Day 6--My fork is finished!!! :)

LOOK! MY FORK IS DONE!!!

Today was another busy day in the shop. I finally feel like I might have a bike made by the end of the week. It is getting really exciting but you have to work consistently and stay on task. Luckily this morning Gary let us work for 4 hours straight and I was able to finish my fork! It turned out cool and I am really proud of it because I got it brazed pretty nice and all the silver flowed where it needed to go so I am sure it will hold up on my bike. :)

The remainder of the day was spent mitering tubing and filing my lugs which don't fit the tubes very well so you have to file them to a loose fit. Since I chose the big, fancy lugs I have about twice as much work as everyone else. Still, they are pretty and I would not change my mind if I had to choose again. I got up at 6am this morning and filed for over an hour before class and I still wasn't done. Tonight after class Steve and I filed for a while and then I went home and filed some more. Good thing I can take that part home because if I had to do it in class I would never get done. My fingers are raw but I am planning on getting up early again tomorrow morning to finish and hopefully braze my triangle by the end of the day! (Top tube, down tube and seat tube). Then I think I will feel more caught up with the rest of the class.

Steve and I doing lug "homework"

Some of us went to a British pub to watch the Tour de France tonight and it was sort of fun but they didn't have the sound on so it was a bit hard to follow. It isn't the same without hearing Phil Liggett. Our room at the hostel doesn't have cable so we can't watch it here unfortunately.

We saw the fox again tonight running through our neigborhood! It is so weird to see a wild animal in town and I have never seen a fox before. He was so cute! As well the California wild fires blew into town from the south tonight and it was hard to breathe outside for a while. Everything smelled burnt and charred. It seemed strange to be able to smell it this far away!

Stay tuned tomorrow for more bike making updates!!! :)