Eric Baar is a full time, professional bicycle framebuilder since 1999, currently welding tandem frames for daVinci Designs in Denver and fabricating creative custom one offs at his home shop in Colorado Springs, affectionately known as The Ground Up Speed Shop.
Buying Components and Subcontracting Work – Am I responsible for their parts or their work? How do I protect myself and my family assets? Selling Overseas – Why not? What could go wrong? How do I prevent problems? Warehouse vs. In-House – Who is responsible for my inventory? What are pitfalls and advantages of renting space vs. my garage? What should I look for in the lease? Working with Quality, Seattle Bike Supply, J&B and Others. Corporation, LLC, or Sole Proprietor – Which should I use?
Learn key simple ideas to SET UP YOUR BUSINESS, PREVENT PROBLEMS in the future, and REDUCE INSURANCE COSTS. Before you start, protect yourself and your family financially.
Lora VanDixhorn is a highly-acclaimed authority in the bicycle industry, insuring large retail bike distributors, manufactures and importers, as well as the smallest part-time custom bike builders for 25 years. She attends local custom bike conventions as well as Interbike yearly, is an invited guest speaker at many conferences and conventions, and is President of ISU Insurance Services of Westlake in California. Her company is licensed in every State for all forms of insurance, with an attentive and professional staff. They access more than 200 insurance companies for the best rates and the broadest coverage, tailored to each client’s needs. Come to this seminar with your business concerns and questions. Ask the expert!
Demonstrating the User-Friendly Sizing Cycle Craig Calfee will demonstrate how the Calfee Sizer can be used with any fitting system to achieve perfect fit and happy customers. The Sizer cycle is a hyper adjustable fitting tool that can adjust while a person is pedaling. This allows the fitter to literally dial in the top tube length to find that sweet spot of comfort that can be elusive with other systems. The customer can tell what a few millimeters longer or shorter actually feels like without getting off the bike. A power measuring device or heart rate monitor can be used to determine the most efficient position. Another improvement is the ability to take real measurements off the size cycle that correspond to real frame measurements. No estimating or calculating needed. One can even hold a frame or bike next to the size cycle to clearly see what the differences are. Quick release levers and easy to read numbers make fitting a less intimidating procedure.
Craig Calfee started building carbon frames in 1987, when “plastic bikes” weren’t very popular. Greg LeMond discovered Calfee’s bikes in 1991 and that meeting introduced Craig into the world of fussy professional racers. Being a custom frame specialist, Calfee became familiar with the limitations of sizing programs and adjustable fitting bikes. Framebuilder Bernie Mikkelsen had been working on a better sizer for many years when Calfee proposed to help bring it into production. A deal was struck and now there is a steel fabrication corner in Calfee’s carbon fiber frame shop. That is where the Calfee Sizer is produced. Now it’s easy to obtain the exact geometry needed for a custom frame.
Moots Product Development veteran Butch Boucher will be giving a talk on High Performance Titanium. Butch has an extensive background in the bicycle industry and uses his vast knowledge to best design products that connect rider and machine for a seamless feel and unparalleled ride quality. Butch worked extensively in steel during his “formidable” years, which gave him the understanding of how a truly good riding bicycle should perform. From there his attention was fully focused on titanium to replace steel as his material of choice in frame construction. Butch has played a key role in Moots latest product development push to evolve titanium to higher levels of performance. That effort has resulted in the RSL and Divide line of bikes. Butch cut his teeth in the bike industry in 1984 and since then has played a crucial role for two small handbuilt frame companies, Co-Motion Cycles (which he co-founded in 1987) and Moots (1996-present). He was in the very first Ti frame builder’s class at UBI in 1992, taught by Gary Helfrich. Butch has over 20 years of titanium experience and has been surrounded by many others within Moots who have intimate knowledge with the magic metal. Butch will be covering topics ranging from how titanium has evolved over the years in the bicycle industry, where titanium is today as well as the philosophies, principles and techniques Moots adheres to in designing and building their frames.
Keith Noronha has been heavily involved with product development for Reynolds Technology over the last 20 years.
Tom Ritchey is a former national level racer, passionate rider and resourceful product designer with a unique, common sense approach to building the best road and mountain components available. Tom was on the scene with other pioneers in the early days of mountain biking and he saw numerous ways to improve the equipment they were using. But his desire to build better parts wasn’t rooted in some grand business plan – many parts simply didn’t exist and the ones that did required substantial improvement. Tom saw an opportunity to develop lighter, stronger, better components. Starting in high school, Tom was focused on saving weight without compromising the strength of the racing bicycles he built for himself. Over the years Tom’s focus has shifted from frame building to component design, but his obsession with functional, lightweight and reliable equipment has not wavered. Tom’s interest in adventurous travel while having his own bike available, led him to create the perfect solution – the Break-Away travel bike, which easily checks through as personal luggage. A knack for developing and refining manufacturing processes and using the best resources available has furthered Ritchey’s reputation as one of the most prolific component manufacturers in the industry. Many Ritchey designs and manufacturing methods have become industry standards. The success of Ritchey products in international competition has validated Tom’s ideas and generated valuable feedback to further refine and develop new Ritchey products. Tom still puts in 10,000 miles a year on his bike, constantly thinking of ways to make it better. These miles of experience and unending passion for bicycles shine through in every detail of a Ritchey component.
Matt Appleman of Appleman Bicycles will discuss the basics of composite materials and how carbon fiber is used in building bicycles. Special attention will be given to design considerations, material choice, and manufacturing methods with an emphasis on tube to tube construction.
Matt Appleman started building custom carbon fiber frames in 2008 and has a degree in Composite Materials Engineering. Matt worked in the wind energy and aerospace industries before starting Appleman Bicycles. Appleman Bicycles is a one man custom carbon frame shop that uses carbon fiber extensively in the design and aesthetic of custom frames.
Kent Eriksen and Katie Lindquist, partners in both business and life, own and operate Kent Eriksen Cycles in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. As founder of Moots cycles, Sore Saddle Cyclery and now Kent Eriksen Cycles, Kent has assembled 37 years of insight, experience and humility in frame building. Lindquist utilizes her organizational skills and science background to keep the momentum and direction of the business fluid. Together, Eriksen and Lindquist will deliver a “how to” presentation on what it takes to start, maintain and participate in the frame building business. In a sometimes serious, sometimes amusing forum the two will present listeners guidance on the definition of success, moving targets, distractions and gleaning knowledge and hind sight from their mistakes and successes.
Kent Eriksen epitomizes the entrepreneurial spirit, starting from his youth. Arriving in Steamboat Springs in the 1974, it was to be a stop in his year off between high school and college. After starting a bicycle repair and retail shop known as Sore Saddle Cyclery, college still waits. It was inside this cone-shaped shop where Eriksen began fabricating the first generation of mountain bikes, pre mass production frames under the Moots brand. Kent developed Moots cycles into one of the finest titanium frame manufacturers with a worldwide reputation for attention to detail, function and design. In 2005, Eriksen left Moots to start his own signature brand; creating custom designed bikes under the name Kent Eriksen Cycles. Today, this award winning business produces titanium bicycles, evacuation equipment for the ski industry and adaptive equipment for disabled skiers and cyclists.
Nature’s composite, wood, was the exclusive material for road and track racing rims for over 70 years. Following the aluminum age, we’re entering an era of carbon fiber. Today’s cycling aficionado’s have an unparalleled opportunity to enjoy all 3 materials. The Cermenati family in Italy, with 4 generations of wood rim experience, has restarted their artisan production. Aluminum rims are ever more sophisticated and carbon fiber is delivering unapproached performance and weight. Ric will explain why wood’s fans were so crazy about the ride quality, light weight, and reliability. Is this success a clue about the rising popularity of carbon fiber? Learn why bicycle wheels are so fundamentally different from other cycling components and so well served by composites. Ric will show some little known examples of influential wheels, old and new. Find out why bicycle wheels have been called the most ingenious contrivance in all of human engineering and come away with a few tips about your own
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