Product Development: Mo Bruno Roy’s Mudhoney PRO 2 is complete and delivered. She’s racing it tomorrow. Here’s a super brief timeline of her frame’s beginnings:
Monday, November 26, 2012, 9 pm: Design details confirmed.
Tuesday, November 27: Frame fabrication begun. Blueprint ant machining.
Wednesday, November 28: Machining and welding.
Thursday, November 29: Bonding and final machining.
Friday, November 30: Final finishing. Decals applied. Frame delivered. Matt Roy assembled the bike.
Saturday, December 1: Mo Bruno Roy raced the bike.
Consulting: I’ve been asked to help a fellow framebuilder [I.P] with some process flow thoughts. Basically, the conversation regards MRP systems. Seven Cycles’ approach is somewhat unusual; we use kan ban as one of our primary tools. I hear a lot of talk about kan ban, and pretty much everyone I know doesn’t really use it or know what it means. Kan ban – used well – rocks for many types of inventory systems, even for a 100% custom production system like Seven’s.
Thursday location: Seven | Studio || 8:15 am – 7:15 pm
Product Development: I’ve posted more photos of Mo’s Mudhoney PRO 2 progress today. We are fairly certain we’ll meet the Friday afternoon deadline. the frame is looking good.
Press: Seven Cycles is in the latest issue of Bicycle Quarterly. The product test and comparison is definitely the most unusual piece in which we’ve ever been a part. The review features a $7,000 Seven with Ultegra wheels matched to an $11,000 Lynskey with Campagnolo Shamal Ultra wheels. Somehow the Seven came in third, in a two bike test. No joke.
Just a few of the memorable Hup kits – on the Studio’s wall from the last Hup Exhibit
Chip Baker of VeloCB made a really nice mention of Ride Studio Cafe today. Chip writes about the Twelve Days of CXMAS; he explains:
[…] for me this CXMAS list will include those who stepped up and showed CX the love. I am not sure if I am on the naughty or nice list. I guess it depends on who you ask. I ride with passion. Its not always going to be nice…With no further ado here we go.
Chip is definitely on the Studio’s nice list! Here’s what he says about the Studio:
Book Project: Seven Cycles was invited to participate in a book project today. We’ll see where this leads. Interview happens on Monday.
Business Development: Met again about Seven Cycles Winter Session with our top retailers. We’ve settled on the dates, invite list, topics, and food. It’s going to be the biggest retailer gathering for Seven in the past five years. I’m looking forward to getting retailers from around the world all to Seven at one time.
Clothing Design: I’m calling it Wool Jersey Hell today. All three versions are just about done. Posting more, soon.
Production Management: Looks like we’ll be able to catch up and meet our Q4 plans – even with the Sandy interruption. It’s definitely all hands on frames but we’ll make it work. Matt O. is managing it. We have the best team.
Product Development: MoPRO 2.0 in process. I’m posting photos of some of the steps along the way in the framebuilding process.
Watching over Mo’s existing Sevens; and collecting data
Mo Bruno Roy‘s first carbon-titanium prototype cyclocross bike from 2011 was great. Good results, very helpful feedback from her and Matt Roy, and some important data that helped make the production bikes perfect.
The PRO 2.0 frameset incorporates all the production improvements, some new prototype elements, and some changes to Mo’s position on the bike.
Project timeline:
Monday, November 26, 2012, 9 pm: Design details confirmed.
Tuesday, November 27: Frame fabrication begun. Machining.
Wednesday, November 28: Machining and welding.
Thursday, November 29: Bonding and final machining.
Friday, November 30: Final finishing. Decals applied. Frame delivered. Matt Roy assembled the bike.
Saturday, December 1: Mo Bruno Roy raced the bike.
New Hire: We just hired Mary A. as a Seven Cycles’ newest frame finisher She’s already being helpful today! That will be it for new hires for 2012. But I hear that 2013 is not too far off.
Product Development: Met with Mo Bruno Roy and Matt Roy this evening to finalize details of Mo’s new Mudhoney PRO design. We learned a lot from her first prototype. We’re incorporating all the production improvements we’ve made in the past year-and-a-half. And we’re including a few new aspects not yet available on production models. We’re working to have the frame ready to race this weekend.
Project Management: We just posted the 2013 brochure credits on Seven’s site. We have a lot of help from a lot of people; this page is one of the ways we’re saying thank you.
The December issue of Bicycling Magazine has a review of five titanium bikes. The article is also a piece about how titanium is still relevant in this time of carbon. Fortunately I already knew that. The article reviews five titanium builders:
Spectrum Cycles: Frame fabricated by Seven Cycles. As the article indicates, Tom Kellogg and I have worked together for more than two decades! Much to his chagrin.
I was flattered to be interviewed for the article introduction by Andrew Bernstein. Andrew terms me as having, “a nearly unmatched pedigree in custom-bike circles.” What an honorific!
More from the article:
“In 1991, a year after winning his third Tour de France, Greg Lemond‘s Z Team came back to the race on prototypes of the Merlin Extralight. The first titanium bike to fully achieve the metal’s promise, it was as strong as steel but lighter, and possessed a unique and pleasing road feel – slightly more forgiving. with a little extra spring, and somewhat counterintuitively, also more stiffness.
[…] Vandermark […] created that iconic Extralight.”
Sounds: It was music history day at the Studio. Not really, but we started the day with Ariela’s choice of Gang of Four; forty songs from GoF all morning. Very challenging to follow that up, so I went with Love, God, Murder by Johnny Cash. Ahhh. From there off to the Mission of Burma; similar darkness to Cash but a very different view. Then over to the Lazy Cowgirls to shake the spokes and lift the spirits. I closed up shop by clearing the house with GBV (warning: this is a music file.) What a way to warm up on a chilly day.
Riding through the thoroughfare
with his nose up in the air
a wreck may be ahead, but he don’t mind
Trouble coming, he don’t see
he just keeps his eyes on me
and any other thing that lies behind
