Vallie Components - bicycle part and accessory design

Yesterday I was able to pick up my 3" 6061 bar stock from a company out in Coquitlam. I swear, the guy working there was a fork lift SURGEON. Dude pivoted, pirouetted, and quad axled the 12' long package into the back of my creepy white van. It was like he was playing the game operation. Impressed. The stuff is super heavy when its all bundled together.

Anways, when I arrived at DMT we cut the strapping and unloaded the bar stock one at a time into his yard. Then we brought his band saw outside in order to do the rough cutting:

It looks kind of janky with the milk crate in there, but he's got it shimmed to be level on the saw, in order to waste the minimum amount of aluminum. Its a lot easier to lift and work with 6' lengths than double that.

Anyways, I left him to cut up my shell blanks.

Soon I'll be picking up my 7075, which is on its way in from Portland. I've also got bearings and bolts coming up from the USA, but I have to import those myself. Anyone ever filled out a B3-3 form?

 

1 comments... click to read and add yours >>

The photos are pouring in and right now I feel like the only one who didn't attend NAHBS. Its alright though, I'm still getting things sorted.

This past week I visited Altech Anodizing to check out their shop. Their GM, Ed Bryant showed me around and explained their processes to me. I was pretty stoked to see a company be so up front about how they go about business. They're ISO 9000:2008 certified, and it makes sense. They are running Race Face parts all day long, and if they didn't have strict process control, then they could end up with different looking parts from day to day. They've got it down to a science, and can do pretty much any colour of the visible light spectrum. I'm not going that far though. Just a simple electropolishing, anodizing, then laser etching. Like so:

The laser etching is the only tricky part, as their laser shoots on a single axis.. so complex wraps (as some Raceface cranks have) take multiple setups, and accurate fixtures. We ended up talking about all sorts of different manufacturing issues, and I walked out of there with a good feeling. I'm really looking forward do doing business with them.

Stepping back a few steps, I've been finalizing things with DMT for the machining of my parts. Before I know it, I'll have my creepy white van full of 12' bar stock! At our last meeting I just realized I didn't have any markings on my cogs! That just won't do. So I guess I have a choice of fonts based on what cutter the mill runs. I'll probably go with a very simple Arial type done with a ball cutter. Its not a huge deal either way, but its just funny how I've got all these little choices to deal with.

Anyways, here's the production hub set profile:

 

 

The new rear collars are flared a bit, with wrench flats to ease removal after they've been abused. Since the fronts don't have room for wrench flats, they'll have pin spanner holes, so you can break them free, should they ever become seized to the axle (worst case scenario, you run the hubs through a salty winter and don't forget to clean them until sometime in the summer).  I've changed the collars to 7075 as well, to be a bit harder. The tradeoff is that the bar stock is slightly more expensive, and I'm warned that the anodizing might not be a 'perfect' match.

The flanges are now going to be drilled on an angle optimized for deep section rims. I've taken a good look at quite a few 700cmx trick forks, and I've got the front flanges as far out as possible so that they still fit within the legs. I feel this will give the front wheel a good amount of lateral rigidity for those who choose to land their bikes sideways.  Despite the differences in flange width, the spokes still calculate within 1mm of each other so wheelbuilding should be a snap.

That's about it for the updates. I'm going to go look at a few more NAHBS photos now.

 

1 comments... click to read and add yours >>

Despite the lack of site updates, things have been humming right along here at Vallie components. I feel sort of like a one man show, trying to figure out the logistics of this business on my own.  Dennis has been helping though, and we've been working hard on trimming the cost down as much as possible for lean batch production of the hub sets and cogs. I've got most of the red tape sorted out (Federal, Provincial, and Municipal licenses/tax numbers etc).. and I've even got Tshirt quotes coming in! Phew! I never thought I would spend so much time in front of Excel again. 

So why aren't the hubs available?

Good question. There are a few suppliers I'm still auditioning, as its tough to find some of the required pieces locally (to me at least). After that, I've got to get Paypal/Zencart up and running for my site (Hopefully my webmaster/wife can help me out with that), write the manual, get the packaging in line, figure out international shipping and tax laws, Do first article QA testing, then FINALLY I can simply hit GO! and the world will rush out to buy my hubs.

Right now it looks like my first production batch will be 30 hub sets, and 20 single rears. All 36H. Half will be silver, and half will be black. The initial run of cogs will range from 15T to 17T. If I get enough interest from the polo crowd, I'll do bigger cogs.

Anyways, thats about it for news. I'm still riding the hell out of my original prototype and its got 4364km (2712 miles) on it since I originally built it one year ago. I guess a year product development time isn't that big in the grand scheme of things, but it sure seems like a long time ago, on an internet far away.

0 comments... click to read and add yours >>

Here's an update for all of you who have been following the blog on this here site.

Its 2010 and I'm back in Raincouver BC!
We've moved into a cute little house in East Vancouver, near the inlet. After MONTHS of not so hilarious home owner type problems (8000lbs of garbage, rotting walls and floors, hot water heater failure, leaky roof,  no ducting etc) I'm finally "settled" and able to get back to work on bike stuff.

I've been grinding away at some final design revs for the hubs, to make them lighter AND more cost effective for production. I'm almost ready to hand them over to a local machinist.

He's super talented, really into bikes, and understands the pricipals of JIT manufacturing so I think this is going to be a good fit.
Either way, we've got a wide open road ahead of us.

Thanks for reading this, and stay tuned for more updates!

0 comments... click to read and add yours >>