Monday, August 19, 2013

Cross Frame

I started building the first carbon cross frame.  It uses custom ENVE tubing, ENVE seat and chain stays (for cantilever brakes).

Here are the main triangle tubes mitered in the jig.  I carefully mark them before cutting to avoid any screw ups.

The ends of the ENVE seat stays come molded to bolt directly to dropouts.  I noticed the spacing was a little off for the Crumpton dropouts I'm using.  I set them up in the mill and carefully ground them down to fit.

Once I had them completed I fit them on the dropouts and checked the cantilever post location.  It was out by almost 1/2"!  This seat stay molding was obviously for a dropout with more offset from the axle.  ENVE did not supply a drawing when requested so I was hoping for the best.  Turns out I had some cutting and machining to do.

I cut the molded end with threaded insert off the stay and tried the Crumpton seat stay plug.  Still over 1/2" short given the amount I had to remove to eliminate the molded end.
My only real option was to machine a new set of stay end plugs with the correct offset.
In the end they turned out better than I'd hoped.  Now they just need anodizing.

2 comments:

Tabi Ferguson said...

Squeee!! This one's for me!

Crash said...

Hey Man- this looks great! The guys at ENVE seem to have checked out for us small builders. The days are gone when I'd call them and talk with an engineer.