Harry was still building last I spoke to him, which was perhaps a year or so ago. They had been building a lot of titanium frames. He also had a nice hydroformed aluminum pursuit bike on display. I personally have two of his frames, including a tandem, and a TT frame from the late 80's and early '90s. Both are still on the road. They do nice work. I believe I have that test in my archives, if anyone is interested.
Take Care, Wade Barocsi Cheshire, CT CycleDesignUSA.com
On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 3:36 PM, AdventureCORPS
<adventurecorps@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hello friends:
>
> I knew Harry Havnoonian pretty well back in the late 80s and early 90s. I
> visited his shop a few times, a close friend of mine worked there for many
> years, and I had Harry build custom frames for my then girlfriend and a
> client I was coaching. (Back then Harry was also the primary, or perhaps
> exclusive, official warranty repair shop for all the glued together
> aluminimun / carbon bikes from overseas, so I also sent him a Japanese-made
> Vitus-clone which needed its head tube re-glued.)
>
> Back in that era, rims were commonly "aero-shaped" and Harry told me that he
> mounted the rear brake facing forward so that, as it flexed a bit under
> braking, it would flex "up" the rim into the wider part of the rim, which
> provided superior braking in his view.
>
> BTW, his website is now pretty useless and I get the impression that he's
> not in the frame-building business anymore. Any Philly locals can perhaps
> tell us more.
>
> Oh, also: Some of you must remember the "head to head" bike test in one of
> the glossy bike magazines which compared steel to various other frame
> materials. ALL the frames were made by Harry with the same geometry. I
> believe it was steel vs aluminimum vs carbon, but maybe ti was in the mix,
> too. The steel frame was brazed but the non-ferrous frames were all the
> glued together type. It would be neat to see that article again, if somebody
> has it posted somewhere, or maybe Bicycle Quarterly could reprint it, and
> then do a modern version of that test.
>
> Yours in sport,
> Chris Kostman
> La Jolla, CA
>
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