Dear Listers:
There's been a bit of back and forth on the topic of building your own frame here. From my perspective, now is one of the best times to do it. There are many resources available, from here to framebuilders.org, courses in frame construction, etc. It would take a willful disregard of this information to make a truly hazardous frame. As far as frying tubes and lugs, it is very difficult to do this with a $40 MAPP torch, 56% cadmium-free silver, and the appropriate flux. I started my frame-building by adding bits and pieces to junk frames, starting with water-bottle bosses, chainstay and seatstay bridges, dropouts, rack bosses, and cable guides. At the same time, I learned about alignment, bottom bracket drop, the effect of trail and rake on ride, and saw enough production frames from the inside, taking them apart, to realize that the average worksmanship on many bikes, many with good reputations, was far from an unattainable ideal.
After that initial period, I started to work on replacement of various frame tubes, and making simple jigs from commonplace hardware. I learned how to rake forks with plywood forms that were pleasing in curvature and allowed repeatable results. I have found that, after repairing numerous frames, that it is easier to build them from the ground up!
My part-time framebuilding journey has taken about 7 years. I work at my day-job about 50-60 hours a week. All that I learned, I learned from reading online, or finding out by trial and error...and yes, you can take one of my tandems down a screaming descent, with lots of off-camber turns, and not only live to tell the tale, but wish to do it again the next day.
In short, do it...but take your time and get it right.
Stuart Stiffey
Woodstock, NY