalist, so went for the simpler frame and just ported all the parts from my Uno over (box-section rims, drops, etc. etc.) to make a 'classic' looking build that just happens to be a very obnoxious shade of orange, like so:

The mix of tubing gives a really nice, stiff ride, but it's surprising comfortable. Also, WoundUp forks are amazing pieces of kit - if you ever have a couple hundred quid burning a hole in your pocket, I'd spend it on one.

Hey man! Jeez it was manic! Not stop superstar action. I couldn't keep up with all the customers! ha ha.
They were good dayz. Don't see a lot of that anymore.
Maybe the Jeff Staple NB release caused a bit of mania recently but it's all been rinsed nowadays.
Good memories.

How's thing in SF? You enjoying life there?

I rode home from work in a t-shirt tonight. Yes, I'm enjoying life very much here - my new job is managing a bike shop that stocks high-end road bikes and is the home of Broakland Bikes (handmade steel track bikes).

It's pretty nuts to be surrounded by Times, Cervélos, Moots' and Pegorettis all day, but work with a bunch of down-to-earth guys that are the antithesis of the 'corporate bike world'. We went to Vegas for Interbike recently and spent twice as much time playing in traffic on the Strip and riding an empty pool we found than we did looking at bikes.

Fun times, indeed.

As Rodney P once asked... How's Life In London?

New Nitto bars B259SL B200SL from EAI so should end up here at some point.

We got these in at my shop last week (I'm in the US). They're actually pretty narrow as they come - about long enough for a set of Ourys to reach from the end to the bend - but they're heavy as all shit. Seriously, so heavy that I think they are solid rather than hollow.

Honestly, they look great on the shelf but, unless you're going to run bare risers (forgive me for pointing out how stupid that would look), who the hell is going to ever see the rounded ends?

Nice idea on paper, but a real world fail, IMHO.

Fuckin Resellers!
Are those really worthy of reselling anyway?! Those days are pretty much over...
Cannot believe you are reselling through this forum either.

I don't want to get started on this....

I'm with Teenslain on this one.

Oh, Todd... remember the Superstar 35th morning?

Here's my favourite 'reseller' story:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqUKEhyvFaM

not half as bling, but your are west coast so you are allways shit, and probably getting used to it.

Yes, it's been tough acclimatizing to having sunshine 90% of the time and this whole 'ability to just roll out my door and go ride a 50-mile loop of gently rolling hills through beautiful redwood forests' thing is starting to really get me down.

Here's my friend Shawn's Nagasawa (used only on the track) by way of keeping this post pornsome:

un-drilled DA's??

Yup. That was the first picture of the older-style DA track hubs I could find via Google. A friend of mine has one of those built up to a white Deep-V that's gathering dust in his apartment somewhere.

oh really
Campag bling bling sheriff star hub:

Da hub:

Sorry I'm a little late to this (I was busy last week), but...

Carry on.

looks exactly like the OBEYxFuji

I was chatting to our Fuji rep at work the other day and it basically is, just with slightly cheaper components and a lower price point. I'm never quite sure what to make of the pricier steel OTPs from the 'big boys' - I figure that anyone that's going to spend $1200 on a steel track bike knows enough to not buy an OTP, but to build one themselves.

It seems like they're pushing it at a really particular demographic of folks that want the 'look' of a classic track bike and aren't that clued up about things like parts and performance and so on.

Then again, I just work in a bike shop, not for a manufacturer, so what do I know?

Well this particular obamacon reckons that if America elects the 72 year old frat boy the democrats might as well give up politics now as they are never likely to win.

Not while Diebold are counting the votes, anyways...

The irony of course is that having pushed out Blair you are now saddled with perhaps the most incompetent and unpopular prime minister in British history.

I've been living in SF for a little over a year now, so I'm actually saddled with the most incompetent and unpopular president in American history. Unless McCain gets in, of course (sadly, a very real possibility), in which case I'll be saddled with an incompetent, unopop... er... nevermind.

Barack Obama - a fresh-faced, seemingly honest, lawyer-turned politician promises to change his country immeasurably for the better.

Some years ago, another fresh-faced, seemingly honest, lawyer-turned politician had just swept to victory in a general election on a promise to change his country immeasurably for the better. A nation rejoiced at finally turning the corner and emerging from the darkness.

To date, Anthony Charles Lynton Blair is the only British Prime Minister in history to have been questioned by the police on an allegation of corruption whilst still in office. He was also the main cheerleader (outside of the US, of course) for military action in a small country named Iraq where women used to be able to go to school without fear of being attacked by religious zealots for daring to want an education. He, and his government, have presided over the collapse of the British economy, the effects of which have only just begun to be felt.

Forgive me for not getting my hopes up about Obama.

Can I get a shout for J Church?!

It's all about N Judah nowadays.

...and this:

...is lovely, Miro.

oh god I want to go back to SF, I miss it so.
the weather, my school, my friends, swimming every day ahhhhhh those were the days.
You don't know how lucky you are.

I was born in the Norfolk & Norwich hospital and moved to London via Cambridge (working there, not attending). I know exactly how lucky I am, my friend, believe me.

Every time a California native complains about how cold it is, I allow myself a wry chuckle at the thought of standing in the snow at the junction of Hackney Road & Mare Street, freezing my bollocks off, waiting for a No.26 bus.

Oh, to keep this vaguely on topic, I have a couple of new bikes, although this is the only one that's fixed:

...the other is a Rauler road bike from the mid-80s that I'm in the process of prettying up. I'll post a picture at some point.

My face remains the same, as seen to your left.

I'm going to suggest Florida

San Francisco. Near the Ferry Building, where legions of kids with carbon front wheels go to practice skidding in various states of contortion.

Zoe, what are you doing here? You're not even English!

Hello hello. I'm Marisa, 25 from LA.

You too?

My personal favourite VeloSpace ever was when someone posted up a grainy mobile phone pic of a pair of stock Pista bars and a stem laying on his bed, next to his feet (which were in dirty socks, by the way) and claimed that it was his 'sick track bike' - because the rest of it was coming in the mail and he just couldn't wait to post up pictures of the parts he had already.

I noticed an Oakland A's cap in the picture, so I posted it on SFFixed asking the culprit to own up
and the entire VeloSpace listing disappeared. I felt a little mean, but what the hell. I also remember seeing one where the guy drew (badly) a picture of his 'dream fixxie' with a pencil. I thought that one was a joke until he updated it to a pic of the real bike once he'd built it and they looked pretty similar.

Yes, I am a sad bastard with too much time on his hands.

(retreats back to secluded log cabin)

BFF comes soon.

SF is ridiculously full of people riding track bikes. Ridiculous.

I'm in San Francisco, so a little out of the loop, but I believe Armortex in Hackney are still the folks to see about powdercoating in my old stomping grounds...

Cog is regular threading, so you're fine with that - I'm running an EAI on mine, if you care - however, lockring threading is FRENCH(!) so you'll need the Mavic lockring.

You may also need a spacer (I did). Go to a Mavic dealer and ask them to order you a set of lockrings and spacers - there's a specific spacer for this hub - and don't use any other lockring or you'll screw up (if you'll pardon the pun) the threading on your not-exactly-cheap hub.

Also, I corroborate briankwan's testimony - the Ellipse rear hub is definitely fixed on both sides. What I'm confused by is the fact that (although I'm assuming here) you didn't get the lockring and spacers included when you bought the wheels - I know I got two of each with mine.