working working working

OK....

Wasn't expecting to turn MLS in to a T-Shirt factory but it kinda happened the last weeks. Super stoked to see people worldwide making it happen and showing the love. Thanks Everyone, The shirts are boxed and shipping!

I don't mind screen printing and you get a real custom MLS made shirt.

Doing the little green DiAcro Press brakes.

Done - This lucky person will be an investor in the DiAcro press brake as shown on their arm with the little green press brake. Other tools include a blue patternmakers vise, Calipers, Drills, Tig torch and so on. Every shirt is a surprise....

the little green press brake that could...

If you want to buy a shirt and help out heres the link -  To the Buy a T-shirt blog page

Back to the metal shop 

Some times you just need to know when its a good idea to say, " Theres a better way or person to do this job". I had to say it the other day. I was machining out the front hub for the top speed bike on manual lathe and I had it almost done and looked at it and said, this works for a prototype for me to make the front steering but really its not the quality I need for the look to be correct.

If Cane Creek didn't do such a good job making the hubs on the carbon rear wheel maybe my manually made hub would be fine but I really want to show off the machining marks on the outside of the hub. On a completely contoured machined hub with no straight lines its next to impossible to do on a manual machine and leave the raw machined look. This hub is really a pain in the ass to make and I can thank my brother for designing it like that.

I might not be a " True Machinist" to the " OLD Guys " but I still can give them a run for their money.

Doing some hoggin out of the center of the hub. That 7075 Aluminum is a dream to machine if you know what I am talking about. 

The hub is very special as the steering is inside the hub shell in the big pocket.

This hub takes a lot of operation changes to make it happen on a manual lathe or CNC lathe, I took it out after roughing out the rough shape for the photo and to start machining the steel mandrel to hold it in the center bearing bore, so I could do my final profile cuts on the outside of the hub shell. 

Like I said up above, I decided its time to ask for help so I got on the phone and called my buddy Derek over at Moss Machine in San Francisco. Derek is one of those machinist that looks at super crazy prototype stuff and says " OK ". The dude has maybe touched something thats on your high end bicycle in some way, he does a lot of prototype machine work for big companies like Easton and so on.... He said " OK " give me the block of aluminum and come back next week to get it, I owe you anyways for hammering out the stuff for the BRD RedShift bike ( video of Dereks machine shop ).

I finished up some of the last fab on the frame other then the crazy seat mount, it was just making all the stainless steel brackets for the rear dropout aluminum sections to bolt too. There is a Paragon Machine Works belt disconnect in the frame because I figured why not set it up for belt drive... Isn't it suppose to be a futuristic concept bike when chains don't exist on bikes, right ...?

 The tube ends are capped and threaded for the built-in belt tensioning, don't worry you will understand later when you see the rest of the parts...   And thanks to Best Buy telling me I am 2 days over on my extended warrantee on my broken digital camera, I am forced to use my Iphone for photos until I get a new camera... What a buzz kill

see the little seam for the belt disconnect?

This was just before I welded it all up and make it look fancy....