Mmm bacon

Sorry Homer in this case we are talking about another type of bacon a Kevin Bacon

 

They said he'd never win.

He knew he had to.

If only he had a onesy.

There is a game called 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon where you can link any actor through no more than 6 connections. However being his doppelganger I feel somewhat closer. What! You don't believe me well here you go have another look at the poster

Now tonight's class we learnt about 7 degrees, which is one better than 6! In your face Kevin! Apparently it's not just the temperature you get the extra blanket out. It is the angle you need to drill the holes in the rim so they don't split as awkwardly as the bill on a second date. This should be a simple and easy thing to understand for any normal person but not me, oh no I had to be slower to catch on than flossing your cats teeth every night. Brett drew several diagrams an example below -

 Now I looked at three versions of this with comprehensive explanations and all I could think of was he must have gone to the Picasso school of art. Eventually I just said I understood so he could stop explaining for both our sakes.

Turns out it was a profile of the wheel the middle was an axle and the spokes went to the rim. Not side on like I thought. I worked that one out on the drive home. Yay me!

There is an extraordinarily scientific and precise way to do this. 

Yes as you'll note at Daryl's foot a block of wood that gives you a 1 better than Kevin Bacon 7 degrees holes or as I prefer 1BTKB7DH. 

I thought since it's been alluded to here by me in this blog (i really need to give myself a good talking too!) and by everyone in the class that I some how get other people to do my work for me. Now to dispel this myth I submit the following as evidence. That is me brazing my rear rim with my hot thing.

 That is me cutting some metal with a saw thingy.

The below was not staged, no matter what you may hear from the twelve witnesses, DNA and video evidence. This was me marking out the rim for the 1BTKB7DH. 

 

 This was using MFTF (my friend the file) to remove most of the excess brass from the brazing so it was smooth. From this...

 To this

All with a smile on my dial a song in my heart and a blog on my mind.

I hope this clears up any misunderstandings about certain posts about outsourcing.

In the interess of your comfort and safety this blog is 1BTKB7DH certified.

It's a mustache kinda day

Upon rising this morning I was immediately hit by the feeling and wedgied by an emotion (which hurt thanks for asking) that it was going to be a mustache kinda day.

This lack of mustache is a painful issue for me, from birth until 15 years old I tried day and night to grow a mustache. After 15 years of trying I came to the realisation I've been cursed with genetics that preclude my ability to grow a mustache that looks acceptable in a mustache orientated society.
 
All good ye olde timey bikey have a bikestache. We had three options for our bikestache. Each one slightly different to the next.

The three types we were deciding between (as close as I can tell) was the connoisseur, gringo and business man. My preferred type was the connoisseur.

Now you would think that a bike should grow it's bikestache naturally but mine was naturally hairless of course leaving me distressed, upset and a little sleepy. Now to clarify I wasn't crying I had just cut an onion.

So Brett realising I was bawling my eyes out over my hairless paradox took pity on me helped create a bikstache. Starting with a straight tapered bar made of some kind of metal.

We then cut it in half.

We then got the pipe bender out and started bending the bikestaches. At this point we really could have done with a bending unit.

The machine was surprisingly hard solid work although Daryl was moving so fast he was blurring.

After a couple of bends we got the bikestaches looking like this.

Which then meant we 'had to' do the hilarious pretend mustache. As you can see Daryl didn't need these artificial mustache extensions.

However I did .

Obviously this is the closest I'm going to get to facial hair *sob* *It's just dust in my eye*.

The other exciting thing for the evening. Well some might say this will be the first exciting thing, as frankly that last part was as dull as reading last weeks post.

We released the fires of mordor to do some brazing to join the front wheel.

Brazing you use a metal that burns at a lower temperature to essentially glue the pieces together. In fact a lot of rims now are actually glued together but they require more specialist equipment and some form of accuracy. This was Brett brazing my big rim. (no jokes thank you it's a serious and mostly kinda family friendly blog)

First you prepare the surface with some stuff called 'something'. Then you heat the area and put the brass (in this case) around the joint and into the joint to make it nice and strong.

You then end up with a rim that's nice and strong which I forgot to photo but here is what it looked like.

You'll notice that spongebob has no mustache though but he can grow one....

damn genetics.

Outsourcing

Now as a number of large organisations have discovered outsourcing saves a lot of money and all those pesky OHS laws. So tonight I thought I'd give it a go. One of the recurring problems as the long time reader of this blog will realise is the cotter pin. Now I've said twice now that I've fixed it and each time I've been more wrong than it is to marry your cousin.

So tonight I summoned spirits using a dark and super mystic spell and I had just the target in mind Mr X*. Now Mr X is an extremely talented and knowledgeable man who has worked a lot of his life with metal and other materials, he has also made all sorts of interesting tools for us including the crank evenness checker jig thingy and a new one for scribing a mark on our headset (that i will talk about another time). Now with Mr X under my spell he proceeded to do my bidding. Whilst his better judgement was under my control I set him to work fixing finally my ACPC (axle cotter pin conundrum)

His persistence considering the state I had left the ACPC in was above and beyond the call of duty. In memory of his performance I hereby award him the Bikesnobnyc approve for curating my ACPC to within a poofteenth.

After Mr X fixed that I still had some goats blood and oil of Newton from my spell (it's surprisingly easy to get oil off Bert Newton , you just really really have to want it)

 I set Mr X to work on cutting my rear wheel reading for pinning.

Upon completion of this task the spell wore off even with a giant finger upon him, so regrettably I had to do some stuff.

I felt we as a group had a stellar night of performance, we rocked and rolled all night and  partied ev-er-y day

Tonight we got the last of the wheels profiled and then all the wheels turned. Here is me turning my rear wheel which I believe ended up around 17 inches diameter but I can't really remember.

Once the rims were rolled we then had to cut them as Mr X showed earlier. Resulting in an angled join. 

Once cut and encouraged to line up we then cut out a piece from the remaining metal that will sit inside the rim. Here is a set up gratuitous action shot.

This is what you end up with.

We then drilled a hole through each rim and put a nail in to hold it together, it appears I didn't get a photo of this so you will have to use your imagination.

It looked just like that but my wheel doesn't have stars on it... yet.. Now the wheel was temporarily joined Brett will braze the rim together and we can then start work on the spoke holes etc. If you click on that link and read that article you will see why I have no intention of attempting that on a critical component like the rim.

But most importantly at the end of the night we had a fully functional invisible penny farthing that wonder woman would be proud of we could RIPF (Ride/ing an Invisible Penny Farthing)

I can tell you it was scary at that height. Here is a man who is a natural at RIPF

 RIPF away my good man RIPF away.

* For the sake of anonymity names will be withheld in case of con artists who are building their own ordinary bike and troll the Internet for people who are competent, I'm very safe from this scam.

Grinding

Grinding

1. Also Known As Dirty Dancing. When a girl is rubbing her ass all over a guys 'tweed gentleman parts' until it comes to the point where he gets a woody i was grinding with this girl with the biggest booty

2. A skateboarding move, where a part of the skateboard is slid off a rail or edge.

That rail's one of the best for grinding.

 3. Gaming reference. Repeatedly performing an action/event to attain an item. Most commonly used when referring to an RPG (Role Playing Game), i.e. World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy, etc.

4. slangin crack for profit

i been on the grind for the last three days an pulled 1,200 dollars all profit

4. Showering yourself in sparks to try and get something to look like something else.

Guess which one I was doing on the weekend? That's right slangin crack.

Brett had given us a square piece of metal and asked for some reason that we cut it into a circle.. bla bla the hub needs to be round as the wheel is round.. bla bla.... square hub isn't the same.... bla bla symmetrical... As a kid I always wanted the round window to come up on Play School but having to grind this metal into a circle I've asked myself what the hell is wrong with the square window? 

Lucky for me accuracy in this job isn't essential as Brett will turn it on the metal lathe for it's final shape.

We went from this mostly harmless piece of metal

to this slightly cut apart version with a hacksaw

 But as traditional as having the feats of strength at festivus.

I stuffed it up as you can see from this more finished version

....one of these things does not look like the other.
My problems stem back to childhood which luckily is where I can also trace back my problems with my left round metal thing. You see I was drilling the second pilot hole when the drill moved ever so slightly making the precise hole about 1/2mm away from where I wanted it. I tried then to drill a bigger hole using a drill press improving but still compounding the problem as I expected. I then thought bugger it I'll let Brett my knight in shining armour sort out whether I have truly stuffed it or only partially stuffed it, just quietly I think there is enough meat (that's workshop slang for metal) for it to turn just fine (I hope). So I did.
Ps. this is your extra post this week. That's right you are getting a two for the price of one. 

Karma

Upon donning my rather fetching onesy and getting ready to leave I noted an ominous omen, my good karma frog had disappeared from it's home within our front gate.

 See it's gone below.

Obviously this LOGKFP (lack of good karma frog presence) was something to be concerned about. However instead of curling up in a ball reciting gear ratios and percentages to myself as usual

I pressed on in a single speed mind.

It was a dark night (as often I find they are at this latitude) a gentle mist had fallen over the moor lands at Bracken Ridge. Driving my Mist Green 2007 RAV4 into the mist destiny had held me a reservation for onesy. (luckily the mist is a whitish colour where as the car is a green mist otherwise it would have been confusing and dangerous for other drivers)

Yes that's right gentle reader the return of the dark lord 'he who shall not be named' MFTF (My Friend The File). In an earlier post I had deluded myself into thinking that I had solved my Welcome Back Cotter issue, not the one how did Vinnie Barbarino feel about drugs but had I really fixed the crank cotter pin fiasco? I showed what I had done to Brett, remembering my LOGKFP, I knew it might not be all frogs and front fences. As it turned out it wasn't, the good karma frog foretold this. There was mention of humps and bumps in the cotter pin connection which would result in me having a floppy crank. Goodness gracious I exclaimed a floppy crank sounds terrible sounds like a terrible condition.

After some whinging (ok a lot of whinging, ok ok I whinged a real lot) to Brett he gave me the bluntest and most piss weak MFTF he could find (although I suggested using brown paper instead might be more at my skill level) he told me to man up and fix it (well he's way too nice to say such things but he should have). So off I went feeling that deep trepidation that only a hipster feels when he's forced to ride a bike with gears. I slowly filed some more off to try and fix my delusions, dreams and aspirations. Regrettably it appears all I fixed was my crank and cotter pin connection although not on my list a nice outcome anyway. At least I hope it's fixed, it's somewhat better but next week we'll find out if I did or have I continued to delude myself again this week. (just quietly the safe money is on deluded)

So I was filing the flat bit in the axle yet again.

A genius put together this jig to measure the cranks, I am forever in his debt for doing so as it really helped me this week.

At the end of the class was time for more home work. Now I was standing there when I heard the words from the 'genuine woman' 3D filing. I repeated my mantra DMY over and over again whilst cursing the LOGKFP.... I think I'll leave it there as there should be some mysteries in life. But if anyone is in the market I have a slightly used onesy for sale on eBay going cheap...

There was more to this weeks class and I'll talk about the homework later upon my recovery from the shock of 3D filing.

Onesy-rama-rama

Now and then in our lives we make a decision that heralds a new era. For some getting married, having kids others having chocolate instead of vanilla ice cream. Just between you and me dear reader one such moment was the onesy.....

This simple yet elegant garment has redefined my whole world.

I thought I had created a new era of style and sophistication. Upon further research this 'onesy' fashion heralds back to a time when things were simpler...

and also a whole lot more disturbing....

In addition to the blue stretch crotch it makes important social commentary....
"Designed for people like you who make things happen". Hang I'm on people like me and I make things happen! What a happy coincidence. But wait a minute I've seen someone else wear an outfit that reminds me of the onesy somewhere before....

He also made things happen. Sure they involved death and destruction and the creation of a huge ball in space but that is making things happen

Whilst science would not doubt prove a stretch terry jumpsuit if alive today would be the most awesome thing in the universe, we really need to consider more modern applications of the onesy

This thought provoking advertisement poses a number of deeply philosophical questions and comments on the individual.
"Show where you are headed". As long as I worked out which way to put it on hopefully the big zip will help those directionally challenged.
"Designed with your desires in mind". What about if I desire going to the bathroom without exposing my entire man front?
"The metaphorical question at the end 'Am I man enough to fill it'?" Considering the average weight and size of the population shouldn't the question be 'are you man enough to actually squeeze your fat arse into it?'

Unfortunately dear reader I've reached my LAMCT (looking at men's crotches threshold) and have to end the post here. If like me you have now a severely overloaded LAMCT Dr Aaron will provide you some oitment to sooth your poor eyes with action people....

You're welcome! 

Next week we'll get back to a more penny farthing related post.