Seven Customers – Page 22

Picking Tubes

There is a practical side to picking the tubes for a custom bike frame, and there is an aesthetic side. There is a science, and there is a craft. What we think will match the rider’s preferred ride feel, sometimes doesn’t match the rider’s stated desire for “fat tubes,” which can be very stiff. As with all things custom design and build-related, finding the right balancing points make all the difference. The key to success, then, is having enough options to create a balance. We have a whole wall of different-sized tubing, steel and titanium and carbon, multiple diameters and wall thicknesses, and then in many cases we butt those tubes to further refine the bike’s ride feel.

But backing up, we take a lot into consideration when picking the tubes for a rider’s new bike. Some of it is formula, knowing what has worked for rider’s of a given size for a given style of riding. But then you have to consider their aesthetic preferences too, how aggressively they want the frame to handle, how comfortable they want to be. You make little adjustments to the tube spec, based on experience. This is the craft part.

Matt O., our production manager, says, only half-jokingly, that when he specs tubes for a bike, he looks at the rider’s profile and asks how that rider is different from him in size and/or in the way they want their bike to feel. Then he adjusts from what he would build for himself.

There are also factors like racks and fenders to consider. Will the supporting tubes take additional weight and strain. We adjust for that.

We say that every Seven is different. Every one is unique, and that is pretty literally true. There are so many levels of customization that goes into each bike. The tube set is just one of them, but it’s a valuable one. It’s part of what makes the difference between any old bike, and your bike.

Mike’s Sola S 29er

We have recently found a good partner to work with in New Zealand, Mark Rose of Bespoke Cycles of Hamilton, which is pretty great, because riding bikes there is a unique pleasure we can recommend highly. Anyway, this is one of the first bikes we built for our Kiwi friends, Mike’s Sola S 29er.

Mike says:

This is my Sola S 29, purchased through Bespoke Cycles in New Zealand, and very recently built up. I’m the first customer of theirs, and I am thoroughly pleased with this bicycle. It fits me like a glove, and the workmanship reminds me of my previous hardtail, a 1992 Merlin. I never thought I would end up owning another titanium hardtail, but the pull was too strong.

I can’t wait to get it out on the trail, and enjoy the benefits that titanium and custom geometry have to offer.

Regards,

Mike

Greg C’s New Old Axiom SL

We built this Axiom SL in our original 1,000 sq ft space back in 1997, the first year of our existence. It is serial number 158 (before we developed our current serial numbering system). It originally had a 1″ headtube, as most road bikes did at that time. The bike’s owner, Greg, decided this was the year to upgrade his bike, so he sent it to us to put on a new 44mm headtube.

Greg wrote to us, after getting his new/old bike back:

To All Those at Seven,

WOW!!!

Great Bike!! Frame #158 runs like a Dream!!

Took it out to Ocotillio CA for the Stagecoach Century, it was a Blast.

Simply cannot say enough, the difference is astounding!!

Thank you all So Much!!

Greg

We have always aimed to build bikes that last, that riders will come back to year-after-year, ride-after-ride. It is extremely gratifying to work with riders who have the same aims.

An earlier version of this post stated erroneously that Greg had added an 1 1/8″ headtube instead of 44mm.

The Specific Woman

Who is the specific woman? We see a lot of “women’s specific” bikes out in the world, but we have yet to meet any specific women. In all the fittings and all the designs we have done, what is resoundingly clear is that women’s bodies are pretty non-specific. In fact, women’s bodies vary more than men’s do, in proportion, so it’s a hard task to design something that will fit most women, even of the same height, in any more than a cursory way. Making a man’s bike smaller doesn’t get at the half of it.

So we consider what makes women different than men. For example, women generally (but not always) have a wider pelvic arch than men, greater pelvic tilt also. These things affect saddle position and saddle height. Generally speaking (but not always) women have longer legs relative to their height than men do. Their weight is lower and farther back, which affects the center of gravity, handling and reach. Their shoulders are usually (but not always) narrower, and they have smaller hands (sometimes), all of which impacts front-end geometry and handling.

The generalized differences are informative, but really, when it comes right down to it, every rider, male or female, is an individual, with specific geometric needs, with a tubeset that matches their riding preferences, with their own aesthetic sense and ideas for their bike. That’s why we make rider-specific bikes.

As far as we can tell, there is no specific woman, but there might be a specific bike for every woman (or man), who wants one.

We Couldn’t Have Said It Better – Linda Freeman

A lot of our riders end up here at one point or another, coming to see where their bike was/will be born, and recently we hosted Linda Freeman who is a fitness consultant and freelance writer from Vermont. We built her bike, an Elium SLX, with our friends at Fit Werx in Waitsfield earlier in the year. If you read Linda’s 7 or her regular feature in the Rutland Herald, Active Vermont, then you know she’s a deep thinker on fitness and cycling. We had a great visit with her, which she wrote about here.