Bikes & Beers: Ride Too or Hurray for Geeks that Horde!

upon matts receipt of his white velocity deep-V's laced to black flip-flop surly out back and a silver ambrosio upfront, we quickly went to work on strappin' them in and on, finally delivering matt to a state of fixed gear wheeling.

after toying with what to do with vic's ride - seeing as its a tiny frame with even tinier wheels (something like 24" wheels, on 28 spoke double single speed hubs (as apposed to flip flop)) - we couldnt figure out how to get it to fixed yet, so, for now, we left it as is, and decided to eat pizza.

only there were four of us - matt, vic, jenn and i - and only three rides. (although jenn rides in baltimore, her stallion did not attempt the journey to east end london.)

"het matt" begins carlos, "i bet we have enough bike bits to build an entire, complete, bicycle."

after a deep-thought inspired long pauses, matt responds,"dude, i bet we COULD!!!!!"

"oh no," mumbles carlos, worried that his half-joke might be taken seriously and that they might now actually have to build a bicycle. "we might now actually have to build a bicycle," reiterates carlos, for those who cant hear what he thinks.

so off they went, carlos to his in order to grab the old lilac peugeot frame and the two boxes or old or un-used parts, and matt into his to grab wheels and other assorted bits and bobs.

within 30 minutes of beginning and 40 minutes of even mentioning, there stood a fully functioning, single-speed road-ready collaborative effort, bicycle. specs: 1980/81 Peugeot PX-10 frame, cinelli criterium stem & bars, selle italia seat, complete campy wheel sets, brake cable and rear brake calliper, cane creek brake lever, shimano crank n chainring. the rear wheel is off matts full speeded t.j. quick, so we just mated the chain to the gear with the straightest chainline. the only part we actually didnt have was two bottom bracket bolts; for a total investment of £4.50 and 30 minutes of fitting, attaching and otherwise putting together, we had a complete bike. hooray for geeks that horde!



although its a bad shot, below is what matts newest ride looks like. however, i will encourage him to take it out for a photo shoot somewhere, and have him post it to FGG.



once we got to the lauriston (an excellent pizza house, replete with a hand built clay oven, and shortlisted for the best pizza in london), we shackled up, up front. i noticed that our collection of four rides made for a particularly easy sight for the eyes. see below.