Somewhere near Ithaca, NY.
Manufacturing guy-at-large.
Filtering by Tag: photos
My Realster
In 2010 I built a short production run of singlespeed bikes, dubbed The Realster. They were intended to be a practical take on the urban fixed gear. From the original product copy:
I believe in minimizing the degree to which my customers need to reorganize their lives in order to ride their bikes. On this project - a short production run of five framesets - I wanted to design a fixed gear bike that would be easy to use on a daily basis. The bike needed fenders, a rack, a comfortable riding position and a bell. It also needed good brakes, generous tire clearance and a reasonable pricetag. It should reward, not punish, you for riding it.
Enter the Realster. It's an upright, practical fixed gear for urban use. The stock version, shown below, sports swept-back handlebars, natural contact points (cork grips and a leather saddle) and a custom made porteur rack with salvaged cross-sawn hard maple slats.
I was in my old shop the other day and snapped a few quick photos of the stock Realster, which I kept for myself. The build is really casual, which is rare for me - but I really like it. I'm particularly fond of its rack, which was an early project that used my rack ends.
There's one of these framesets that never got built up; I recently put it on Etsy.
Stainless steel bike
This is from a while ago - late summer 2010. At the time, it was one of my proudest pieces of physical output, but somehow I never got around to properly sharing it on the internet. I never photographed it properly either, so these iPhone shots will have to do for now :/
I love the belt drive, but am now quite a bit less enamored of the Alfine setup. The frame is pretty awesome, though (it's all Reynolds 953 mar-aging stainless steel), and I'm *really* proud of the racks.
This bike was the real impetus for me to make my own rack ends. I also made a few other little bits on the bike, including a pretty cool seatstay bridge with hidden fasteners for the rear rack.
Incidentally, the mushroom-head velcro on the front rack is a pretty slick way to attach commonly used things to a rack surface.
On Location w/ The Lady's Harp
Last night I went to the opening of The Tinnitus Suites at Nothing Space and saw The Lady's Harp in all its splendor.
The experience is a bit beyond words, but I can verify that the instrument is pretty cool. Daniel manipulates the mixing boards, but the Lady's Harp really plays itself.
Photos below. Daniel says he'll be posting the recordings on Soundcloud... eventually :)
Shack
Somewhere near Ithaca, the other day.
Should I sell this?
Was at NYCVelo today and saw some of the Swrve selvedge aprons, which retail at $100... And I'm like, "mine is *way* better!"
This is like 2010. I had been wanting a nice apron for a while, and worked with a local seamstress to make this one. I sourced all the fabric & straps and made all the leather and copper fittings (I literally had to bend and braze custom copper rings for this); she sewed the apron body together.
Is this worth my time & effort to resurrect? Kickstart it, sell a handful? Or is it just a crafty thing I designed back when I was young and full of energy?
If you've got feelings one way or the other (read: if you'd buy one) then speak up!
OG Maker fer real
Summer shop camp. This would be like 1994 ish, 6th grade or so. I'm fourth from the left with the weird combover :)
Ceiling
A while back.
Public Radio progress
The latest rev (v1.1) of The Public Radio:
The current state is:
- Arduino Pro Mini
- Si4703 breakout
- Mono audio amp breakout
- VREG
- A bunch of screw terminals
The next rev will be a little PCB that the Pro Mini can mount to, and on the back will be all discrete components comprising our own FM tuner & amplifier. This will reduce the cost of the assembly by a *lot* (these Sparkfun boards are easy to work with but silly expensive), and will allow us to play with the circuits a bit.
The incredible thing is really how cheap the Pro Mini is. These things cost under $9 (cheaper on eBay) and have a lot more features than we'd ever need. Eventually we'll strip that off too and run the whole thing off of an ATTiny (or similar) but for now there's no point in getting ahead of ourselves - the Pro Mini is cheap enough and requires very little work on our part to get our MVP out quickly.
We should have the updated circuit done tomorrow and will be working on board layouts over the weekend :)
Dance dance
Documentation
Note: This is old, and too complicated/obscure to explain here. I still like it tho :)
Snowdog
A couple days ago.
The Shortest Pencil
From the archives :)
Driver
This one is silly. This is 2012, and I needed this dumb Maxon motor driver to be quickly reversible, etc., for mocking up BLDC motor assemblies. This thing was a major PITA... but it worked.
Ai & Paint
Top: Illustrator artwork by yours truly. Bottom: Paint by Keith Anderson.
The funny thing about this is:
- I had so little experience with Illustrator! The whole Creative Suite is still pretty opaque to me, but back then... I was making it up *seriously.*
- I still really like this design. The customer didn't want any graphics, but I told him that I needed something on his frame. This was a pretty good compromise - I made it just for this one bike - and I think it holds up.
- It was *impossible* to photograph. Damn round tubes.
Phew
My notes from a few years back, when I took MITx 6.002x - Circuits & Electronics.
If I recall correctly, this particular path was a wild goose chase - there's too much guzz here for it to have been the right solution.
SFO
San Francisco: I will be in you 12.24-12.26. Holler at me.
This photograph, of the Golden Gate Bridge, was taken by my parents sometime in 1976-1977.
Dog
Yesterday, or something.
Dog is generally a lot of fun in the snow :)
I guess I'm naive, but I hadn't thought that the road salt would be as much of a hindrance as it has been the past few weeks. It only takes a block or two and I notice him limping around - something I rarely saw when we lived in the country. I even went so far as to buy him some booties, which has no joke increased the number of girls smiling at us/him by 5000%.
Currently
My desk, working, at the end of the day.
Oh - as I had been hoping, The Public Radio *should* fit in this super cute 250mL jar :)
Currently
I think this is technically workbench #4.
I spend quite a bit of time prototyping at my desk, and a lot of stuff ends up behind me, here. Could be worse.