Ahearne Cycles | Thoughts and Words

It's been a very long time since I've added any words to this blog. So much has happened that it would take a couple of volumes of words to even scratch the surface. I can be pretty wordy, and the longer I wait to write and the more events that take place, the more daunting the prospect feels.

To put the last several months in summary, I've been in the shop a lot. I've built quite a number of bikes, some elaborate and decorative, some simple and straight-forward, all utilitarian to one degree or another. While working away, filing/brazing/grinding/polishing/inventing/deconstructing and so on, quite a few major events have taken place. It's a good thing there is NPR, and that Maggie keeps me somewhat up-to-date on current affairs, or I'd be lost in the land of steel. We have a new president. In my eyes, it's not so important that he's African American, although I understand that this is a huge cultural step for America. What's even more important is that he's intelligent, and he seems to have a system of values that include (rather than preclude) making peoples lives better. He's not war-mongering. He's interested in helping us, as a nation, to take responsibility for our future rather than living like a narcissistic, muddled adolescent, full of trash and anger and apathy. It's been so long since I've had any faith in our government stepping up to the role of acting "for the people" that I find myself ambivalent, untrusting, and generally hesitant about giving in to having faith in the new administration. Obama has been put into a huge mess of difficulties, and it will probably take much longer than he has in office to make any sort of real dent in the problems that are here now, but we all have hope that we can at least get started in a better direction. I, for one, would much rather build bikes than be in his shoes. But I wish him a lot of luck, nonetheless.

One of the factors that's been haunting us all is the sour economy. I've had a lot of people ask me if I've seen the effects of this in my orders. It's hard for me to say. We're well into the slowest season for bikes, in which I usually don't receive too many orders anyway. My lead time is pretty long, as well. I think that, as far as the economy goes, the bike world has been fairly stable. I've had quite a lot of people interested in my bikes, and have gotten several orders over the past months. We'll have to see how things go as we get closer to this next cycling season.

One difference that I am noticing is the type of bicycles that people are interested in getting from me. There is definitely a lot more interest in the general purpose, utilitarian bikes, including commuters, Randonneuse, light touring, and fully loaded touring bikes. This is a direction that I've always leaned, which is why I got into building custom bikes and especially custom racks in the first place. I really love a good mountain bike, but I consider this a second bike. The first bike, or the bike I would want to have if I could only have one, would definitely be a general purpose touring bike that would accommodate racks, fat tires and fenders. It's a bike I could ride all year, it would carry anything I'd need it to carry, and could be stripped down for faster, lighter day trips, or could be taken on the trails for some non-technical and quiet out-of-town riding.

With this in mind, I move on to this years' North American Hand Made Bicycle Show in Indianapolis, Indiana, from 27 February through 1 March. That's at the end of this week, in case you weren't paying attention. Because of it's location, and some of the politics that revolve around the show, there are quite a few of the west coast builders who won't be in attendance. It was very lucky for me this past year that the show was here in Portland, within about 10 blocks from my shop. I do think it's a good thing that the show goes on the road, so that builders can present their wares to a different audience each year. I look forward to seeing the work of builders from the midwest and the east. Now that I've gone through the process of getting everything in order for the show, and working out the details of shipping, travel and accommodations, I fully understand why many of the builders from the midwest and east were unable or unwilling to travel across the country to show their bikes. It's expensive. It's requires a lot of time. There are so many worries involved in having bikes shipped; hoping they arrive undamaged; hoping they arrive at all.

Thanks to the initiative and organization of Sacha and Scott at Vanilla Bicycles, some of the local Portland builders have gone in on having our bikes shipped on pallets in the back of a truck. This past Friday the truck came by the shop to pick up our pallet, and there was quite a scare involved. The driver showed up and, within the first minute of being there got his finger lodged in a latch at the back of the truck. It nearly tore off the end of his finger, and as it was it looked like he would need quite a few stitches. We gave him some bandages and some time to clean it up and asked him several times if he needed to call someone else so that he could go to the hospital, but he declined each time, saying he'd be alright. He said he'd called to chew-out his boss for giving him a defective truck, something about the lift not working properly.

When it was time to load the pallet, three of us helped him, and it's a very good thing we did. He pulled the pallet onto the lift with a pallet jack and I noticed that the truck was parked on a slant so that it was listing heavily to one side, but thought that he know what he was doing so didn't say anything. Once the pallet was on the lift he started raising it and the whole thing shifted precariously. As the lift came even with the truck bed he started pulling on the jack and the whole lift suddenly dropped about 6 inches. There was only a small part of the pallet on the truck bed so the entire load tipped and nearly fell on top of Mitch, Mike and I, who were standing on the ground trying to keep the thing upright. We stood there physically holding our pallet upright, while Mike grabbed a couple of pry bars, which we wedged under the pallet to support it. The driver started cussing at the lift and tried to raise it again and the wheels on the pallet jack got lodged between the lift and the truck, so the lift couldn't go up anymore. Only after grabbing a cro-bar and prying the wheels of the jack free we were able to raise the lift and get the pallet on the truck. It was all very bad, and very scary. He very nearly dumped our pallet on our heads, or in the street, which would have destroyed at least 2 of our bikes. Then he joked about how it looked like he gave us a scare, and that we must at least have a couple or 3 thousand dollars worth of stuff on the pallet. When I told him it was more like 25 thousand he became quiet. I don't wish ill will on the driver, but I do think there were some bad judgement-calls made on his part.

As you can imagine, this did nothing to instill any confidence in me that our bikes are going to arrive in Indianapolis undamaged. My only hope is that this is the worst that any of our bikes are going to see for the entire trip. I'll be relieved only when I get there and see the condition of things.

I am excited for the show. I've been to quite a few of these, and it's always good to see what other builders come up with, and to talk with people about what I do. I've not built a bike for anyone within 500 miles (at least) of Indianapolis, so I'm excited to have a whole new group of people see what I can do. I really enjoyed attending the show in Portland, but I felt like most people here knew who I was, and what sort of work I do, and many had surely seen a bike or two that I'd built. It'll be good to have something tangible, something more than pictures on the internet, that people can experience and touch and walk around and ask about. I also feel it's important for people to be able to talk with the builders, discuss the possibilities, and see how great a custom bicycle can be. This is how bicycle dreams really get rolling. It can be very inspirational.

I'm not showing any pictures of what I'll be taking to the show at this time. It's something of a surprise. But I do have to say that I'm excited about the bikes I'm taking. I've incorporated a couple of elements that I've not yet tried, and I think they came out really well. If you're in the area and are able to attend the show, you really ought to stop by. I don't think you'll be disappointed.

I intended to keep this blog entry fairly short, but I see that I've run on for quite a while. There is a lot more to say, but I've got to finish getting ready to go. I'll try and get another post up soon, so that I don't have to ramble quite so long.