2018 Japan Handmade Bike Show

I stopped by Kitanomaru on January 20 for this year's handmade bike show.

Some highlights:

1. Equilibrium Cycleworks. As usual, Vlad from Equilibrium brought some beautiful bikes. As Vlad notes, he gets clients -- despite being a foreign builder in Japan -- by a willingness to do things other builders will not.  Disk brakes. Internal cabling. And on and on. Spectacular paint and overall craftsmanship.

167 wheels from GS Astuto / Tim Smith with yellow labeling to match the paint on this bike!

2.  Beautiful craftsmanship.

Makino brazing on this lugged bike. Just gorgeous.

Dobbat's seat post tightening hidden bolt (embedded in the seat stays from the other side).

3.  Tradition

For some reason, this year my eyes were drawn to the nice, light/small rear racks on many of the randonneur bikes

Beautiful Toei Tandem!

4. Supplies and components

Jig

Tange (and Columbus) tubing were on display

Lugs and more lugs here and elsewhere (though mostly imported from Taiwan)

Honjo Koken fenders

Gokiso hubs

5. And more and more!

Where did the top tube ... and seat tube ... go?