Good morning all, Since this is Dale's list and he requests certain things that I was unaware of to be a member I will oblige; it's like entering someone's house or being a Stonecutter. Many of you know me already, but for those that don't here's a little history. I'm a super bike geek, not really a retro grouch, more of a retro techno wienie. I'm a professional mechanic and have been for 15 of my 31 years. I've retired from the industury twice only to be dragged back within a month or two. I think of the Sutherland's manual as a fine afternoon reading, and have memorized the internal hub charts.
The start of my love of classic bikes comes from the early 80's in North Idaho and the guys who rode Ciocces, Bassos, Colnagos, De Rosas and other like breeds that would sneer and laugh at me on my cheap Sekai as they sped by. Because of my hatred and envy of these gents I aspired to be better than them and own all the bikes they owned. In the late 80's I moved to Seattle and started putting bikes together for the Velocipede after being turned down for a salesman job at R&E. At this first job I met my to be mentor Val Kleitz, now current owner of The Bikesmith, who is a Raleigh nut and I learned that cool bikes didn't need to be racing bikes. Throughout the 90's I owned at least 60 bikes, most of them of the style of the of the racers I used to envy. After all this buying and selling I realized I love bikes, all bikes, but I have a leaning to "the older the better." For those of you who want to know about my current bikes here's the breakdown: Bike Friday Crusoe prototype (bar/store bike) Bike Friday AirGlide (Commuting/road bike) Diamond Back Overdrive comp (29"MTB/touring/psychocross bike) . . . Drum roll please. . . for the classics '52 Schwinn Corvette (in storage) '54 sports style Rudge (in Storage) Mid-80's SLX Razesa now built as weird fixed gear early-70's Peugeot (was going to be my winter bike but was too small) late 60's Bianchi Specialissima (my first classic collectible) early 60's Olmo (was my uncle's race bike in Europe in the early 60's, so I hear)
These are all of them I can think of now and it doesn't include a half dozen frames and many large boxes of parts. In my attempt to put my wife through grad school I'll be shrinking the piles and when things of interest to this group come up I'll post them. Lastly, my name, which has caused some controversy, is monkeyman to my friends and Brandon Todd Ives to the IRS. I hope to include the list members in the first group, so feel free to call me by name. To abide by "list rules" I will post under the name known only to government officals, but, may I forget to do this, you can read it in my signature file.
Thank you, Brandon
Brandon and Mitzi's-- "Wurld uv Wunder"
http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Nobody can do everything,
but if everybody did something
everything would get done.
-Gil Scott Heron-
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