SABMA Meeting #4 notes
About a year ago Alistair Spence and I proposed starting a local group of hobbyist and professional framebuilders to meet once in a while and discuss projects, techniques, whatever. Alistair came up with the name SABMA (Seattle Area Bicycle Manufacturer’s Association). This weekend we had our fourth meeting, which signified the start of the second year of SABMA.
So far the meetings haven’t had much of a theme, they’ve been more of a chance to explore other people’s workshops and to get to know each other. This time around I proposed that we do a little hand’s on work too. I brought over my oxy/propane rig and we setup Alistair’s oxy/acetylene rig. Mark and Martin offered to do some demonstration joints. Alistair prepared the lugs and I mitered some tubing. The meeting had a good turnout for such an event,8 of us showed up for it (Andy, Alex, Alistair, Dan, Eric, Mark, Martin,Thomas).
First up Martin brazed a Ritchey dropout to a chainstay:
Mark brass brazed a lug using oxy/propane:
Martin silver brazed a lug using oxy/acetylene (this shot wasn’t taken through didynium like the rest of them,so you can see the red sodium flare from the flux):
As a Grand Finale Mark quickly mitered up the remaining scrap tubes and fillet brazed for us. Since I’ve been working on my fillet brazing myself I learned a lot from this quick demo and look forward to practicing some more at home:
We didn’t have too much time for show and tell this time. Martin brought a road/disk bike that he is working on, Alistair showed his latest bike (well documented on his flickr site) and I bought a couple of front triangles that I’ve built. Eric Bailey came with this neat stem with integrated decaleur:
Thomas from Idaho also brought his latest kokoPedli folding bike and showed it off to us.
I didn’t take a photo of the awesome spread of food that we brought together for the event. Alistair and Alon made a nice Gazpacho and there was a variety of store bought and home made muffins, bread, cookies, cheese, and beer.
I really enjoyed this meeting and look forward to the next one. I think we’ll be discussing alignment at that one, and hopefully having a bit more time for show and tell. I might even have a bike to ride down to it.