gugie 

Gary was never a framebuilder.

obrentharris 

Which reminds me...
Otis Guy, Joe Breeze, Steve Potts.

Brent
oops. I see @tricky beat me to Joe Breeze.

motogeek 

I'll buy that, wasn't sure if he was or not. Thanks for clarifying, Gugie

obrentharris 

I don't think anyone has mentioned Ross Shafer yet. Ross was building lugged road bikes before Salsa. Now days he designs and builds pedal steel guitars.
Brent

rccardr 

Frank the Welder. Used to participate on this forum years ago.
Contract builder, recently heard he was doong torchwork on some of the new Serotta builds.

wrk101

Another name to add is Steve Garn. In the late 1980s, Steve started building frames with the BREW brand name. Still in business outside Boone, NC, and has a frame building school (TIG welded).
unless you are an experienced welded, i would not expect someone to become proficient at TIG welding in one week (I’ve taken the class).

motogeek 

I might have shown this before,but it's my custom built Veloce that I had built for me in around 1986 by John Stinsman in Allentown, PA.Paintjobfades from Dark Rose Metallic at the top to Light Rose Metallic at the bottom

Doug Fattic 

Kieth Anderson started in Indianapolis. Eventually he went out west and was best known for painting until he retired. I helped him a little with advice when he started building but not with painting where he made his real mark.

Chris Kvale does beautiful file work on the lugs on his frames. Nicely thinned. The building where his shop was located burned and it has taken some time to get it back to functioning again. He reports its progress periodically on the CR list.

I taught Curt Goodrich also in Minneapolis how to paint. He wanted more control over his entire product and didn't want to depend on when someone else might be able to get them done.

Rich Gangl has more various skills than another other frame builder. He has the most well equipped shop I have ever seen. He can build steel, titanium and aluminum and of course paint too. We are very good friends. We drove together to take the 1st titanium welding class at UBI that John Cherry also attended. His work is amazing.

steelbikeguy

The short-.lived Asphalt magazine did an article on Rich Gangl. Very nice!


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Steve in Peoria

bamboobike4

At NAHBS in Charlotte, he built a frame in his booth, during the show. I saw an unpainted steel BREW decimate the field in a triathlon.

Also in NC, Mills Brothers. Indianapolis also has Five Points, with interesting frame designs.

63rickert

https://waterfordbikes.com/w/culture...e-early-years/

Emil Wastyn was an active builder in the 1930s and worked a lot with Schwinn, to include first Paramounts. I was lucky enough to have one of his bikes as a loaner when my ‘65 Schwinn Continental crashed out. Emil was also a famous six day mechanic and his connections to Euro riders, builders, mfrs were very important to Schwinn and to the ongoing success of Wastyn Cycles.

One part of the story has to be that there was a huge gulf between Oscar’s generation and Albert’s generation. The hippies really did not want to connect with the past, wanted to do it all themselves starting from nothing. Everyone was eager to get a little piece of Albert’s limited time when Oscar and Brilando and Magnani had the door wide open, hoping someone would walk in. Chicago in 60s was in a lot of ways a European city and cycling almost existed here. Schwinn and Wastyn survived and did what they could.

bamboobike4

Mr. Mootry (Sr.) built frames with pragmatism in mind. As a minority businessman, inventor, and entrepreneur in the plains states, he faced obstacles in several areas. Some of his frames had rear-facing dropouts but also RD hangers, long before the fixed gear phase. He built with Aluminum as far as I know, oval tubing in the early 80’s aero style.

Social norms at the time probably limited his exposure, along with his interest in a myriad of projects and issues. His son tends to dominate the results of on-line searches, but Primus Sr. was possibly one of those modern (sic) Renaissance Man geniuses that never really saw exposure, for various reasons.

I have little doubt his frames will become collector’s items.

bamboobike4

Do you know the Fiorini brothers? Chris built frames and also painted. Not sure what Tony does now, but he raced. Chris is connected to Paramount, Buell, and I think H-D.

bamboobike4

Kvale’s building was burned intentionally by rioting arsonists. Here’s hoping he gets back, if he wants,to. I haven’t seen if any arrests were made.

@cuda2k had a great thread on the build Kvale did for him. He posted it from idea to design to finishedbike.