• WingIt Bike Talk

    The WingIt One!

    December 6, 2020 /

    Frames #003 & #004 are completed. Frame #003 is a small geometry variation on #002 as planned – 64° Head and 75° Seat. Detailed build log to follow…

    Frame #003

    We’ve been dreaming up another design for a while. Frame #004 is the first WingIt One frame. A single speed klunker style bike with a mid-travel (130mm) suspension fork! We’ll be playing with this whilst the serious evaluation of #003 against #002 takes place…

    Frame #004 – WingIt One

    Made from some left over 4130 steel tubing to try out some new design features #004 is a bike that can be built up a lower cost and still be huge fun. The sort of bike you can keep in the van and pull out at any opportune moment! That’s what we’re going to do…

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  • WingIt Bike Talk

    Head Badges & Clear Coat. WingIt Bikes this week…

    November 15, 2020 /

    Frames #001 & #002 are back from clear coating. They look even better than we thought they would. The colour of the steel has been enriched and the bronze brazing really shines. Love it…

    Both bikes will be built back up this week. Winter riding and testing starts next week. Plenty of guys lined up to ride them! Frame #003 being brazed up this week too so will be ready for build-up by the end of the month. More on that frame build next week…

    Head Badges…

    The fresh frames need head badges. An important part of a bike’s identity. When you look back at the history of bicycle head badges there are some pretty cool designs. The traditional material for many years was brass, especially if you wanted quality. In the 1950’s and 60’s enamelled head badges became widely seen. In more recent years pressed or printed steel and aluminium badges have been used mostly and some brands now deem a decal to be acceptable…?

    At WingIt Bikes we wanted to make something a bit more special than a decal. Something that combined traditional materials, quality workmanship and unique design just like our steel frames. So here we are… the first two head badges for prototype frames #001 & #002. Acid etched brass. Still some finessing to do for our customer frames, but we think they look rather nice as a staring point. Question is – leave as brass or blacken the background?

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  • WingIt Bike Talk

    WingIt workshop this week…

    October 31, 2020 /

    Accurate Geo… OK, the first big news is that we now have a fully laser-aligned commercial bike frame jig! Woohooo… The original self designed and built version did us proud for the first two frames, but it was difficult to set up with a high degree of accuracy and there was always the possibility of some creep the head/seat angles slightly during the repeated checking and re-profiling the tube mitres to the best possible fit. A small tube movement can result in a significant change to the intended geometry. 

    The commercial jig/frame fixtures from the Bicycle Academy isn’t hugely different to our own design but it is rock solid, perfectly aligned in every way, beautifully engineered, easier to take measurements from and much easier to adjust accurately.

    So first job. Put frames #001 and #002 into the new jig and see how close the geo is to what we planned / thought. #001 was no surprise as we had already measured the angles without sag on the built up bike- the design was supposed to be 66° Head tube (HT) and 76° Seat Tube (ST). Ummm… pretty good it’s actually 66 / 75.5°…. So, what about #002? This we had hoped would be a degree slacker head and should be 65/75… well it’s not – it’s actually 66/75° but with an ETT (Effective Top Tube) 6-7mm longer than #001. Interesting. When we all rode the bikes back to back over a weekend at Coed-y-Brenin a few weeks back (when we were allowed to Wales) we unanimously voted #002 the better ride, more planted, more manoeuvrable, yes it was marginal, but definite all the same. We assumed the slacker head angle was the reason, but looking at the result above it was clearly the slightly longer ETT or the slacker seat?. 

    Our plan for #003 was tweak the HT and ST angles. Not now. We have decided that a good comparison with #002 would be to have the planned 64° HT but to keep the ST angle and ETT, thereby making #003 about 25mm longer in the wheelbase (#001 & #002 are the same WB). #003 should be ready to ride by the end of the month (November), and we’re inviting more guys along to try both back to back. Which will be best? Which will we prefer? Which will become the first WingIt frame that you can actually buy?!

    Of course, we could have started with the geometry of a perfectly good UK designed and built steel hardtail – there are a number of designs that we like and have ridden over the years. Our trial and error approach to frame design is far more fun and is giving us first hand experience as to how subtle geometry changes affect riding on our favourite trails. To some extent we are ignoring the obsession about head angle and what makes a hard-core hardtail, we’re starting with a blank piece of paper and working out what rides best for us…

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  • WingIt Bike Talk

    The First Big Test

    October 19, 2020 /

    The new WingIt™ frames 001 & 002 go to Wales for a two day intensive test against each other. Which is best? After all there’s only 1° difference in head tube and seat tube angles – could we tell the difference?

    Well, as it turns out yes! Two days riding the Beast at Coed-y-Brenin and Summit trail at Nant-y-Arian. Each bike set up the same in the cockpit – same spec stems, same 20mm riser bars, same forks. The unanimous vote at the end of the weekend was for frame 002. More manoeuvrable and playful, yet planted and confidence inspiring when you needed it.

    Next – Frame 003 is now in the jig. We think 002 is great, however for 003 we’ll try another 1° slacker in the head tube and steeper in the seat tube then ride it back to back with 002. The favoured geo from these two will be the final frame geo… The look of the bike is already how we wanted it…

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