Here's the quotes about the TIG welding thoughts in Yosemite and the cheap ugly bike. I found 'em in the Urban Velo post linked from the blug:
*Do you ever think of building cheap TIG-welded mass-market bikes?* I think of it a lot. I thought of when I was in Yosemite on vacation. That should drive home the point. But a good idea isn’t always a good idea. Ideas have tentacles, they affect and are affected by other things outside the main idea, and those things aren’t always obvious. If you could take some of our bike models, fold your arms and blink your eyes like Jeanie, and turn it into a TIG-welded bike with thick, seamed, straight-gauge CrMo steel tubing; you’d have a heck of a cheap, functional bike. But if we did that and they became immensely popular, we’d have tons of competition the next year, and that competition could smother us. We don’t source from China, but that kind of bike could be, and suddenly we’re just an also-ran, an after thought. *What about building a bike that is a bit more theft resistant?* I still have a plan for a cheaper bike for riding in bike thefty areas. Everybody at Rivendell knows about our “cheap bike project.” The idea is to have a super ugly bike with a few manufacturing shortcuts, it would come primered, but not painted. You’d assemble it and then paint it, and not worry about overspray on the rims and tires. Each bike would look already stolen, and could have a unique paint job that made a real thief reluctant to take it, because it would be so identifiable. http://www.urbanvelo.org/issue32/p76-77.html Paul -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msg/rbw-owners-bunch/-/i0nTOAxlgQsJ. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en.
