January 30.12 – Instagram

Donhou Bicycles is now using Instagram. Search for us using donhoubicycles to be kept up to date with the latest build shots from the workshop and anything else that takes our fancy…

January 11.12 - Alasdair’s Expedition Bike

Here is another TIG welded expedition frame and fork ready to leave the workshop, bound for South Korea where Alasdair is currently living and riding. Check out his blog here if you would like to get a little insight into riding in that part of the world.

This frame will see duties touring around South Korea but Alasdair is also planning a larger expedition and hopefully this bike will be seeing some fully loaded miles across the ‘Great Land’ – Alaska. For that reason this frame is built tough with plenty of clearance for snowy conditions. There is a full array of braze ons and a large chain stay plate to mount the Pletscher twin kickstand. Some off the shelf frames suffer from crushed chain stays when this stand is used fully loaded. By spreading the load across a large area this won’t be a problem on this frame and Alasdair can use this great stand with confidence.

Finished with clear over British Racing Green powder, this bike is ready to load up and get gnarly! Happy riding Alasdair…

December 24.11 – Reynolds 931

Look what Santa bought me. Limited quantities are available and I was lucky enough to get hold of some of it. Reynolds brand new 931 stainless tubes. These are bound for a sweet road build starting in the new year…

Would also just like to take this opportunity to wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and say a massive thankyou to everyone that has helped, supported or spread the good word this past year. Donhou Bicycles wouldn’t be what it is without you.

December 6.11 – Photography From the Exhibition

Just incase you didn’t get to make it down to the exhibition last month, here are a few of Hal Shinnie’s photos from the show… Will put a few more in the next newsletter so if you want to see more, sign up!

November 28.11 – Dominic’s 29er

This is the first Donhou 29er to roll out of the workshop. Built with a Reynolds 853 DZB front end and a Columbus rear, it features custom Donhou dropouts, wishbone rear end, braze on stainless badges, internal cable routing and super minimal bar stem combo. Its dressed in the UK’s finest; Hope hubs, bottom bracket and brakes and Middleburn cranks. With other parts including the Thomson post, Chris King headset, Fizik Gobi Kium saddle and Continental Race King tyres. Finished in a dark slate grey pearl this bike looks awesome!

Dominic will be riding this in the Transpyr, an 8 day race through the Pyrenees from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic along the border of France and Spain. To do it single speed is die hard, good on you Dominic my kind of mentality, give it hell!

More pics in the Gallery.

November 11.11 – Donhou Exhibition

Was a great opening night last Thursday down at Look Mum No Hands, thanks to everyone that came down, hope you all had fun. Here’s a few pics of the exhibition I took when it was little quieter, with some sneak shots of a couple of bikes still waiting to go in the studio.

Hal’s photographs look great as well, telling the story of some of the frames from the show being built…

The exhibition runs until the 17th November, stop in and grab a coffee over the weekend, there’s still plenty of time to go take a look.

November 8.11 – Greg’s Road Bike

Greg’s frame is built from Reynolds 853 Pro Team, Reynolds top end super light steel tubing with 725 oversized chain stays and Columbus over sized seat stays. This makes for a real light yet stiff frame, as one of the key things for this build was to have a bike that climbed well.

As inspiration for paint Greg gave me a heap of photos of old 60′s race cars and Grand Prix bikes. We decided in the end to use these as colour reference, well one particular car… yep you guessed it, Greg was in love with the Gulf Porsche! I then used those colours in a more contemporary way, more in keeping with the frame design and the components going on it. We are both real happy with how the paint has come out, looking awesome with all the carbon parts on it.

Components include, USE and Ritchey finishing gear, Flite saddle, Easton fork, Dura Ace group set and a super light FSA carbon tubular wheel set… This things a quick one!

If you want to see this one in the flesh, it’s on display in Look Mum No Hands until the 17th November.

More pics in the Gallery.

October 28.11 – Stems

Custom stem week this week. First up is a pair of fillet brazed 1 1/8th quill stems for a customer’s retro MTB builds. These look great having taken inspiration from the classic GT stem from the 90′s using the pierced style construction. They are also front loading as the customer will be using four piece Luv bars.

Next up is this cute little fillet brazed clamp on stem, which will be dealing with steering duties on Gav’s new tourer. More on that bike very soon…

October 17.11 – Richards Fixed

Richard had quite a strong idea of what he wanted when he first approached me, he wanted a curved seat tube, sloping top tube and he wanted it in bare metal. As we progressed towards the build Richard saw some other features on some of the other Donhou’s that he liked such as the curved seat stays, fillet brazed segmented fork and Richards is the first bike to get the all new stainless brazed on badges which look stunning in the brushed finish.

The bike looks great and is a lot of fun to ride. Built from a mix of Reynolds 631, 725 and good old 4130 with custom Donhou dropouts, this thing is tough. It’s finished in clear over brushed steel and Richard assures me it will be seeing plenty of miles and getting a good thrashing.

Richard put a cool build kit together including ‘King headset, Thomson post and stem, Profile hubs and we had a great day when he came up to collect, building the bike and getting the studio shots taken.

More pics in the Gallery.

October  10.11 – Donhou Exhibition at Look Mum No Hands

I am exhibiting some bikes at the most excellent Look Mum No Hands on Old Street in London. Hampus’s show winner will be there, along with the Donhou track bike and a couple of other stunners.

Hal Shinnie has spent some time in the workshop documenting the process of building a Donhou bicycle and his pictures are being exhibited alongside the bikes, giving you a great insight into the love and work that goes into each bicycle.

I will be there for the opening night on the 3rd November from 19.00 – 22.00, and then again in the afternoon on Saturday the 5th, so if you are London based and would like to talk about a new project then stop down for a beer or a coffee. Drop me an email to pre-arrange a time.

Hope to see you there.