... In search of the obscure.

[d_douglas]

Over the years on this forum, I have seen thousands of bikes. the range is from huge names like Giant and Trek to the brand of the day (year?) - Speedvagen, Firefly, Festka etc., to the downright obscure. The latter is the subject of this post.

I am curious about what some of the more obscure modern brands are that are circulating around. not the hobbyists making a few frames to hone their skills, but people aiming to make a living at it. Firefly is now an established successful and trendy brand, so the rarity factor is almost lost on them (and yes, I would love to own one!) Some obscure brands that come to mind are Scarab, Moth Attack and Prova - what are some others?

I liken Serotta to a gateway drug to the hardcore stuff coming down the line. It seems like some of us are always searching out more and more obscure bikes to experiment with, fetishize, enjoy.

[cinema]

peacock groove and winter are some of my favorites doing it right now

[Spaghetti Legs]

My interest lies in steel and someone posted this Ellis, a brand I’d never heard of. I keep going back and looking at this one.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Ellis-Cycle...fc48%7Ciid%3A1


I put it on my watch list and got an offer for $500 off if anyone is interested in it. If I decide to go custom one day, I think this builder will be on my list.

[weisan]

Get in before Mr. Thompson raise his price...

[Mark McM]

I'm not sure that you can put such a fine dividing line as "not the hobbyists making a few frames to hone their skills, but people aiming to make a living at it." There are quite a few builders who make their living in the bicycle industry, but don't build frames full time. Builders like Peter Mooney, Gualzetti, Hot Tubes, etc. fill this niche.

[d_douglas]

Originally Posted by Mark McM

I'm not sure that you can put such a fine dividing line as "not the hobbyists making a few frames to hone their skills, but people aiming to make a living at it." There are quite a few builders who make their living in the bicycle industry, but don't build frames full time. Builders like Peter Mooney, Gualzetti, Hot Tubes, etc. fill this niche.

Yes, the dividing line is not clear for sure. Gaulzetti is a good example of obscure, gone big, then kinda obscure again.

As for Ellis, I don’t consider him obscure - his framebuilding palmares puts him in the ‘well-established’ camp I would say. Love his frames too...

[phishrabbi]

Is my habanero obscure?

[jtakeda]

I’m not 100% sure what meets your criteria but what comes to mind for me

Fitz
Rick Hunter
MAP-(although no longer building)
Steve Potts
Black Cat
Caletti

Like that kind of stuff?

[d_douglas]

Yes, those are some. Black Cat is a favourite of mine (though I’ve never actually seen one!!) Hunter too, but he’s been at it for a long time (tooling/toiling in obscurity)?

Potts doesn’t make the cut (in my opinion) - he’s amazing and one of the originals in MTB fabrication.

[slowpoke]

A quick glance down William's list of American framebuilders will easily yield more than dozen unknowns for anyone: https://forums.thepaceline.net/showthread.php?t=113817

[fignon's barber]

How 'bout Stoemper ?

[weisan]

I would ask Doug Fattic

[Coffee Rider]

http://www.classicrendezvous.com/ lists a lot of builders, probably most of which were unknown to me before going to the site. I think that relative to the overall number of bikes sold, pretty much any builder that does custom would count as relatively obscure.

[vav]

Chapman
AR Cycles

[Coffee Rider]

Originally Posted by d_douglas

Over the years on this forum, I have seen thousands of bikes. the range is from huge names like Giant and Trek to the brand of the day (year?) - Speedvagen, Firefly, Festka etc., to the downright obscure. The latter is the subject of this post.

All three of those are obscure to most cyclists.

I'm hoping this thread will lead me to learn about builders I didn't previously know about since I love this sort of thing.