Seeking some constructive criticism

[Nick_Neuhaus]

After the beginning of the new year I decided to make my son a balance bike and matching pedal bike. I’m still in the process of finishing these.

[Nick_Neuhaus]

I hope everyone is staying safe and healthy. I just wanted to post some pictures of my most recent work. This is a a 29+ singlespeed built around a 100mm suspension fork or suspension corrected rigid fork. I made an attempt at internal dropper routing from the downtube into the seat tube.

As far as process goes things are going much smoother these days. With the extra time around the house I’ve been spending loads of time doing practice welds and then cutting/breaking them apart to see how I’m doing.

[jon_norstog]

Looks OK to me! And it's WAY nicer than my gnarly oxy-acetylene welds. Keep it up!

jn

[Nick_Neuhaus]

Got it all built up and I couldn’t be happier with how it turned out. I ended up putting CushCore’s in to keep the tires from burping air on the dually rims, but besides that one little thing I am very pleased with it.

[Nick_Neuhaus]

I’ve been beating my + bike all over Northern California and absolutely loving it, it rides better than expected and is holding up great.

Based on some things learned with that bike I decided to make myself a new gravel frame. I shouldn’t have it back from the powder coater in a week or two, but I’m looking forward to getting it built.

I also moved into a dedicated workshop and have been working on getting some additional machines set up and tooling made.












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[progetto]

Time at the bench is the only thing that makes you better. Well done Nick.

[Nick_Neuhaus]

Time at the bench is the only thing that makes you better. Well done Nick.

Thank you

That’s it, like anything time and practice is the only way to get better. I’ve been challenging myself under the hood and at the machines I’ve acquired.

It’s crazy to me when I look back at where I started a little over a year ago. I couldn’t have gotten to this point without some of the feedback I received on this site.

[Nick_Neuhaus]

Wow, been a while since I updated this. I’ve got quite a few more builds under my belt and things are going well. The shop is pretty well dialed in, I have all of my fixtures mounted and easily accessible, and I’ve been able to start focusing on smaller and smaller details as the big stuff becomes more second nature.

Here is a 29+ forward geo frame. I made a yoke to accommodate the tire size and ultimately feel that the route I took to reduce weight was less than ideal. I’ve since got my process for that much more dialed in.













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[Nick_Neuhaus]

Next up is a gravel bike I did for a friend of mine. This is almost an exact copy of the frame I’ve been riding with just a few small changes based on his needs. This frame will clear a 700x44 with any road 2x crankset. It’s a little more mountain bike than my previous gravel bikes, but it’s incredibly capable in the dirt.















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[Nick_Neuhaus]

And a few of my finished gravel bike.




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[Nick_Neuhaus]

This is a forward geo mullet bike I made for myself. With a 480 reach, 64.5 hta, and 415 chainstays, I designed this around a 130 fork with a 29x2.5 up front and a 27.5x2.5 out back. Jury’s still out on how this will ride. I’ve made some revisions based on what I learned from the gen 1 mullet that’ll hopefully make a slightly better pedaling bike.









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[Nick_Neuhaus]

This frame is known as the trials9er, built for a friend that likes to hop up on, around, and off everything in sight, this frame was a real challenge as he had some unique requests. One of those was “make the chainstays as short as possible. This frame clears a 29x2.5 at a 405 chainstay with a standard boost chainline.









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[progetto]

Once you have the basics down, time at the bench is the key. Well done.

[Nick_Neuhaus]

Here’s one of the frames I posted earlier all built up.

[Nick_Neuhaus]

This is a singlespeed frame I finished up today and dropped off for powder coat today.

[progetto]

Just goes to show what time at the bench can do. Well done.

[Nick_Neuhaus]

Just goes to show what time at the bench can do. Well done.

They just keep getting easier and easier. I dont use time as a metric, but I do keep track. This frame start to finish was a hair under 9 hours start to finishing including making the yoke, and working out some details with the dropouts (chainstay pad is .740 and chainstay is .750)

The main construction is becoming less of a focal point and that’s allowing me to focus on the smaller details.

Alignment early on was a struggle for me and while it’s always at the forefront of my mind, I don't dread bolting a welded frame to the bb post anymore. Ive gotten to a point where I trust my construction techniques, I’ve developed my process, and I’ve honed in my welding to the point the the results are as expected and fall within the range of acceptable outcomes.


I also made a fork. It turned out ok, I learned a lot and the next will be better.

[Nick_Neuhaus]

I decided to jump into the deep end today, and started my first titanium frame.

[Rody]

Nick,

Unlike steel, Titanium is very subject to failure due to undercut, or starving the joint. Specifically in acute angles, where your torch is pulling more material from the two surfaces, it is vitally important to feed the puddle to ensure a smooth fillet between the two. This can be accomplished by using a larger filler wire or by multiple passes.

Pictures 6 and 7 above, show areas that need to be fed more material to reduce the probability of focal stress failure.

Gas coverage is looking great...I hope you continue to enjoy the journey!

Rody

[Nick_Neuhaus]

Nick,

Unlike steel, Titanium is very subject to failure due to undercut, or starving the joint. Specifically in acute angles, where your torch is pulling more material from the two surfaces, it is vitally important to feed the puddle to ensure a smooth fillet between the two. This can be accomplished by using a larger filler wire or by multiple passes.

Pictures 6 and 7 above, show areas that need to be fed more material to reduce the probability of focal stress failure.

Gas coverage is looking great...I hope you continue to enjoy the journey!

Rody

Rody,

Thanks for the tip and reminder. I intend to lay filler heavily into those areas once I tack and begin welding the rest of the frame. I have developed a sequence that has me start at the back of the thin areas on the bb and work forward towards the “ears” on the downtube/seattube/bb junction. I find this helps me establish my puddle and lessens the chance of blowing out one of those ears. I’m hoping this translates over to titanium well.

Thanks again for your tips and guidance