This weekend sees the first running of Bespoked Bristol – the UK’s first handmade bicycle show. The event is running on Saturday 11th and Sunday 12th June at the Paintworks, Bristol, click here for full details > http://www.bespokedbristol.co.uk/. The show includes numerous frame builders, bike designers and small scale manufacturers of premium components, clothing and accessories. Retrobike will be there over the weekend, look in here for a report and pictures next week.

Plenty has been written on this and other internet forums about the re-emergence of cult Canadian brand Off Road Toad. Michael Golinski, the Managing Director of Off Road Toad Bikes has agreed to speak exclusively to Retrobike about their current and future plans.

1) Retrobike: So, welcome back Off Road Toad. First things first, what sort of bikes will you be making? And perhaps more importantly can we see some pictures?

Off Road Toad: Thanks! We are glad to be bringing the brand back. Like the original Off Road Toad frames, we will be building hardtail chromoly frames. These will be available for both 26″ and 29er tires and no, at this point there is no plan to built Horny Toads (the elevated chain stay Off Road Toads)!

2) RB: There’s been a lot of discussion on the forum about who’ll be making the frames – here’s your chance to put the record straight. Who’ll be making your frames and what tube sets will they be using?

ORT: The first thing that we want to point out is that the reason somebody should be buying one of these frames is because they want an Off Road Toad. Each and every Toad is designed and built to our specs and we back up the quality and finish 100%. If you want a frame built by a certain welder, you should definitely support that frame builder by buying one of their frames. If you have always want a Toad, here is your chance.

When Rod originally started Off Road Toad back in ’86, he used a number of different builders to make the frames depending on who had capacity and the right price. We are using a similar approach. At the present time, we are using a contract welder who has built frames for Yeti, Strong, Ibis, Titus, Spot Brand, Control Tech amongst others. If you need to know exactly who it is, drop us an email.

Every Off Road Toad frame is built to our specifications, using our custom designed and machined dropouts, Reynolds 725 tubing and then powder coated for a high quality, durable finish. We inspect the frames once they are welded to ensure that they meet our quality standards and then once again, we inspect them after powder coat.

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Saracen bikes are looking for people/bikes for the ‘Heritage’ page in their 2011 catalog. They are looking for owners of a Saracen bike from the glory days (approx. 88-98 ) They need pictures of owners riding or standing with their bike (old pics would be great but recent ones good too!) Or just the bike on its own.
Anyone who’s pictures is used will recieve a t-shirt!

Please send your pictures to the Saracen graphic designer: kira.askaroff@madison.co.uk

For more details please click here.

Cook Bros is alive according to the recently updated website.

Look forward to seeing what they come out with.

Just been sent a link (thanks to @cdnprairiedog on twitter) to a very interesting advert on craigslist. The advert reads as follows

I’m selling all my framebuilding jigs / fixtures / tubing / brazons. These are all the jigs and fixtures used to make the 4000+ handbuilt brodie frames over a 15 year period… a liitle bit of history you might say! I haven’t built a bicycle frame in about 5 years, so it is time to move them on, hopefully to a good home where they will be used. The price is $8000 firm. Call Paul @ 604 xxx xxxx

Could be a chance to own a piece of history or at least setup your own frame shop. More pictures and discussion in the forum here.

This just in from Joel Smith from Tomac Bikes on the new Tomac DB10.

-The working name of the bike has been the DB10 (drop bar 10 years, 10 total to be built)
-This is the ten year anniversary of the Tomac brand, and this limited edition bike to commemorate the occasion.
-Johnny raced in drops back in 1990 and 1991. He was racing pro on the road as well as in the dirt and was very comfortable racing with drops.
-Custom build with straight gauge chromoly tubes by Chris Herting and custom painted by Spectrum Powder Works

The Background Story by Joel Smith
Johnny raced his drop bar bike back in 1990, at the time when I was racing Expert-level cross country and I saw him race the bike at Mammoth. He was absolutely flooring it, screaming by people on the descents, and I was highly impressionable when it was my cycling hero. The day I got home, I pulled an old set of bend drop bars out of a trash can at the local bike shop, took the shifters and road levers off a bike that someone had abandoned in our college house basement, and converted my mountain bike. Since that day, I’ve always wanted to make another one, but do it the right way.

I knew that Zap had the original drop bar bike that Johnny raced. It was given to him by John Parker back in the day and it is Zap’s prized procession. Anyway, I talked to Zap and he shipped it to Chris and Chris took all of the measurements off of it. We really wanted it to be a modernized version of the old bike, so while we kept the basic geometry the same, we wanted to have improvements to make it rideable by today’s standards. The DP10 has disc brake tabs, 73mm bb and standard head tube for a threadless headset. The fork was actually custom painted by Spectrum to resemble the original Answer/Manitou fork that he was riding at that time. The fork is actually a R7. The bike has original Johnny T signature Cinelli bars that we bought brand new out of someone’s private stash in Germany. The only branding on the frame is the Johnny signature on the top tube. Tomac’s Clarke Dolton managed the project throughout the process.

Click for rest of article (more…)

We’ve recently been asked to include the Cunningham Bikes website in our link directory. It’s a great site so here’s a link on the homepage too.

Cunningham Racer #18C

What better way of ensuring the survival of the creed we all love than by sporting some of the fabulous merchandise available.

The RetroBike crew have commissioned some of the top designers to create a unique set of apparel that will stand you out from the crowd and help spread the message.

Along with the awesome racing jerseys which were worn by all those in attendance at Mountain Mayhem there are casuals T’s and Freeride jerseys for those who prefer a less figure hugging look..

Check out the Shop or drop John a PM to check what is available..

RetroBike does not pay for itself and JV has gone to a lot trouble to source this stuff so your support is appreciated !!

According to http://ibisbicycles.com/ ‘Velo Club Ibis returns in September 2005′. A few more details can be found here.

Sweet!