Riding my bike to Grandma’s house

For ten years, from the age of 13 until I was 23, I lived in Luton; an industrial town some 30 miles north of London.

This was where I started cycling, and throughout my teen years I rode my bike all over the South East corner of England, within a hundred mile radius of Luton.

My grandmother lived in a little seaside town called Hythe; in the county of Kent. It is on the South Coast of England, near Folkstone and Dover. On a clear day you can look out over the English Channel and see the coast of France.

On many occasions I rode my bike to visit my Grandma, who at that time still lived in the same house on High Street (Left.) where my mother was born.

The shortest route was 100 miles, and I would usually ride down on Saturday, stay overnight, and ride back on Sunday.

The direct route took me right through the dead center of London; right down the Edgware Road, to Hyde Park Corner.

If I could get an early start, usually around 5:00 am., I would be clear of London’s center before 8:00 am. when the traffic got heavier. This was a Saturday, and it was the 1950s when traffic was a lot lighter than today.

On the way back, I would take a detour north and east to Gravesend, where I would catch a ferry boat over the River Thames to Tilbury on the North Bank. This route was about 110 miles, taking me through Brentwood, Harlow, Hertford and Welwyn Garden City.

On one occasion, I rose early for my ride to Granma’s; I ate a large breakfast and immediacy threw up. Throughout my childhood and teen years I would periodically have these stomach upsets that my mother always called a “Bilious Attack.”

Looking back, I now suspect it was nothing more than food poisoning.

We never owned a refrigerator, and meat would be cooked, and then eaten over several days.

I really had no choice but to make the trip, neither my parents nor my grandma had a phone.

I had written a letter the week before, saying I was coming; had I not arrived she would be terribly worried.

I rested a couple of hours, then ate something again and set out. By now it was too late to take the direct route through London; I would have to go the long way.

I hadn’t gone but a few miles when I brought up the food I had just eaten. I struggled on, and somewhere out between Harlow and Brentwood, weak from lack of food inside me, I collapsed in the long grass at the roadside.

I hadn’t laid there long when I felt something biting me and I discovered I was lying on a red ant’s nest; I was not having a good day.

However, it did get me up and back on the bike again; soon after, I was forced to eat again, and this time it stayed down. Once I was able to eat, my strength returned and I completed the ride.

If you ever have a chance to visit Hythe, be sure to check out St. Leonard’s Church. (Above, right.) Originally a Norman Church built in 1080; it was later enlarged in 1120.

An unusual feature is the crypt under the church; it houses a stack of 8,000 human bones, and some 2,000 skulls.

These are the remains of some 4,000 men, women and children, some who may have lived in the first millennium.

They are believed to have been placed there when the church was expanded, and later when the graveyard became full and bodies were removed to make room for more.

I went there as a child in the 1940s, and always wanted to return, but during the 1950s though the 1970s it was closed to the public. Now it is open again and there is a small fee to visit, which helps in the upkeep of the church.
   
 

Chrome

In 1982 when I began building custom frames in San Marcos, Southern California, I was fortunate that there was an excellent chrome plating business in nearby Escondido.

It was the chrome lug work and other parts of the frame that helped me gain my reputation for beautifully finished work.

This was the same plating shop used by Masi, later used by myself, Dave Tesch, Brian Baylis and other local builders.

What makes a high quality chrome finish is the same as what makes a good paint finish; it is what’s underneath, the preparation.

On a frame like the one pictured above, the whole frame is chrome plated, however, only the parts that will show are polished; the main tubes that are painted are left rough.

First it would be an unnecessary expense to polish these parts, and secondly the rough surface made a better key for the paint.

The parts of the frame that would be left exposed chrome plating were first highly polished. The slightest scratch left by a piece of emery cloth, would show after the plating process.

To achieve the best chrome finish, (Which this is.) the polished steel is first copper plated, polished again, then nickel plated over the copper, and finally chrome plated.

The copper affords the best adhesion to the steel; nickel gives the finish more corrosion resistance, but is yellowish in color. Finally the chrome gives the bright, bluish, almost mirror like finish. The coats of plating are extremely thin, measured in millionths of an inch, rather than thousandths.

Chrome is an abbreviation of the word Chromium, one of 91 natural occurring elements. Chromium is a metal which is not useful by itself; things are not made from chromium. However, it can be alloyed with steel to increase strength and hardness, or used for chrome plating.

Chrome is always applied by electroplating; it is not simply dipped in a tank. Say for example a frame was to have a chrome rear dropout faces, right chainstay, (To prevent chain slap damage.) and a chrome front derailleur braze-on. 

The Fuso Lux frame (Above.) and the John Howard fames were chromed in this fashion.

The frame is suspended in a vat of chromic acid. H2CrO4 with the parts to be plated below the surface, the surface of the liquid acid is agitated to make small waves. Without this there would be a solid line where the plating ends that would show beneath the paint.

Electric terminals are connected to a plating material, either copper, nickel, or chromium and to the frame to be plated. A current passes through the acid solution (Electrolyte.) and molecules of the metal travel through the solution to deposit on the frame.

A frame plated in the manner just described would be plated 2 or 3 inches up the seatstays, to include the whole rear dropouts on both sides, left and right chainstays, and the bottom bracket shell. In addition, the seat tube would be plated up to 2 to 3 inches above the front derailleur braze-on.

Also of course part of the down tube would be plated; it being impossible to immerse the derailleur braze-on without immersing much of the lower portion of the frame.

As I mentioned before, only the dropout faces, right chainstay, and front derailleur braze-on would be polished; the remainder would be plated, but with a rough, less shiny surface.

A frame with chrome head lugs (Picture left.) would have the head tube and several inches of the top and down tube plated.

After chroming in this manner the parts to be left unpainted would be masked with masking tape.

The edge around lug work required some delicate cutting of the tape with an Exacto knife.

If a fork crown was chromed the steering column was masked with duct tape before the fork was placed in the tank so it was not chromed.

Similarly, the bottom bracket threads were protected with a rubber plug.

I would use an etch primer over the chrome; this contains phosphoric acid that etches into the metal and provides a firm key for the coats of paint that followed.

Good chrome plating is expensive; one of the reasons being the high cost of disposing of the large amounts of toxic waste this process generates. Even the water used for rinsing the chrome parts after the plating cannot be disposed of without first treating it to render it harmless.

I remember the shop in Escondido had a low wall, about 18 inches high, built around the plating tanks so any spillage was contained, and could not escape out of the building and seep into the ground.

The chrome plating industry was the first to be regulated for toxic waste by the government, and is still highly regulated. Workers in the industry have to undergo regular medical checkups.

It is not the business I would choose to be in, but I was glad to have access to a good plating shop when I needed it.

A more detailed description of the Chrome Plating Process can be viewed here

The Evolution of Frame Design, Part III: Clinging to Traditions

The final article in a 3 part series; Part I and Part II precede it.

After more than a decade of hard times from the late 1950s through the early 1970s the lightweight bicycle business finally came out of the slump, helped to a large extent by a bike boom in America.

By the end of the 1960s the 73 degree parallel frame was now the standard road geometry. Although it had been born out of necessity to build something that was easier to construct, it was still far better than the 71 degree seat angle, 73 degree head of the 1950s and before.

However, tradition dies hard, especially when those who had survived the hard times were the old established framebuilders that were around in the 1940s and 1950s, or new ones schooled in the belief systems of the old builders.

If you remember from the first article I wrote in this series, how the 2 degree difference between the head and seat angles suited the framebuilder, because the head and seat tubes diverged away from each other, and as the frame got taller the top tube got longer.

No one wanted to go back to 71 degree seat angles, so by the early 1970s the standard racing frame geometry became 73 seat angle and 75 degree head. Both Italian and British framebuilders followed this trend.

Typical are the head and seat angles on the 1973 Italian DeRosa shown at the top of this article. Picture from The Racing Bicycle Collection.

It was necessary to shorten the fork rake, otherwise, with the steeper head angle the point of the wheel’s contact with the road would actually be in front of the steering axis, making the bike just about impossible to ride.

Many of these traditionalists still held the firm belief that a bike should have zero trail; so by steepening the head and shortening the fork rake, (Offset.) they maintained the status quo.

See the picture (Left.) from the same DeRosa with the steering axis superimposed in green. Note there is little or no trail.

Now the head angle was steeper, steering was much more sensitive; less forgiving towards rider error.

Over the years road surfaces had greatly improved in Europe, bicycle tires had become narrower; as a result rear chainstays could be made shorter, therefore stiffer. Couple this with the steeper head and less fork rake, and bike wheelbases became a lot shorter.

Riders noticed with the new steeper head and short wheelbase, the bikes felt much more lively and faster when sprinting or climbing out of the saddle. Both riders and framebuilders attributed these ride qualities to the shorter steeper frame.

However, if you remember from the first article, “The Wheelbarrow Effect,” the livelier feel came from the fact that the rider’s weight was now directly over the front wheel, not behind the front wheel’s point of contact as it had been in the pre 1950s.

During the period from the late 1950s and through the 1960s, I had been building frames mostly for my own use; trying to find something that suited me. Because I never had any real notion to build frames as a business, I was not restricted to what was fashionable or what everyone else was doing.

In the early 1950s I found the shallow seat angle and long top tube totally unsuitable, I would always end up sitting on the nose of the saddle. Because of this I experimented with a frame that had a steeper seat angle and shorter top tube; my reasoning was, if this is where my body wants to be, I will build a frame to accommodate it.

I was also aware of the wheelbarrow effect. I experimented a little with different head angles but accepted early on that 73 degrees was the ideal head angle for a road bike, although a degree either way is okay. (72 to 74.) However, I did shorten the fork rake considerably to get the front wheel under the handlebars.

The resulting trail made the bike handle better, and go round corners faster, especially on fast descents. By the early 1970s I had established my design. The top tube was even shorter, seat angle steeper, and by using a longer handlebar stem, the handlebars were directly over the front wheel’s point of contact.

I was now building frames for other people and by 1974 had a full time business. The formula I used was simple; as the frame got taller, (Larger.) the handle bar stem had to become gradually longer to keep the handlebars directly over the front wheel.

This set up had the same desired feel when sprinting of climbing, but without the over sensitiveness of the steep head angle and less trail. Trail was a good thing; it helped keep the bike on a straight line, and gave certain self-steering qualities when cornering at speed.

The top tube became longer as the frame got taller, but at a lesser amount than the seat tube, because the handlebar stem was also lengthening.

With other people riding the bikes, some of them International class riders, my reputation grew as a framebuilder; the reason was the way the bike handled. 

As a young rider in the 1950s if I mentioned that my bike felt sluggish on the climb, I was told, “Good climbers, climb sitting down.” In the 1970s if an inexperienced rider crashed because the steering was over sensitive, he was told he didn’t know how to handle the bike.

My thinking was, put a novice on a good handling bike and he is an adequate bike handler; put an expert bike rider on the same bike and he becomes a brilliant bike handler.

Several readers of these articles have mentioned that they find this history interesting. What the reader sees as history is just a memory to me. However, I have found it interesting to reflect on the way the racing bicycle has evolved over the years, in many ways accidentally.

By the 1980s most of the world’s framebuilders had dropped the steep head angle thinking and gone back the old standard 73 degree head angle. They kept the shorter fork rake and found the resulting increase in trail was a good thing.

This was something I had discovered ten or fifteen years before. Did I influence anyone? I very much doubt it; I imagine most of the world’s framebuilders had never even heard of me in the early 1980s.

The saying, “Thinking outside the box” wasn’t even around when I was playing with different frame design ideas back in the 1960s.

Tradition is one thing that will always keep you firmly inside the box

Stargroves

During WWII after the bombing in 1940, my mother, sister and I, left the East End of London and moved to the rural countryside in Hampshire, England.

Strangely the tiny village we moved to was called East End, part of the larger village of East Woodhay.

I began school there in 1941; we lived there until 1946 a year after the war ended.

A short distance from the school were the gates to a large Victorian mansion called Stargroves, (Picture above.) at that time it was the home of Sir Frederick Cardin.

The title “Sir” meant that he had received a Knighthood from the King of England. It was my understanding that Sir Frederick was formally a high ranking army man, and probably received the Knighthood for services to his country.

We normally couldn’t see Stargroves as it stood on its own large grounds and was hidden from view. However, every Christmas, Sir Frederick would invite all the local children over for a Christmas Party.

We would assemble on the road outside the school, line up two by two, and then march through the big iron gates and about half a mile up the winding private driveway to Stargroves. (See the satellite picture below.)

We walked in though one of the large front doors, which opened into a huge central hall. If you look at the picture below, at the front door on the left, you will notice there are two large windows either side that span two floors.

That is because the central hall had no first floor ceiling and went all the way to the roof of this enormous building. There was a wide winding staircase at one end of the hall, leading up to a balcony that gave access to the upstairs rooms on the other half of the building.

At the end of the hall next to the staircase was a decorated Christmas Tree that had to be at least 25 foot tall. We all sat cross-legged on the polished hardwood floor, facing the tree, and various small groups got up to sing carols, and individuals recited poems that we had been rehearsing in the preceding weeks.

Then there would be a merry “Ho, ho, ho,” and looking up to the balcony, we would see Santa Claus, or Father Christmas as we knew him, as he made his way along and down the staircase with his sack full of presents. A whisper went around between the waiting children; “That’s old Freddy Cardin.”

Above: The tiny school I attended. I took this picture during a visit in the 1980s; the school was still in use then, not sure if it is now. 

Happy childhood memories during those hard wartime years. Stargroves has had an interesting history since those times; in the 1970s it was the home of Mick Jagger. He had a mobile recording studio and the Rolling Stones recorded Exile on Main Street, Sticky Fingers, and It’s Only Rock ‘n Roll, there.

I did read somewhere that the drums were set up in the large hall I spoke of, to take advantage of the natural reverb.

The Who recorded a number of songs there, including Won’t Get Fooled Again and Pure and Easy. In 1972 Led Zeppelin recorded parts of the albums, Houses of the Holy, and Physical Graffiti. Other artists who have recorder there are Deep Purple, Status Quo, Bob Marley, Santana, and Iron Maidon.

I wonder how Sir Frederick would have felt about all that. Stargroves is now owned by Rod Stewart, who bought the property in 1998. If he ever comes across this, there is an old ex-framebuilder who would love to take a peek inside that large central hall again. Just nostalgia

Footnote: This  article is written from my childhood memories. The later events and in particular the Rock n'Roll history is what I heard from other people and from information gathered from the Internet. Therefore I can't guarantee the accuracy of the information, and suggest you cross reference other scorches. Dave Moulton.

The Kermit the Frog Salesman

In 1983 I opened my own frameshop in San Marcos, California. It was all work back then trying to get the business off the ground. It was not uncommon for me to work 18 hour days. 

The bane of my life were people soliciting and selling all manner of stuff I didn’t need. It got so bad that I would lock the door to the front office.

One day a guy walked in selling Kermit the Frog glove puppets.

He had a puppet on each hand, with little red tongues that shot in and out. He immediately went into his cheery Kermit sales pitch.

I shouted, “Who the fuck left the front door unlocked.” I walked towards the guy to show him the way out and lock the door behind him.

He must have thought I was about to attack him because he turned to run. The problem was the door had closed behind him, and he couldn’t turn the door knob because he had a Kermit the Frog puppet on each hand.

As I got closer, and closer, he kept glancing back over his shoulder with a look of sheer terror like an animal in the slaughter house. He would try one hand, then the other, even both hands. In his panic it never occured to him to remove a glove puppet.

Just as I reached him, he got the door open and was through the front office and out the front door in a flash. I locked the door behind him and went back to work.

I wonder about this guy. Did he realize he was not really cut out to be a Kermit the Frog puppet salesman, and get a real job?

Maybe after this incident he at least left one hand free to open the door for a quick get away.