Tom,
Finally a question with some teeth in it. The differences of opinion
conversations aren't any fun. Thanks for asking.
Here are the plans. Each situation is a seperate case. Painting first.
What will return is a paint service that is going to cherry pic the
jobs that are presented, in order to stay withing a small range of
bikes that we are commonly able to refinish without having to get into
difficult hunts for graphics and so on. Fortunately, the list of
easily obtainable period graphics expands all the time. Certain
additional approaches to providing graphics will also be developed. I
won't have anything to do with this. These jobs and the jobs related
to the usual types of American, English, Itanian, and French classic
lightweights will be what Carlos is going to do to earn a living, at
least for a while. The days if the one person Brian Baylis restoration
are pretty much over, except for the things that I have in my
possesion. There isn't a huge amount left; but still things I will
take care of myself. After that, I'll probably just restore my own
pile of stuff.
On the other hand, Carlos has learned what he knows from me and
learned by helping with restorations over the past two years. He has
the same attitide towards what should and shouldn't be done as I do.
Carlos is technically more artistic than I, insofar as graphics
design. I expect within a few years he will have a recognizable
indivual style of his own. He is also evolving his style on his own as
both a builder and a painter even though he has learned many of the
things I do. He doesn't just copy me. He regularly comes up with his
own ideas. The reason Carlos is going to work and manage a paint crew
as opposed to the "solo" approach ,is it is more effecient as a
process; therefore more profitable. The paint bisiness has to be and
is intended to be profitable. Carlos is very smart. He also knows from
hanging around with me and being inside the framebuilding community
that the big shortage in the "industry" is really good painters.
Framebuilders pop up at a much greater rate than really good and
experienced painters do. Having a crew, he will be able to service the
OEM framebuilder to whatever volume he chooses. I will continue to
teach him the finer points of paint finishing that he hasn't
encountered in his earlier apprenticeship. But at the same time he is
experimenting with air brushs and pinstriping of the type I'll never
do. The other advantage to Carlos taking over painting for restoration
is he is more hip to the modern paints, paint guns, and painting
methods. I'm still old school.
BTW, Tom, EVERY paintshop has a black hole of some sort. Some jobs
just end up in that situation based usually upon some sort of
difficulty that is stopping progress. The natural thing to do is to
keep things moving while you slowly (SLOWLY in some cases) try to sort
out the wrinkle in the pesky project. This can be avoided or minimized
by not taking things that you know will be difficult (bad situation
for a person who can't say "no" to be in). Carlos has now my guidence
and a better ability to control incoming work.
For me as a framebuilder, like I have mentioned a lot recently, I NEED
to focus on filling my back orders. I really want to get a waiting
list down to about 2 years and would like to spend some time with
special one off bikes of various sorts; from randonnuer to city bikes,
from multi wheel designs to an occasional kinetic sculpture. I also
want to make a track bike every so often as a tribute to the concept
of the fixrd gear bike, that I would put up for sale when complete.
Part of the reason for this is I really enjoy making track bikes, but
I also have a large amount of vintage PL tubes that are begging to be
made into bikes, even if they don't end up ever being raced. The
classic lugged steel track bike is a thing of beauty and can stand as
a piece of metal sculpture in any museum where they appreciate fine
craftsmanship in metal. Not that it will happen, I'm jusy saying.
The only thing about keeping a waiting list at two years is it will
still require turning down more orders than I will be able to accept
in the future. There will be no way for me to make more than 7 to 10
frames per year, no matter what I do. Needless to say, and yet people
always ask me, "is something going to change about your frames?". The
answer is deffinitely not. The point is I like what I do, I have a
market, what I do cannot change or be done any other way and still be
what I intend. Call it Retro if you want. The market is there and I
get paid good money to make the frames; I just don't make a lot of
money as a living on account of it. I never complain. I like it that
way and I'm pleased with the bikes I make. If I want more money I'll
make it some other way. Being a "part time professional" framebuilder
is a good way to go in my opinion.
So I hope that prepares you for what to expect. One person
restorations are just not effecient. JB and Cyclart have both proven
top quality work can be done by comittee.
One person framebuilding allows the greatest freedom, if one chooses
to do so. No harm if they don't. There is an art and skill to building
bikes no matter how you go about it; there's skill in becomming
effecient and profitable and there's skill in taking the frame a
little further beyond it's function to give it character and
personalize it's function. Expect more of the same of what I'm known
for and don't expect that you've seen everything yet, because there
are still lots of things left to be done as a constructuer, etc.
Brian Baylis
La Mesa, CA
Brian...What will this mean for turnaround time on painting bikes and building them for folks...are multi- year waiting lists going to
shrink? Perhaps paint jobs will come back sooner? Folks don't realize it,
but you are actually one of the quicker painters of the really major guys.
I've never had you take more than a few months and I've got bikes in paint
right now that have been gone for well over a year into the black hole of a painter's shop. Tom Sander Landing, Mi USA