Angel's Gate

This Panasonic Team road bike was recently taken in for an overhaul. When Angel assessed this bike all the fastners were frozen with rust. In an effort to prevent stripping out the bolts, Angel chemically treated the rusted threads over about a two week period with his secret penetrating oil. Once this proved successful and he was able to strip down the bike, he cleaned and greased all the threads, replaced the chain and freewheel, thoroughly tuned overhauled the bike and re-taped the bars with Planet Bike cork tape.
It rides like a beauty with 700c wheels and Tange 2 Crome-molybdenum-lug-joined frame and fork tubing brazed in Japan in the early 1980s. Almost all original components Angel installed MKS Sylvan pedals with Soma Toe Clips and straps. The original Italian suede saddle completes that link between Japan and Italy. As much as we need the money from this ticket, I will hate to see it go out of the shop.

'twas the night before Christmas...

and all through Lit Fuse,
Not a creature was stirring
Not even Blue and Jim's Mouth

Ehh
I can't keep this up. I wanted to thank all of you who have stood by us through all of our growing pains. The shop has been steadily evolving and improving service. We are hoping to make it through the winter and have had a boost from the New York Times blog on our shop.

Happy Holidays to all and a joyous New Year.

Damian and LFC

Another Miracle

Unbelievable bike returned from being stolen. Our customer lost his bike and miraculously it showed up back in our shop. No questions asked we accepted the bike back into bike sanctuary; and now Luis wants us to sell it for him. Feather-light Giant carbon fiber TCR C3 with full 105 gruppo, Xero lite wheelset and Carbon seatpost.

Luis was working and turned his back on his whip for a half an instant. In the blink of an eye he lost his trusty steed. She disappeared into the ether.

And as fast as she disappeared, she returned to our shop. A dude asking us how much she was worth, and we responded that it was already sold, to Luis. Like that, the bike was returned to
our fold.
Come check out the miracle bike before someone snaps it up.
As well I found a funny you-tube video. This dude reminds me of a goy-Andy Samburg. It is called Performance.
Perfect commentary on today's cycling scene.
Hope you get a few laughs from these hyjinx.

Lit Fuse Tatoo Run-About

We put together a little Raleigh Colt with some vintage parts and some modern parts for Lit Fuse Tattoo over in Japanther's second home OLYMPIA, Washington. For the hills we added a fully re-conditioned Sturmey-Archer three-speed hub and NOS shifter laced to 36 hole Mavic Open Pro rims by DT Swiss spokes. The front hub is an original Atom Hub made for the Raleigh Record that I reconditioned for the front wheel. It is the opposite of the vogue high flange... the bolt-on low flange hub with the Whitsworth 3/8" Raleigh logo track(ish) nuts. We added Soma Everwears with the white stripe for the Scenester homage to Oly's own styles.

Pictured here is Victor Mendoza the LFC mechanic behind the foundational work in lacing the wheels, prepping, aligning and assembling the parts onto the frame, and testing the ride at speed. I handled the fine tuning and dishing of the wheels, the three-speed hub overhaul clinic and the rear brake fitting and overhaul. Jim handled some trouble shooting on the rear hub and shifter, the wraps and seat-post shimming. Fenders are not full-coverage but they will suffice. Bars and stem by Cinelli and tape Schwinn leather saddle are rounded out with the Japanese 165mm Tourney cranks and Shimano rear calipers with tektro dual-pivots up front. The bottom bracket shell was re-threaded for the modern English Taiwanese cartridge bottom bracket and anchors the bike with smooth reliable service.
MKS Sylvan Tour pedals and re-greased, re-torqued chainwheel screwpegs lend some effort against annoying ticks and clicks. Full-length cable housing and the absence of a cable pulley offer more reliability and longevity to the shifting.
I only wish I still had some of my stash of Scott-Matthauser salmon brake pads. I would settle for the Kool-Stop continentals in salmon but the bank account is in the red again and I got many more items to order for urgent customers. Weinman brake levers are the cherry on the top of this multi-cultural bonanza.
The British-Belgian-French-Italian-Japanese-Taiwanese-American Lit Fuse Cyclery Flyer.
We have been struggling to keep up with a greedy rent and and a neglected basement that is holding us back from being what we intend to become. We are planning some events to celebrate our existence as tenuous as it is. No time like the present to appreciate life's wonders.
I love the re-furbishements that we have been doing. It is why I wanted to build this business. I hope that the Borough can come through for this refugee from Manhattan's gentrification so we can become a fixture in the landscape here. We know that we are not perfect, but we do a damn good job here when we are allowed a little latitude to get the job done.

Hoopty Fever

We converted Georgia's brass colored 1985 Trek 420 road bike to a single-speed the other day. She was as gleeful as we were upon completion of this beauty. The basic flip-flop cone-and-cup wheelset and single-speed 144mm bolt-circle-diameter alloy cranks and Action Messenger 700 X 23 tires were some of the new additions to this bicycle .

We added Wellgo track pedals and a used Velo saddle to the mix and Georgia elected to wrap the bars with red Deda tape with Jim's signiture twine binder. We charge an extra $15 for this touch which is longer-lasting than electrical tape or the lame end binder that comes with most wraps.

The process is fun to watch but and I have been fooling around with it feeling like a boyscout on a fishing expedition. It makes the bike look so classy that I want to do it to all bikes I can get my hands on. The problem is that it almost takes longer than wrapping the average bars including the electrical tape binder at the end of the job.

The nice quality electrical tape works pretty well to keep the bars anchored up top of the drops but eventually the adhesive dries out and your tape begins to unwind slowly but surely.

So far all the twine binders that I have seen have held up great. If you want a twine binder, just ask for Lataesha and he will get to it when he can.

Next project to be featured will be the Lit Fuse Tatoo Shop coffee runner. Stay tuned Brooklyn!

Beat's Custom Raliegh Lite Refurbish

We had the priveledge of fully refurbishing a Raleigh LTD-3 frame from the 70s for a dapper young professional man. We put on new 3 speed wheel-set with aluminum 26 X 13/8" rims, new cotter-less crank-set and cartridge bottom bracket, and vintage aluminum handlebars. We re-tapped the bottom bracket shell of the frame allowing the modern BB and cranks to be installed. This process is fun and takes full advantage of the great old British steel that these old frames are made out of.

Notice the MKS sylvan touring pedals and the modern crank-set. We installed refurbished old Japanese alloy calipers which stop the bicycle better than the steel calipers that came on the bike ever could. As well replacing all the Whitsworth with metric should go much appreciated by any mechanic that works on this bike.

With all these Japanese parts we had to reinforce the British roots with a genuine Brooks Saddle. The alloy post-style seat pillar and old Sturmey-Archer pulley cable-guide serve to lighten the bike up and reduce friction in the shifting cables.

This photo does not do justice to the beautiful alloy Phillips French three-speed bars and sweet clear cablehousing guiding the controls. Keeping the bike and rider cleaner and happier and lighter are some Planet Bike Cascadia fenders in black. Light for a three-speed is an understatement. This bike's brand new Sturmey-Archer three-speed hub shifts like a charm and the bike flies the way these were meant to glide through traffic and up bridges.

Stay tuned for the next installment where we feature a sweet conversion of a Trek road bike and the Raleigh Colt that was reborn as a Pacific North West tattoo parlor shuttle bike.

Gnarly Vines and Lit Fuse

Today is the Transportation Alternatives Park(ing) day.

Park(ing) Day NYC is a New York City Streets Renaissance collaboration which supports the conversion of parking spots throughout New York City's 5 boroughs into human-friendly places for a single day. These small, temporary public spaces provide a breath of relief from the auto-clogged reality of New York City, and aim to spark dialogue about our valuable public space and how we choose to use it.

As part of Park(ing) Day NYC, Gnarly Vines is reclaiming the parking spot in front of their store and transforming it into an engaging, people-friendly public space for wine tastings and bike repairs!

Angel and Sean will be tasting wine and helping our beloved Brooklynites with their human-powered cycles from 1pm to 4pm today while the wine tasting will last until 8pm.

A great partnering of vino and Cicli harkening to the days of Fausto Coppi.