30 Jun 2007

I have to profess it’s rather a relief that that EBR is finally finished and rollin’. I think all-in-all this has been the longest build we’ve ever done, and certainly the most complicated involving a one-of-a-kind frame and a hub that probably has to be the most un-German German thing I’ve ever come accross.

Yesterday for some reason we could not get the hub to engage in some gears - it would freewheel but just wouldn’t drive. The instruction book we got was of course completely in German, but unfortunately all the German words we know are only of use to anyone in a pub brawl, which this wasn’t, although if we’d had started drinking biers at that point it would probably would’ve sunk to that. The Intarweb to the rescue - we found an English version online and downloaded it.

I honestly believe it’s the sign of a great bike mechanic to want to intrinsically know how something works, to get into the nitty gritty and pull things apart just to put them back to gether again. Expressly tied up in this quality is also the ability to ignore parts of an instruction booklet that has a picture of a 1500 dollar wheel and a Mallet.

So that’s what we did for about half a day. Scratch our heads, pull things apart, put them back together again. No luck. 6pm Friday, screw this, let’s have a beer and try again in the morning.

At midday the next day I call up Tim the head mechanic at Flemington Cycles who was helping us out with the build to see if he’d had any luck. “Yeah, I got it running” he proclaimed. “How the heck did you do it!?!” I wondered. “Well, Damian and I had been working on it for about an hour, when Matt picked up the instruction booklet and said “Have you hit it with a hammer yet?” so we tapped it twice as per the instructions and now it works”.

So there ya go. If you’re ever in Melbourne, Tim is now the man to see if you’re crazy enough to have bought a Rohloff. A massive ‘thank you’ to Damian and Tim at Flemington Cycles who have been an amazing help getting this bike together. They’re Pros of the highest order and deserve your business if you’re in the market for a new bike or spares and repairs.

On Monday Gal’s EBR will be on it’s way to sunny Jamaica, and then it’s only 9 days until our little baby boy is due to make an appearance in this crazy mixed-up world. Probably not the best time to be building eight custom frames simultaneously, but hey, that was the plan all along, so I can hardly complain. Also on Monday one chapter in the build of our new road model - the Tephra CTi - will end and another will begin, when the Titanium section is off to have it’s carbon bits added. Exciting times!

Posted by warwick @ 8:37 am

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