Welcome to The Bike Brief 2: The Re-Bike-ening! I don’t know if you all have been outside recently (a tough question for Seattlites, I know), but it's really starting to look like prime bike season out there to me! As more people are getting back in their saddles, we are going to need more help with staffing the Bike Shack and getting people's bikes roadworthy. So if you have been wondering if you should swing by and help staff a shift at the Bike Shack, in Shoreline or in NE Seattle, now is the time! You don’t need to be a professional bike mechanic, you just need to be willing to learn and to get your hands dirty. You get to learn how to fix your own bike in the process, and there are even snacks! If that sounds like a good time to you, send an email to bikeshack@seattlereconomy.org.
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We got a very generous donation from a friend of one of our staff members: A classic Davidson custom touring bike.
This bike has some very interesting history. Davidson is a local custom bicycle framebuilding shop in Fremont. If you aren't familiar with custom frames, shops like Davidson weld or braze together frames from raw metal tubes into whatever specifications you want. This frame was brazed together right here in Seattle by Bill Davidson himself in 1980. These days, Davidson is mainly a custom TIG welded titanium manufacturer. I won't do a deep dive into the differences between TIG welded titanium and silver brazed lugged steel in this post (the bike brief is supposed to be *brief*). Suffice to say, both styles are strong, long-lasting ways to build a frame, and it's exceedingly hard to find such a classically styled bicycle these days.
Aside from the sweet frame, this bike also comes with top-of-the-line components: Sugino cranks, Nitto handlebar, and old-school Campagnolo hubs, headset and seatpost. It even has a pump peg under the top tube. I love pump pegs!
According to the previous owner, this bike was bought new and has been all over the place. It's been on the Seattle to Portland ride. It has been from San Francisco to San Diego on multiple occasions, and it's even been around the Netherlands. When it wasn’t on a world tour, this bike was busy being just your average daily commuter. A bike that can do it all!
If you are someone between about 5'2" and 5'8" in stature, and are into the idea of a classic, Seattle-made, touring bike, or just owning a piece of local biking history, come stop by and take a look! We have done a full service and cleaning on the bike. It's ready for a new home and a whole lot more adventures!
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We’ve entered another one of those eras where news from two days ago is already, somehow, old news. It’s hard to keep up with it all. One thing that is for certain is that these are scary times for all of us. Are we entering another recession? Is our education going to stay funded? What is going to happen to all that federal grant money? We just got the Link running up this far north, and now the feds are talking about getting rid of public transit projects. Are we even safe? Are our neighbors?
I just wanted to remind everyone that the Bike Shack, and the whole tool library, is committed to being a resource for the entire community and a safe space for all. We aren’t bound to the whims of corporate overlords or shareholders, and we aren't affected by tariffs. We aren’t going to get through this alone, we only make it through times like these as a community. Stay safe out there, everyone, and we will continue to support you in any way we can.
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Switching gears (chainrings?): Our bike sale last Saturday was a huge success. In total, we sold 23 bikes, which is our new record for most bikes sold in a single day. Thank you to everyone who showed up to check us out! Also, HUGE thanks to all the volunteers who have been helping us get ready for the sale by coming to our work parties and tuning up all the bikes that Cascade so generously donated to us.
Some key takeaways from the sale were that the people of Shoreline are looking for bikes with wider tires and kids' bikes. We were actually planning on having a kids' bike sale later this year, but we are basically out of kids' bikes now, so we are putting that on hold. In fact, we are almost out of used bikes in general! But don’t worry, Shoreline, we are busy finding more bikes that just need a bit of love and a new home. So if you missed the sale or just couldn’t quite find what you were looking for, stay tuned!
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On May 14th, we are once again going to be hosting a celebration station for the annual Bike Everywhere Day! We will have chairs, a couple of tables, a canopy, a few repair stations, and some goodies to hand out. If you are biking everywhere that day (which you should be!) and happen to be biking by the Shoreline Tool Library, come say hi! We can even give your bike a quick look over if you are still trying to get it in tip-top shape for the summer season. If you are able to help out, you can sign up on our signup spreadsheet (if you have access) or send us an email at bikeshack@seattlereconomy.org with what time you'll be showing up and we can put it on the calendar. If that sounds like too much work for you, you can also just show up and hang out, we won’t mind. We will be open on the trail from 6am to 7pm. It’ll be fun, come say hi!
