Richard Sachs Cycles

[e-RICHIE]

Twenty Seven Years

Being alone is something I’m used to. It’s the way my time passes, it’s how work gets done, and how I find balance. But twenty seven years ago I broke routine, let others into my personal space, and was given this lasting gift. It’s the Bicycle Guide from June 1990 that was placed in Box 194. I turned the dial to G then to C and then between I and J. I grabbed the mail, and I plotzed.

Michael Furman and Christopher Koch produced the cover story. They came to town in winter and spent a long weekend at my studio. The two men observed. One shot images. One took notes. After two days of intense fussing, rearranging, and interviewing, they left. It was then I remember feeling a calm that only solitude can bring.

At no point in the early years did I feel a connection to the trade. I saw myself as an outlier who somehow slipped in through an open window – and stayed. I’ve met precious few in my business with whom I share ideals or even a vision for how to stand at the bench. I’ve made many friends, but the list of names I have a common bond with is very short. By 1990 I knew the industry was a place I didn’t want to be.

In six pages, Michael and Christopher captured that sentiment perfectly. Almost three decades have passed and I still feel this way. I don’t dwell on the time, but realize that I’ve spent most of what’s been allotted for me. Every so often I’ll read the article, look at the photographs, and hope that the ink on these pages hasn’t dried.

Thank you Michael and Christopher.

[e-RICHIE]

Two tubes one lug -

[e-RICHIE]

Naming Names

Once a month I’d bundle 10 crowns and bridges, and send them to a place I’d never been and to a man I never met. Branford is 26 miles from my door and the Shaw family put RS logos in frame parts since 1976. That’s when I decided to become one of those whose marque appears on bicycles, highlighted in contrasting paint. Through a Yellow Pages search I found Cooney Engraving, told them what I wanted, and they said, “No problem.” For over 40 years it was no problem at all.

Two weeks ago I get an email from a lady introducing herself as Mrs. Shaw asking about a parcel with my name on it. She’s closing the place down asap. Arnie died suddenly, and it’s the end of the road for the family business. She has to return my last box and just needs an address.

There was this smooth routine since Carter was in office. Everything around us may change, but I could always depend on the Shaws to carve perfectly edged graphics in the pieces I sent. I don’t know if I ever said thanks, past the small note I stuck in each box along with payment. I don’t know if they ever saw one of my bicycles either in person or print to know the weight their labors carried. They were skilled craftsmen who did intermediate work so that mine could look a bit more elegant.

The folks at Cooney Engraving were a key part in my life as a maker. Anonymous, and unsung, until now. The last check, never cashed.

[e-RICHIE]

[progetto]

Diamonds are to be admired, Gold on the other hand is a real investment in your future.

[e-RICHIE]

At The Bench

I’ve been pasting in images lately, all from Nick’s book, Richard Sachs Bicycle Maker. He visited me many times over a twelve month period, capturing my work through his lens. Here’s one, pulled out of sequence. It’s my bench, most likely later in the morning or from the rest of the day, maybe an overtime shift on a weekend.

Deb and I spent eight years in the woods in, as I like to say, deep isolation. The pictures were all taken before we decided to leave, when we were still secluded and expected to be for duration. That was the plan going in, the ideal.

When we found the property it was like the world opened up for us. This was it. By the end, it was something else. Change happens all around us. But, back to me. I didn’t foresee changes within. They just came. I look at all the black and white photographs of me, over one hundred pages of them, and don’t remember that guy.

[e-RICHIE]

In The Beginning

My fascination with the macro lens began as innocently as so much else around here did. It was maybe 1998 and Brad loaned me his Sony Mavica so I could shoot pictures and sell some crap on this newfangled thing eBay on this newfangled thing the internet. I’d bought a parcel of goods from a fellow whose dad had a bicycle biz in the 1970s. My intention was to keep the good stuff and jettison the ballast for some recovery cash. The boxes loomed long enough that Brad convinced me to list them online.

I began shooting tabletop images of my work. The unit had exceptional close-up capabilities and I was intrigued and wanted to get closer and closer and. That’s how the needle got in my arm. I never cared about the long view. Pictures of complete bicycles did nothing for me. What I wanted, what I want even this week, is to be in the grains of the tubing. To idle time away in the scratches. To know what it’s like to surf a wave created by the flow of 56% silver alloy rod. A wave that I make happen, and control, and then accept when I see it looking back at me laughing. I control so precious little in the big picture. It’s probably why the little ones mean so much.

[e-RICHIE]

Part Of The Process

Nuovo Richie Seat Lug on Vice –

From my personal collection.

Artist’s statement: A lug is a multifunctional, multidimensional part. A holding device for two tubes that hope to have a long romance. Lugs are often brazed by a person who thinks less and feels more. Grab a lug you pay homage to a process perfected when the streets of time and money were less likely to intersect. When you wouldn’t find a time-clock where your bicycle was made. When you coast down the road on your frame brazed with lugs, its maker is riding with you. And will for decades. Maybe more.

All This By Hand

[progetto]

My favourite lug design, so elegant

[e-RICHIE]

Spots

As with everything there are the spots. Not all are high ones. Most are good ones. But when the fall happens I dunno what leaves first, trust or faith. I got myself a situation or three that I’m sure (based on life so far) won’t even be memorable a month from now. These deals the alliances the things you wanna make happen so that they appear to happen so organically ya’ just wanna sit there and grin when they do, but certainly take no credit for your part in them. But then a thing goes missing. Or a pal. It’s such a balls in the air situation some days that it’s weird more don’t hit the ground. I’m used to the juggling the keeping up appearances crap. But every so often there are these spots and all I can do all I can muster and hope for is to look up high and know that it’s where I belong not here. My mom empowered me with a phrase a thought process a belief system from her days as a mentor of school principals. It’s see it done. Three words no waiting. I need to see it done and find the spot that’s not this one.

All This By Hand

[e-RICHIE]

Behind The Curtain

A rare peek into the fork department. Forks are overlooked now and have been for a spell. I’m used to this. I accept it. People willingly give others the work they themselves once did. Where does my front wheel go? Dunno. How will the front wheel be held in my frame? Dunno. Will the offset and span be close enough? We’ll have to see. Oh right maybe I’ll design my design around the aftermarket part designed by committee. Dunno. When you lose resources and or stop carrying out tasks and enough time passes one can get used to anything and rationalize the changes by summoning up that nothing stands still. I’m not there but I’m almost there but not yet not today. What’s your fork’s SKU?

[e-RICHIE]

Moving Metal

There’s a moment in every 3-4 day build when the fab part is put on hold and the decoration party begins. Filing lugs is part of the maker’s job. It probably goes back to an era when I was still a schoolboy and the parts were God awful crude pieces of shit that existed as little fixtures that held the tubes in place so a bicycle could be made. They were ugly or utilitarian at best and it got into he public psyche that adding flourishes or at the very least removing some of the manufacturing marks was a way to add value. I spend an hour on each joint for the very same reasons and do it automatically. Intuitively. By feel. While listening to pre-1970s Dylan on YouTube. I have this feed that begins with With God On Our Side performed at Town Hall in 1963 and it just goes on from there. Precious. At least 50 cuts and I never tire of them.

Back to said moment. All of it revolves around elegance. You want the lug(s) thinned a bit. Eliminate high and low spots. Make sure the flow is complete from top to bottom from side to side from front to back and that the same intention spreads to each lug so the job is the sum rather than the parts. At day’s end, this is about taking off some 3/10s of a millimeter wall thickness and doing it with class. You wanna turn heads, your own especially.

All This By Hand

[e-RICHIE]

Finish Work

So I’m at a place where I’m gonna admit that not finishing things is really the best part of the job. The end is a place I don’t care much about even though I get there every 3-4 days. I wanna stay in that space where almost done is as close as I get before somehow some way something distracts me and so fucking what. To stay suspended in those last moments feeling I have a chance but knowing something will get in the way if I stay a minute longer. I wanna leave things unfinished and then go on to start again.

All This By Hand

[e-RICHIE]

Redemption Song

I’ve had few line in the sand moments in my life (so far), those that others call a-ha times. Counting maybe eight or so. One was while 24,000 feet in the air gazing at an in flight magazine. Maybe early 1990s. Maybe late 1980s. I don’t remember. But it was me in typical RS questionable low self-esteem fashion, always in a state of questioning my lot in life, contrasting what I thought I should know by now (then) and what I assumed others thought I knew (by then) with what I knew I really knew (then). I expected to be a lot further along despite that so much came so easily and the market accepted what I did and placed it in a decent, comfortable layer that I wondered if I deserved. I’m reading this ‘zine, remember the ‘zine? I’m a bad reader in the best situation and a really bad reader if my hand is on the bible. I’m a scanner. I find words. Sentences find me. If I’m lucky I mean really lucky a page, or maybe an entire article will find me. The story was about an artist and, whenever I remember this flight the artist becomes Louise Bourgeois, the sculptor. Buried in her story was a quote that went something like this: “I continue with my work to redeem myself for all my past mistakes.” The further I get from that airplane ride, the less accurately I recall the story or even if Ms. Bourgeois was the person being highlighted. I think these were the words and they were hers.

That quote, that sentiment, it became a hook I’ve hung my hat on for decades now. The moment came when I needed it most, as the ones that matter that really matter seem to do.

All This By Hand

[e-RICHIE]

Just This

I want the essence and nothing more. Having more means having to take some away. To remove it so there’s less. Not really less. But just the right amount. The exact amount. Exact maybe can’t be measured. But it can be seen. Those who know, know. Even if there are just two of us. If only two of us know, that’s more than enough.

All This By Hand

[e-RICHIE]

There Is

So the worst part of working in a bubble is the best part. So the demons that come with standing alone at a bench are the gift. So being the last word on whatever happens is also that no one else is heard. There’s the entropy and the beauty. There’s the imprecision and the delicate balancing act. The smoke and also the mirror. There’s the trying. There’s also the failure. There’s also the trying.

All This By Hand

[e-RICHIE]

But Who’s Counting

10,000 files strokes are just a down payment.
After that, you still have to make the thing.
There was a time when every part, even the smallest, demanded attention.
Then the future happened.
I’m glad I was born in the past.

All This By Hand

[e-RICHIE]

Facts Of Life

Where do lugs come from? They’re not conceived in the classic sense. There’s no coming together of older parts to make newer ones. Lugs come from initiative. If it isn’t taken, lugs don’t exist. How do I know? I’ve lived on both sides. I came up when lugs were ubiquitous, when their place on each bicycle frame was never questioned. I also saw the turn away from traditional methods, and watched as conventions broke down and lugs were sidelined while the future began. When that happened, I took the initiative. Ya’ know that Who album with Keith sitting in the chair, the one stenciled with the words, “Not to be taken away“?

All This By Hand

[e-RICHIE]

7.31.17

Say goodnight Gracie. Tomorrow I disassemble this one and send it to JB for what’s gonna be its seventh paint job since 2009. I’ve only owned two bicycles since then, twins. They’re cx units and I ride them year round. All the RSCX Team bicycles have been at the paint shop since late May, my other one among these. When it arrives home next week I’ll shuffle Number Two to SoCal and let Joe and Johnny do their thing. It’s been red at least twice. Saffron. Yellow. And green. I’m going from memory. There may be another color I’m spacing on.

I made a road frame (and fork) for myself that’s also at the paint shop. It’s the first road bicycle I’ll have in a long time. And I plan to keep it. I may even ride it after the show season ends. But for now I’m cyclocross 24/7. That’s all I got. It’s all I want.

All This By Hand

[j44ke]

^That's^ a fave pic there for sure.