Oh looky

A Desoto Pic

Someone sent me a link to a pic of my Desoto from July 2010 Cruise Night

Enfields

This local guy Carlo has been restoring two Enfields. Check em out and follow him!
http://restoringmyenfields.blogspot.com/

Vans

My slip-ons were worn clear through, so I picked up some new kicks, some grey Vans Spawn. They were on clearance, which was a good motivator. I hate being a walking, talking stereotype: Vans, motorcycles, flannels and plaid, flat caps, hipster this and that. I'm certainly not quite as bad as others, but still fit the bill. I could say, "I've been doing it before it was cool," but meh. What's the point anymore? Wear what you like. Do what you like. "Hipster" has lost all meaning. I complained about jocks in high school, frat boys in college, I think at 30+ it's time to hang up the complaining hat. I'm already destined to be a curmudgeonly old man. Unless they are one of those super, annoying hipsters. You know what I'm talking about...

To be honest I wouldn't be caught in Vans 10-15 years ago. And definitely not DC. I was all hardcore "support the shoe companies that support BMX." Vans were junk, in my opinion, and not good for BMX. And they didn't want bmxers in their skate parks. And F DC. At the time DC wanted nothing to do with BMX. Wow... what a tangent...



What I don't like is having to buy my shoes at the same place as all the giggling 14 year olds. And at least I wasn't the 30-something getting the Yo-Gabba-Gabba Vans. Now, let me buy my shoes and this flannel off the clearance rack and I'm out of here...

Clubman's 2011

Made it there at 8AM for the first time in my life to get in on the good swap action. Went down with Lucas, ran into Doug and Paul, found Jared some swag. Also ran into the SF Vintage guys, saw Kim and Pete's Velos, didn't see the Ton Up guys this year, nore Dave from the Road Devils.

First year of cafe and chopper/bobber classes. Took a bunch of pics of bikes I hadn't seen before.

All pics I didn't take tons of pics. Here's a link to another gallery by McQueen.


CB750 in some dirt bike chassis, with side car rig






Really like the struts










Pete & Kim's Velos

Clubmans booty

The primary cover and trans are for Troop.

Photoshoot

Here a few behind the scenes of the photoshoot for the fixtures.

Computer layout of the tradeshow booth


Test sizing the hamster graphics


The hamster wheel just as I finished it


Behind the magic




Fixtures after being photographed, ready to be crated and shipped

The Bolt "Laser Cat" Fixture

This last student fixture concept is a display for already existing line of laser pointer toys for pets by a company called Bolt. The idea is this is a pedestal where the toys can shine on the top surface and show off the random light action of the toy. Here's the student concept:



And the front page from my drawing package:


I had our vendor in China make the top section in fiberglass and paint it while I made the graphics/decals. Here are some build process photos:





When we received the fixture it was damaged in transit. It has a huge tear and dent in one side. Plus, to be honest, the quality of the finish looked like the cellulite on Kim Kardashian's ass. So we had an autobody shop fix it for us. He had that surface smooth and shiny. Here's the photoshoot image:



You can see all photos here.

The Run 'Round Hamster Wheel Fixture

This 2nd fixture I had the most creative license with. The student provided this very basic mockup as a guide.


I decided to go all out with it and make the hamster wheel actually rotate and use gears to move the hamster whirly-jig. Here is the assembly page from my drawing package:


This fixture was made by our vendor in China. They can make anything work. I had it pretty much figured out, but they tweaked it enough to finish my unfinished thoughts.





During the shipment from China the Japan tsunami happened and our shipment got stuck there for a bit. I know, the least of everyone's concerns. But it did make it to us the day before it needed to ship to Vegas. I drew the graphics and had decals made and modified the the fixture in a few places. And here is the end result:





You can see all the build process photos here. Tomorrow I will show the last fixture I worked on.

The Hermes Fixture

Last week was a busy week for me at work, and probably the most fun I have every year at work. Every year my company puts on a student design contest. This year the students were to design a pet store retail fixture. We got about 200 entries from around the world and picked the top 12 to actually make prototypes of. I was in charge of designing 3 of them.

This first one is the winner of the competition. The student designed a fixture to display Hermes Saddles, which are multi-thousand dollar horse saddles from Paris. I took the student's concept and made a full drawing package to have a local artist, Kyle Minor, build.

The student's rendering:


The assembly page from my drawing package:


Here are some build progress photos. The wood is 100+ year old redwood from a Novato ranch, the i-beam is from an early 1900's pier in San Francisco, and the saddle is a shoddily made and cheap seat from India... because, well, Hermes saddles are really expensive.








And the end result:


You can see all of the build photos here. Stay tuned for 2 more fixtures and pics from the photoshoot.

New Toys!

Almost Springtime

Rain should be stopping soon, and that means it's time to make something of our backyard. Here's a little rendering I did. No, they aren't palm trees.




Deck over concrete, hot tub, picnic table, trees, stone, paint the fence, nice bbq grill. Chillax 5000.

Bigger IS Better

I finally got the new tire/wheel combo on the CB750. I think it looks fantastic, but, most people think their shit is awesome, hence some of the horrible customs out there. But, really, this is like 300% better looking than stock. I just need to make some spacers. I also may need to flip the wheel around so the hub is on the other side.

I tried to get the 16" tire on, but it is pretty stuck to the wheel. I'll probably just have to pay someone to do it. Motor work should begin soon.

Missin' Flattie May

Guess you just can't keep them all.