How to Build a Bamboo Bicycle

Step 2 Get your parts and bamboo

There are some parts that you simply can not use bamboo for (maybe you can, but I didn't)
These are:
1. Dropouts
2. Bottom bracket shell
3. Head tube (I tried bamboo and it did not work - too wobbly)
4. Fork

I chopped the dropouts off an kids bmx which are very similar to track dropouts. The bottom bracket shell was cut out of a wrecked road bike frame. The fork I ended up getting was a carbon road fork from Nashbar. The pink one was just for sizing purposes.

The bamboo:
I had no idea what to get so I went to my local bamboo nursery and bought some hefty green pieces of bamboo. The size I chose was about the same diameter on say an aluminum bike.

Comments

[mad doctor]

How did you get your bottom bracket shell out of the bike? Most of the bikes I have looked at have their bottom bracket shells welded on.

[banksos]

How much of the tubes coming out of the bottom bracket shell actually went inside of the bamboo (like reverse lug style)? Or did you just butt the bamboo and the remaining tubes and hemp the heck out of it? I'm stuck trying to figure out how much metal tubing from the steer tube/bottom bracket/dropouts, if any, need to extend into the bamboo tubes. Your thoughts would be extremely helpful! Thanks! Sakeus

[Nkevin90]

do you by any chance know what type of bamboo they helped you pick out?

[Nkevin90]

hey, I'm definatelyyyy building one, if not more of these things this year (I go to an environmental science themed high school and I'm sure they'll eat the idea up), so don't be surprised if these aren't the last questions I've got for you. the rear dropouts I see here; what kind of bike did you get them off of? I can sort of see that where the seat stay would normally weld on doesn't match your frame geometry. what did you do about that? also, was it difficult to fasten them on, considering there isn't any tubing sticking out of them? lastly, the bottom bracket shell. it seems you went with a euro bb, or whatever they're calling them nowadays; the ones that are standard for square/ taper bottom brackets and three piece cranks. did you out of curiosity, get yours off a lugged steel frame from the seventies or eighties or so? did you also choose to go with the smaller bottom bracket size, as opposed to an american shell with an adapter, so you could get more hemp around the thing? sorry for all the inquires, but I promise you pictures and the whole ten yards for everything I do to build mine ; ) thanks, Kevin

[ayasbek]

The rear dropouts were in fact from a children's bmx bike - they are a lot like track bike dropouts. There was enough metal left on them to wrap epoxy/hemp even though the angles did not match. If you are not building a fixie or single speed then you can get much nicer dropouts. The other option is to buy brand new dropouts. Either way just be careful in how you attach them. I filed little grooves in them to give the hemp something to bite onto. The bottom bracket is straight up off of a 80's steel road bike. I think it is called an english style - 1.37 in x 24 TPI - 68 mm width. It takes the most normal bottom bracket you can buy with square taper ends. Good luck. I will try and find the pictures I took of one of Calfees bikes so you can get some ideas of how else it can be done.