TimothyH

https://books.google.com/books?id=1tmyiqjvpnYC

chaadster

You don't understand what you're looking at. Visit the Black Cat site.

joejack951

If the seat tube is a standard steel frame set tube, it would be a simple tube cutter and Dremel job (plus a little touch up paint) to convert it to a standard seatpost and clamp arrangement. For the benefit of owning a pretty unique frame it seems worth it to me.

TMonk

sorry for the crappy photo, I'm no photographer:

tinrobot

Baum Ristretto

chaadster

That's the tamest Rock Lobster paintjob I've ever seen!

chaadster

Baum seems to be about fancy paintjobs with matched stems and seatposts than anything really special, but they do have cool graphics.

Bob Ross

I own this TIG-welded steel beauty, custom built for me in 2010 by Carl Strong:




...and I am a few weeks away from finally receiving this lovely lugged steel dream bike:

kbarch

He doesn't explain why he applies a monolithic finish to an otherwise visually articulated connection. I'm not saying the lugs need to be polished, or that it needs to be a two-tone bike, but such approaches to finishing make more visual sense - like this example of his:


Dipping something complicated in paint can result in a cool look, but it obliterates any suggestion of precision, thoughtfulness or skilled handiwork in the connection of the pieces and parts vaguely telegraphing their shapes through a sort of blanket.

I'm not saying it looks bad, just that it seems somewhat equivocal.

rpenmanparker 

Ah, I thought it must be something like that, but Google wouldn't bring it up for me. I get what you are trying for, but maybe you just haven't read enough of the chapters.

chaadster

Like I said, if that junction "obliterates any suggestion of precision, thoughtfulness, or skilled handiwork" in your eyes, you simply don't know what you're looking at.

I'm fine with saying you "don't get it," and leaving it there, if that's cool with you?

kbarch

Perhaps you could explain what you think I'm failing to see, because frankly, no, guessing games are not cool with me.
I see a paint job that doesn't do the bike justice. I see custom, hand made lugs connecting some tubes, which is quite nice, but the whole thing has been painted over as if it didn't matter whether the connections were concealed or revealed. Now if it doesn't matter, as fine as the bike may be, how can that aspect - how the connections are finished - be beautiful? Put another way, that bike may have the body of a supermodel, but it's wearing overly modest and unflattering sack.

Jarrett2

Cool, what is that?

bleui

is that a Sachs? Wow

TimothyH

Rides like a wet dream.

Mrs. Butterworth's got nothing on this.

Barry White's voice incarnate.

Crepuscular rays shined down and choirs of angels chanted songs of praise the first time I rode this bike.

Leaves the rider fresh as a Summer's Eve.

rpenmanparker 

Or put more bluntly, that is a beautifully applied, butt-fugly paint job. And folks complain about blacked out bikes?

rpenmanparker 

Exactly what I would expect.

andr0id

RS

I'd recognize that head tube badge anywhere.

Jarrett2

What's an RS?

andr0id

Richard Sachs

One of the best steel frame builders on the planet.

Jarrett2

Cool, never heard of him before. Thanks.

himespau 

How long did you have to wait for that? Before you ordered the Carl Strong?

Lazyass

Brick Lane Bikes have a lot of sweet NOS 80's-90's frames for sale. They have a bunch of Rossins which are one of my favorite, I've had two. I think they're free shipping to the US.

Brick Lane Bikes: The Official Website. Frames

chaadster

What you're failing to see is that you keep changing the terms. First you asked, "why not fillet braze?" It is fillet brazed. Then you say the paint "obliterates any suggestion of precision, thoughtfulness, or skilled handiwork," but I'm willing to bet you've never seen a lugged steel ISM junction before, let alone with custom made lugs, two things right there-- even if you don't know fillet brazing when you see it-- that reek of "precision, thoughtfulness, and skilled handiwork," and which, arguably, cannot be made without those things.

So do you know what you're talking about? I don't think so. I think you don't like the paint job and don't get the aesthetic, and are trying to cook up some clever sounding rationale to explain it's not to your taste, because you like old style stuff.

Everything on that bike is rendered in monochrome paint -- from the seat mast topper to the headset dust cover-- and matte black components, expressly for the purpose of presenting a uniquely uniform aesthetic, which compels the viewer to look at the bike in the whole, yet you want them to highlight junction details which would directly contravene the overarching aesthetic goal.

To say you don't "get it" is a wild understatement, and you should be happy to leave it there. Immanuel Kant said there is no argument if a man says something is pleasing to him, rather than pleasing in and of itself. Beauty is not an intrinsic truth, but an agreed upon property of a thing. Suggesting that bike is wearing an "unflattering sack" is proof that you are interested only in your simple opinion, and unable to aggregate an aesthetic interpretation which doesn't correspond with a narrative of precedent forms. I suppose that's more of a post-modernist approach, but your example of a detail pic of old fashioned lug work would confirm that you're not there yet.

chaadster

That, right there, says a WHOLE lot about this conversation. Richard Sachs.