front end

Pinning

Dont forget to add a chamfer/cone to the nail end so that after fluxing the overlapping holes are easier found and alined. The nails are big and what I had on hand.

brazing

I had an 'Ahaaa' moment. For the longest time I was working the flame wrong. too close and too hot. The blue flame too close. So I stepped back and relaxed and washed the flame feathers over the lugs. Much better! Everything comes up to heat nice and smooth. The silver flows like butta! The shore lines are crisp and the joint fully flowed. Nice!

Okay.. where are we??

Its been fun but a little weird. Couplers are something else. Somehow I managed to produce a little runout off axis. No big deal. apparently the weirdness lies on bth sides so I rotated the short end in 90 degree increments so that the wobble evened out. I say wobble.. the two halves were joined and the assembly rolled along the floor. The alignment issues were apparent. Little of this and little of that and they were strait-ish.. enought to build with. Really I should not have these things but I do and respect the install. I found some Verus tubes from Henry James that have insane butt lengths. Something like 152mm. still though it was a pinch to nest the couplers into the butts. I laid the entire frame out in Autocad so I could easily see where they were. Then I changed the design a bit. Weary of needing to work around brake caliper clearances.. long or short.. I decided to use canti brakes so I could raise the crown for longer blades. Now I can fit 35's for off road situations. What all this means is that the DT was rotated up to 59 degrees rather than the standard 60. This is a 58ish cm frame so the HT looks a little squat. Its all good though.. FREEDOM!!!

couplers.. As can be seen, I trued and clamped the tubes and couplers to plumb in two planes. All good right? not so much. the tubes ended up being about a wall thickness out. so it goes... I had and have concerns brazing an assembled coupler. However the more I think about it, these are made for retro fit so therefore assembled. Did not have the nerve to try. Now I know.