Bespoked 2015 preview part two: Donhou, Sword, Daniel Merenyi, Curtis, Legend, Roberts, Woodrup, Sarto and more

We brought you a the first part of our Bespoked 2015 preview earlier this week, here’s another roundup of what you can expect to see at the UK’s only handbuilt bicycle show. It takes place next weekend, that’s 17-19th April, and it returns to Bristol this time around, taking over Brunel’s Old Station. You can get tickets at the official website here.

Wheeldan

German-based Wheeldan will be showcasing this stunning Rohloff-equipped titanium tandem. It has been designed to accommodate a “child as a stoker” as Wheeldan’s founder built it so he could ride with his 5-year-old son. Last year they put the bike through its paces, cycling 1,000km in one hit. It has mudguards and a front rack attached to the novel fork for carrying luggage for such an extended bike ride.

Daniel Merenyi

A regular at Bespoked, Daniel Merenyi is from Hungary and trained under the watchful eye of Dario Pegoretti, and for the last few years has been making his own frames, previously under the name Merényi Bicycle. He has now decided to concentrate on building bicycle frames and will sell them under his own name, rather than his previous focus of building a brand and a business. Pictured is his most recent creation, the Superleggera Mk II. He’ll be bringing another new bike to the show, based on an idea he came up with while working with Pegoretti.

Curtis Bikes

Another regular at Bespoked, Curtis Bikes will be showing this new CX9 cyclocross frame, still a prototype at this stage and is currently being used to get some feedback from team rider Matt Livesey before it is ready for production. The frame is made from Reynolds 853 tubing with Columbus seatstays and chainstays and paired with a Columbus carbon fibre fork.

Wildcat Gear

Makers of bikepacking luggage, Wildcat Gear will showing a handful of new and updated products. The Tom Cat is new, a small pouch that exploits the space provided within the loop of a Jones Bikes Loop H-Bar, providing instant access to small items while riding, yet with a surprising capacity.

Fat bikes are really popular in the mountain biking world at the moment, and so Wildcat have introduced hte new Fat Lion, a larger version of their existing Mountain Lion handlebar harness. Talking of the Mountain Lion, their longest standing product, it’s getting an update and the bar-mounted bag inherits some new features first seen on the Fat Lion.

Legend

Italian bicycle brand Legend, run by Marco Bertoletti, will once again be at the show with a range of bikes showcasing their skills in creating custom frames out of titanium, steel, aluminium and carbon fibre. The company is celebrating 25 years of frame building and will display the new Venticinquesimo, a limited edition frame crafted from titanium and carbon fibre.

Sword Cycles

Derbyshire-based Sword Cycles build custom steel frames and forks and work with each rider to their specific requirements. Run by Tim Leicester, who trained at Mercian Cycles, the brand previously won the Best Utility Bike at Bespoked in 2012. This year they’ll be showing a new road bike featuring a Reynolds 853 tubeset that is electronic groupset specific internal routing, along with a heavy duty cargo bike.

Geoff Roberts

Geoff Roberts of the Roberts bicycle brand in South London will be in attendance on the Steve Olsen belt drive stand and available to talk too, so if you’ve got any questions for one of the most experience frame builders in the UK, he’s your man. Roberts has taken up residence teaching frame building at Enigma Bikes recently, and has helped Steve Olsen develop his belt drive bikes. Geoff is also now selling bikes under his own name.

Workhausbikes

Last year the founder of Workhausbikes made a touring bike on a Dave Yate’s framebuilding course, and this year has started his own brand. He’ll be showing this utility bike, built for artist Sam Hewitt, and has been build in response to the Bespoked Constructors Challenge.

Paulus Quiros

Dr Jonathan Paulus combines his background in motorsport engineering, studying medicine, formal training in welding and participation in the Advanced Bicycle Fit at SICI in America into building his own unique frames in partnership with Jose Quiros from Barcelona, who has a background in industrial engineering. Together they’ll be showing this Reynolds 953 frameset

Bicycles by Design

Shropshire-based Bicycles by Design will be showing their own Swallow bicycle brand, established in 1981 and providing bespoked frames in steel. n 2013 Swallow walked off with the Best Road Bicycle Award at Bespoked. This year they’ll be showing an new Reynolds 953 frameset with an exclusive 1 1/8in to 1 1/2in tapered head tube.

The frame is reported to weigh just 1,899g. Other details include a bi-axial oval down tube, round tapered seat tube, engraved rear brake bridge and trademark fastback seat cluster.

“The concept with this particular frame is to produce a truly modern bike and frame design in class-leading materials while still retaining a hint of our own design heritage,” says Peter Bird.

Woodrup Cycles

Based in Yorkshire, Woodrup Cycles have been building frames since the 1940s and will be showing some recent commissions at Bespoked, including a collaboration with other Yorkshire artisans to produce a gravel racer for the upcoming 2015 Transcontinental race. 

Other bikes worth a look at include several 650b wheeled touring bikes and road and time trial bikes.

Toad Custom Cycles

Toad Custom Cycles will be showing a bike built specifically for this year’s Eroica Britannia event, after taking part last year Toad founder Toby has designed to build his own bike, using a Columbus Spirit tubeset for the frame and fork, with a custom front rack including an integrated torch holder and seat tube mounted rear light.

The design is based on a 1960s touring bike and sourced an old Shimano  Shimano 600 Arabesque groupset in good condition, which will be matched to some new components. The wheels, built by August Wheelworks, use the classically styled H+Son TB14 rims, laced onto Paul Components Jono Hub, allowing me to use the 6 Speed Freehub.

Phoenix Hotworks

Phoenix Hotworks will be showing a couple of new frames, a fully rigid mountain bike and a “micro racer.” The frames have been designed and built by Darren, and the new road frame is still in the paint shop, so here’s a couple of pics of previous frames he has produced.

Wittson Custom Ti Cycles

Wittson will show their flagship model, the Suppresio, made from titanium tubes and with  claimed frame weight for a medium with uncut seat tube of 1,580g. It’s the only road race frame they offer as standard, this one is packed with features like the integrated seatmast, conical head tube, internal brake and gear cable routing, and press-fit 30 bottom bracket.

Findra

It’s not just frames and bikes that will be on show at Bespoked, there will be clothing brands too, such as Findra, a new range of bike wear designed specifically for women.

Started by fashion designer Alex Feechan after starting mountain biking three years ago and spotting a gap in the market, she has combined her fashion design skills with her passion for cycling to produce a range of clothing with a specific women’s fit and using performance fabrics, and all handmade in Scotland.

Advanced Velo Design

In the 1980s famous bike designer Mike Burrows (responsible for Chris Boardman’s Lotus bike) developed the Windcheetah as a winter training vehicle for recumbent cyclists. The recumbent is now manufactured in Lancashire by Advanced Velo Design with locally sourced components where possible.

“The Windcheetah is an artisan machine created for the more discerning rider looking for speed, comfort and performance,’ says the company.

Comtat Cycling

London-based Comtat Cycling will be showing a fleet of Italian bikes from Tommasini, Sarto, Casati and their own house brand, Comtat Cycling.

Each brand can boast loads of experience, with Casati having been around for 80 years and still a family run business. Sarto are one of the few bespoke carbon fibre producers still working in Italy and their flagship frame weighs in at just 699g.

Stanforth Bikes

Stanforth Bikes will be showing the Kibo, an expedition bike with the lugged frame built by their own framebuilder, Lee Cooper. They’ll also be launching the Kibo+, an all-terrain touring bike with a Reynolds 631 frame and fork with parts from  Paul Components, Brooks and a Shimano XT transmission.

Middleburn to reveal new cranks, hubs and bottom brackets

Component manufacturer Middleburn will be showing samples of their new range of cranksets designed for road, touring, tandem, mountain bikes and fat bikes, along with new hubs and bottom brackets. The RO2 road crank is 11-speed compatible and the chainrings are finished in their own Hardcoat finished to provide good longevity. They will also have a new Bottom Bracket on display which is an upgrade for the BB30 for 24mm axle cranks.

Hartley Cycles

Hartley Cycles have built this lovely 650c Columbus XCr and Spirit tubed road bike with hand cut solid silver detail brazed onto the frame. They’ll also be showing a new Reynolds 931 and 953  'Demi Porkeur' which is being constructed for photographer Camille Mcmillan and has been designed to allow him to carry photography and snow walking equipment for exploring his new home in the Pyrenees. It’ll be packing some state-of-the-art technology, including a new Boost 148 Syntace bolt-thru rear axle and huge 2.8in mountain bikes tyres, it really is designed to go everywhere and anywhere.

Cloud 9 Cycles

Last year London-based Cloud 9 Cycles released the Street Racer, and this year it has been updated and is now available in a choice of singlespeed or geared builds. The frame is made from Reynolds 631 tubing with a geometry designed to provide a mix of agility and stability for city riding.

Sven Cycles

Darron Sven of Sven Cycles will be displaying two Reynolds 953 singlespeed bikes he has built for friends recently. The bikes are going to be ridden over the Alps this summer, and they both wanted bikes with a classic look, which I think you’ll agree has been achieved.

COFA Engineering

COFA Engineering are well versed in producing special one-off bikes, and at the show they’ll be displaying a bike built for the UK’s tallest man, who stands at 7’7”. It’s hard enough for tall people to get a bike to fit from a mainstream manufacturer, let alone someone so exceptionally tall, so he approached COFA and they produced the custom bike you see in this photo.

Donhou Bicycles

Thomas Donhou will use Bespoke to show his brand new DSS2, a followup to the original DSS1 which road.cc has had in for review recently. The new DSS1 is designed to be versatile. There’s going to be space for up to 35mm tyres with mudguards, so it’ll be a better choice an all-terrain do-everything bike.

Donhou will also show three customer bikes, showcasing his ability to build bikes to specific requirements. There is a step-through women’s town bike built from Reynolds 953 and shod with Shimano XTR disc brakes and a Brooks saddle and matching bar tape, and a custom handlebar and stem.

There’ll also be a belt-driven, disc-equipped commuter bikes plus an XCr road bike with a “mind-bending paint job” and Enve equipment, which should be a head-turner.

www.bespoked.cc