News / Fairdale Feed from FairdaleBikes.com

It is so flattering when someone customizes one of our bikes. I like seeing our bikes reborn in ways that I would never have imagined. It’s also great to know that someone likes the starting platform enough to pour all that extra time/money into the bike. No Life Like This Life just posted a really pretty Weekender OG build belonging to Tyler Scaife. Here’s a bit of the text from the build story: Tyler started with the Fairdale Weekender OG frame and fork and stripped them down to bare metal with the intent of oiling them to prevent rust. He meticulously dialed in the exact parts he wanted after months and months of research. It’s easy to see his BMX roots in certain parts of this build, especially in the Wellgo MG-1 pedals, a classic staple to the lightest trails bike. Some of my favorite parts of this bike are the hidden friction shifter tucked under the rear brake lever, the vintage mountain bike stem stripped down to bare metal, the Wolftooth chainring that was blasted with oven cleaner to strip off the black anodization, the DIY rack to fork crown mounting system that can hold a TON of weight, the vintage tennis racquet tape as bar tape, all of the security bolts hidden in plain sight, the wood headseat cap, the fatty 38cm Fairweather gumwalls in brown, and really the overall color scheme is just so on point. There’s so many really smart and thoughtful pieces and parts of this bike. You gotta take a closer look to catch em all. Click over to check out all the photos and surf around a great new cycling blog too: http://www.nolifelikethislife.com/fairdaleweekender-tylerscaife-weekenderporteur/ Thanks guys! -taj      

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We receive quite a lot of questions about bike sizing. It’s an obvious question to ask but one that isn’t always that easy to answer. In an ideal world you’d head down to your local bike shop and have them “size” you for a bike. The CSPC gives you the above sizing information. Of course you don’t want to get “crotched” every time you try to dismount your bike but there is a lot more to bike sizing than the standover height. People come in a lot of different shapes and sizes. Some have longer legs or some have longer torsos or whatever you got going on. You can (or hopefully a bike shop can help you) make all kinds of adjustments to a bike for fit. Adjusting bar height, stem length, seat height, seat set back and a bunch of other things probably means you can fit more than one size frame. Ultimately what matters is that you feel comfortable on the bike and that you will want to ride it. You probably don’t need your bike set up in full “race mode” if you are just going to be casually cruising. If you start putting in 100’s of miles a more aggressive fit might be ideal. You might have back issues or who knows what to work around. The idea is that bikes do have a lot of flexibility and if something doesn’t feel right (on a bike from any brand) there’s probably a way to adjust it. These photos are on our 2015 Weekender Archer (which will still be in some bike shops). The 2016 Weekenders coming in November will have the same geometry.  

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I should tell y’all sometime about the day I first set foot in Austin back in 1992. It was a life changer and a magical moment. I’ve been forever in love with riding bikes around that city because of it. I know not all cities are perfect for cycling, but pretty much year round Austin is better enjoyed by bicycle than any other means of transportation I can think of. Austin Bike Tours and Rental recently picked up a fleet of 30 Daybirds and put them to work. On a strictly personal level that is a such an awesome achievement for me! Fairdale exists because I fell in love with riding bikes around Austin… to see our bikes being lent out of strangers to experience some of what I love is the coolest thing I can imagine. Located at 102 1/2 W 3rd Street, Austin, TX 78701 (between Congress Ave and Colorado Street) Austin Bike Tours is walking distance from just about anywhere in downtown. I hope that anyone who finds themselves in Austin can grab a bike and wander around. It’s by far the most enjoyable way to see the city. We asked Kieth a little about what he has going on at his rental business: When did you get started? Why did you want to have a bike rental in downtown Austin? I started working for the company in 2011 and bought it in 2012. I’ve been riding around Austin for the better part of 30 years, so I know it’s best experienced on a bike. Tourists are coming here by the plane loads and looking for something cool to do. We get to show them a good time and do what we love. It’s the best way ever to make a living. We love the Daybirds at the shop. We tell our customers that they’re the easiest bikes they’ll ever ride. Most folks we get aren’t avid cyclists. The Daybirds are so stable and easy to operate, our customers are able to concentrate on the sites and let the bike do its thing.  How much is it to rent a bike form you guys? There tours too right? Our rental rates range from $10 an hour to $35 a day to $125 for a week. All bikes come with u-locks, lights and a helmet if you want to wear one. Tours are what we really like to do. Our “Hey Austin” daily tour is a good way to learn about the city and take a killer bike ride. We also offer a craft beer tour with a local brewer, a music history tour with a local musician and a yoga/swim tour with a local yoga instructor. We’ve arranged bbq picnics and two-step lessons as part of our tours. We’re just doing things that we love on a bike in our city and bringing some out of towners along. If you come to Austin hit up  Austin Bike Tours and Rental at: 512-277-0609 www.austinbiketoursandrentals.com   Thanks Keith! -Taj

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  Upgrading or updating your grips is a simple way to freshen up your bike. Throwing on some fresh grips can make a bike that’s starting to feel old feel new again. Did I mention that we make grips? We do, and bartape too!   This is our bartape. It has our Swan logo embossed all over it. A while ago we posted some simple instructions on how to wrap your bars. It’s started a total bike nerd debate about the “right” way to wrap bars. A lot of people said you should wrap them the other direction for sprint-induced-bar-twisting. Some people said you should use banana peels! Having a pro do the wrap is what we recommend, but if you do want to do it yourself just remember the tape starts at the bottom of the drop bar and should wrap in opposite directions on either side (which ever direction you choose). Personally I have a pattern where the direction switches when it crosses over the levers and I don’t use those little extra pieces. Grips have about as many install options as bartape but the goal is to just get them onto the bars in a way that doesn’t slip around (that would be dangerous). With an air compressor you can slip them on by pumping air underneath them. I’ve always been a fan of a couple squirts of clear spray paint to kind of glue them on. There’s also the tricky zip-tie trick for installation. Give your bike some love with some new handlebar Hodors.

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Trying to keep the creative juices flowing I amass quite a number of doodles around my desk. They keep me giggling to myself and keep things from getting stagnant. I just finished and shipped off this Bat-Bike for the #5050fortaylor fund raiser. The Loop Project raises money each year by sending out a bunch of blank decks to have people “art” on. The boards will be shown at Fun Fun Fun Fest and then auctioned online in November. More info on Project Loop here. I’m still overly excited about having our own pencils. There’s something so satisfying about having a pencil in hand to me… gives me just a few moments of not staring at a computer screen when I’m working “old-school”. The art for the Kung-Fu Party t-shirt started as a desk-pad doodle. Always working on ways to take Monty on bike rides with me. Or get him set up so he can ride by himself. -Taj

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While supplies last get a free Fairdale rabbit drawing stick with all orders from our catalog (shirts, hats, waterbottles… that sort of stuff). Imagine the fun you can have with them!

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Some months ago The Ride Journal  asked me to write a little story about Fairdale. Funnily enough they had seen our momentarily viral R+D video and wanted to know more about what we were all about. Though I expect they were hoping for something as goofy as that video I gave them a much more sincere version of “our story”. This ran in their mag a few months ago which you can download from Ride Journal. I imagined myself trying to explain my motivation for the brand to someone who didn’t know anything about Fairdale.  -Taj A Change of Gear by Taj I want to keep my bicycle innocence. I want to walk a into a bicycle store and feel amazed by all the spaceship styled machines inside. When the salesman spots me lusting over the top of the line road bike I want to still feel bewildered when he tells me the “cross-weaved carbon-fiber lay-up” makes the bike so strong it’ll win the Tour de France (but don’t let it fall over because it’ll break if it lands on anything sharp). I want to remember the discouragement I feel when the mountain bike that looks like a motorcycle with no engine somehow costs more than a motorcycle WITH an engine. I want to remember what it feels like to not know anything about bikes… to just want to go for a ride. Not long ago walking into a bike shop was an alienating experience for me and that’s strange because I’d spent the majority of my life as a professional bike rider. I was a BMXer though and the little trick-bike world on the very fringe of cycling has been content to be defined by stone-age single-speed chromoly steel-framed bikes. My “cycling career” on the edge of cycling has been a unique journey that brought me to an almost metaphysical understanding of what riding a bike was without actually knowing much about bikes. That’s not to say I didn’t “know” BMX bikes, on the contrary, I had signature model bikes, parts and even shoes. They were all designed out of my personal necessity as the rider who would use them. I had no engineering background or scientific understanding outside of millions of hours of brutal bike-destroying trial and error. Even so I was left relatively ignorant of what the rest of the cycling world was doing. After a spinal injury it was time for me to step away from BMX. That led me to a job at long time sponsor Odyssey BMX. With little bikes being off limits post surgery I started visiting bike shops looking for a bike I could ride. With my innocence intact I started wondering why bikes weren’t more like I thought they should be. If BMX teaches you anything about bikes it’s that the most simple bikes can do some of the most amazing things. My bike shop friends seemed to see things differently. They said what I really needed was the new electronic gear system, and that I would […]

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The 2016 Fairdale line will arrive to bike shops in November. You can check out all the bikes now in the above digital version of our print catalog or see more detailed info on our “bikes” link. If you need info on 2015 models or older you can also find our bike archives there.

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Remembering that Roger Skateboards collaboration bike… man that was cool. Graphics by Michael Sieben, video bike Mike Aho, skating by Max Taylor and acting by Tim Kerr… holy crap! How lucky are we to have been part of that! Check the rad video… The Roger bike was a special edition Coaster model with included special edition Roger skateboard and Fairdale Bikes Skaterack. Fun project! We need to do more of these.    

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Our new Adjust-A-Rack is now instock. This rear cargo rack is designed to be easy to install without any cutting needed. The Adjust-A-Rack ships flat and then easily folds out for installation. When the rack is open you have a few set up options. You can mount the legs with only one bolt, or increase the set-back of the rack by mounting the front leg to one of the optional holes on the bag-hook. Next, attach the arms to the seat-stay rack-mounts. If your bike doesn’t have seat-stay rack-mounts you could connect these arms to an optional seatclamp that has rack-mounts. A number of companies makes those and they are relatively inexpensive. If needed you can also flip the position of the arms to work-around interfering brakes. Once the rack is in place it’s easy to adjust the top so that it’s level. More about the Adjust-A-Rack here.  

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