Brian,
I want to thank you for debunking much of the hooey about frame building in one short post, especially the portion I have quoted at the end of my response.
It is refreshing to see a fine craftsman call a spade a spade and then walk the talk.
You aim to make a unique bike each time you build one, if I understand your many earlier posts. Doing so is an utterly sound working out of the thesis that digital robotics can exceed any mastercraftsman in terms of purely quantifiable accuracy and precision of design and construction. What digital robotics cannot do is make consistently brilliant choices on the frontier between the quantifiable and the unquantifiable or not yet quantifiable. This realm is where a human craftsman should focus his/her energies and this is where you seem to do. I applaud you for that.
Since the beginning of formulaic human activity, there have had to be crucial choices made about design and construction that were not easily reducible to formulas. Heuristics must inevitably be defaulted to in certain decisions and as the field of artificial intelligence has discovered, heuristics, even with fuzzy logic, is often tricky to distill to operational activity by robots involving high touch experiences of artifacts.
Mastercraftsmen, master engineers, master mechanics, etc. have always distinguished themselves by operating skillfully in these realm between the quantifiable and the difficult to quantify by being adroit at both pioneering new rational understanding of the feasibility of new systematic processes AND by use of experienced intuition or feel for a problem and its partially heuristic solution.
Great masters have always understood more than most where the frontier between the then currently completely quantifiable and the not yet (or perhaps never) quantifiable existed. They work and distinquish themselves on that epistemic seam. It is a balancing act. Those that veer too far to the quantifiable get bored, or become boring. Those that veer too far to the unquantifiable, become too fanciful to be taken seriously.
There are of course other paths across the frontier than the one you have chosen, Brian, and you often point this out. That is another reason I admire you. There are as many paths as there are unique, authentic individuals practicing a craft. This is why there can be a Michelangelo and a da Vinci in the same period. But there are never very many of these folks at any given time, because it takes serious artistic huevos to stay authentic for any length of time on this frontier in any craft.
My compliments and appreciation to you and the other handful of folks that tread this frontier in the niche of steel tubed bikes. It is exciting to watch, interact with and assess.
Don Wilson Los Olivos, CA USA
"Although material is important to
> some degree; you
>
> can trust me when I say that how the frame is built
> is more
>
> important. The kicker there, contrary to what most
> framebuilders and
>
> people in "the business" say, is that building a
> "good" frame is
>
> extremely easy to do. What goes on inside most of
> what we all
>
> consider "the cream of the crop" and "world class"
> vintage steel
>
> frames from the classic era are far from perfect
> from a technical
>
> sense. Poor mitering, really poor penitration, and
> numerous
>
> other "major sins" in framebuilding are present
> aplenty in almost
>
> every one of our revered classics. But they hold
> together, they ride
>
> fine, and they will continue to do so for several
> more generations
>
> most likely. So why build a bike to extreme
> precision and obcess over
>
> every tiny detail if robots can build nearly perfect
> bikes? This
>
> whole thing has captured my attention for quite a
> while now. I think
>
> I'm getting close to putting it all in some sort of
> perspective that
>
> has relevance and makes sense (oh no, PLEASE not
> that!!). Soon it may
>
> be time to reveal that the Emperor has no clothes.
> Yikes!
>
> Brian Baylis
> La Mesa, CA"
>
D.C. Wilson dcwilson3@yahoo.com ----------------------------------------------------------- Note: This message may contain confidential and/or privileged information. If you are not the addressee or authorized to receive this for the addressee, you must not use, copy, disclose or take any action based on this message or any information herein. If you have received this message in error, please advise the sender immediately by reply e-mail and delete this message. Thank you for your cooperation. -------------------------------------------------------------
__________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com