bonnie & jason

Ready for a test ride!

I got the bike back from the shop today and installed all the parts. Unfortunately, when I first stomped on it, one of the joints came loose (left side dropout). Oops! I rebrazed it and now it seems fine… for now. As a first time bike builder, I’m not all that confident in my handy work so I won’t be going on any long rides on it for a while.

Anyway, here’s a pic:

Canon 5D2 - short video sample

Bonnie’s dad just got the Canon 5D2. I haven’t had a chance to put it through it’s paces yet, but I did try a short video clip.

This was taken in pretty bad lighting with a 24-105mm 4.0 IS lens. I think the ISO ended up at 3200. There’s no autofocus feature in video mode so that will take getting used to. Otherwise, it works pretty well! The coolest thing is the bokeh in the out of focus areas. Take a look for yourself. (You can view in HD if you click through to vimeo.)

2008 12 09 5D2 test video from Jason Wang on Vimeo.

Sweet Bea

Ravi and Jen stopped by today to introduce us to Bea (and drop off a couple trays of pasta for the poor housebound family.) We’ve been waiting to meet her for a while now and it was really nice of them to drop by, especially with food!

Anyway, I took a couple quick snaps. Isn’t she a cutie!?

Definitely a mellow baby. She sat there and looked around for a while before drifting off for a nap. Didn’t make a peep the whole time. Enjoy it before she turns into a little monster like Alissa!

California Academy of Sciences - trip #2

I took Alissa to the CAS again today. This time around, we went through the four story rainforest. There were lots of cool geckos and butterflies as well as fish and birds. Also, since I’m too cheap to pay for parking in the garage, Alissa got a good workout walking to and from the museum from 10th and Irving. Recently, she’s grown weary of my “Come on, hurry ups” but instead responds to “faster, faster.” She also says “two, three, GO!” Sometimes she says “one,” but more often not. (However, she does remember 8 and 12 now.)

Walking through the park:

Insisting on holding her jacket:

Raisin break underneath the rainforest pool:

One of the many cool frogs:

Time to go home:

Two, three, Go!

Running by Ebisu (which is closed for renovations by the way.)

Detail work in between the chain and seat stays

I wanted to put some braces between the stays but all my scrap was tapered so I had to use two pieces, butted together to make a single symmetrical brace. Instead of doing them plain jane straight across, I decided to give them a little flair and angled them a bit. Here’s the result:

Chain stay stiffener:

Seat stay stiffener:

The only other thing I did today was trim off the excess head tube. Now I just need to spend a little time making some of the joints a little prettier and then it’s off to the bike shop to get the head tube faced and reamed for the headset and have the seat tube reamed for my seat post.

Main frame done!

I got the main frame done today by brazing on the chain stays and seat stays. Still have to put in a bridge between each set of stays and do a lot of cleanup. But this is a major milestone! Yeehah!

My wheels came today!

Other than the frame itself, the biggest expense on this bike is the wheels. I didn’t go as cheap as possible since I think the wheels play a significant part in how the bike looks so I semi-splurged on a new set with radial bladed spokes in the front with black hubs, black spokes, and black rims to match the color scheme I’m planning. Black on steel.

Not a big fan of the decals so I’ll take a hair dryer to them tonight and peel them off.

Brazed on the track ends

I brazed on the track ends today:

I also mitered the chain stays and will be getting ready to braze them to the bottom bracket shortly.

Annual Holiday Huey photo session - 2008

Alissa and I went over to the Huey’s with white backdrop in hand for the annual holiday photo session. Although we added Devyn to the mix this year, things went pretty smoothly and I think we got a lot of keepers.

This one is definitely one of them:

And here are some more with the backdrop in play.

For those of you out there who are interested, this is just a large white sheet from Joann Fabrics doubled up and sewn together at the seams. (I think I bought a 10′x20′ piece.) I used to use this with my professional lighting and backdrop kit which I have since sold. But as you can see, a couple tripods and natural light from a large window does a pretty decent job as well.

Finished the front quadrilateral

Well, it’s not pretty. And some of the joints don’t seem 100% filled in. But it’s together and actually feels rock solid. I’ll probably go back and try to redo the parts where I can see gaps. I think I’m getting better at the whole brazing thing but I might just be getting lucky too.

The geometry didn’t quite come out as I had calculated. The top tube is almost 1/2″ longer than I expected probably due to the cumulative effects of measurement and cut errors along the way. Plus, some of the angles are off a hair here and there. This bike building thing really is half art, half science. Overall, I’m pretty happy with how it turned out given I’m doing it without a proper jig.