Rock Out With Your Lock Out.

Our Man from Japan is in town, bearing gifts from afar, picking up material for B-Maniac.






Last time he was in town to pick up Japanese Gangstas, he lost a liver at Bike Kill and we're going to see if we can do better for 08. If you're in the NYC area follow along for what is going to turn out to be a bitchin' spring weekend of riding:


Friday night is a night of warehouse parties, the last of which is being thrown by our friends at Times-Up at their fancy new space in the West Village.


According to the invite:
"Dance party with the Rude Mechanical Orchestra & DJ D, an olympic-size trampoline, Hot Seat and video projection by Velchrome. 11pm to 12:30am the Traffic Jam tap dancers will perform with the Boom Boom Brooks Trio plus a Bicycle Fashion Show - be in it!"
Beer, trampolines , and bikes. (Map Here)



Then on Saturday morning, the boys at NYCMTB.com are throwing the first legal mountain bike race in Manhattan, Hustle and Flow. A 4 racer relay mixing disciplines of road, cross country, DJs and Downhill on a 16 minute course. (Map Here)


Wind down for prizes and brews at the Knitting Factory and catch the NYC premiere of Seasons, the new MTB film by The Collective (makers of ROAM). (Map Here)


Then ride the banks for one last hurrah and hope our Japanese friend is sober enough to not wind up like this on Sunday Morning.
(Map Here)

...Where Do They All Come From?

Spring has sprung here in NYC; temperatures are rising, hems are getting shorter, and people are hitting the city in style.
Here's one of our springtime orders in a custom colorway, ready for its new life on the streets of Japan.

To see what kind of abuse the BMW park frame is up to, check out the latest clips from our man Dan Bowhers, who has been bustin' out videos left and right as the Winter fades.

Tune back in for more footage, or check out the forums to catch the latest rider buzz.

No Flash Photo...

Things are inching closer to production release of the ACL- here's a peek of the latest version: Pick up the latest issue of Distilled Magazine for an exclusive interview with Factory rider Anson Wellington and ride shots of him testing out prototypes of his signature frame.
Check back right here for more pics and release updates.

For New Yorkers waiting for our full lineup, break your cabin fever on the 12th by entering Mud Sweat and Tears, NYC's first unsanctioned as hell cyclocross series.



Word is that this Saturday is ", Sludgement Day: The Day of Wreckoning.
.....Randall's Island Circuit Racing. Rat Pack Hustle sprint competition. Skid-hockey, mudsprints, grasstrackstands, and other tomfoolery."




Check out their website for maps and details. Check out this website before you ride to the pristine shores of Randall's Island.

A Quick Shafting.

We're jumping into the spring season by testing all the products we've developed and prototyped over the long winter, both large and small. Swing by the shop to see what we have in our hand, or take a peek at this little side project in our bag of tricks.

A 29.8mm aluminum BMW seatpost!

*3D cold forged, one piece head
*simple and secure 2 bolt adjustment
*400mm long
*Shot-peened and anodized black...just black.
*250 grams
*Made by Communist Robots in a far away land.
*At only $44, it won't break the bank and makes a perfect compliment to your new (or current) Brooklyn frame.

Available now, call the shop or Email BMW@Brooklynmachineworks to order.

As much as we love to give frames away, sponsored riders do more for us than just pimp our prototypes- they provide real world feedback on our designs, telling us what needs to be changed, or in the case of Tom Lamarche's gangsta, letting us know that we did things right in the first time around.
Here's Tom's beat up steed back home in the Jig it was made in, now just as straight as it was when it left the shop, even with all the dents and ledge-pounded metal. After a few custom additions and hellish 2 hour sticker scrape down, it was sent to paint for a facelift, just in time to tape his new feature segments in Bootleg Sessions 2 .
Stay tuned for more rider-tested frames, or call the shop to lay your own fat beatdown on some of our new steez for 08.

24 inches of love.

A Brooklyn original and still the best, the Park Bike is available now for 2008.

(photo via review on descent-workld.co.uk)

Designed around a 24" wheel and BMX bottom bracket, the Park is made in the USA to be a tough, flickable hardtail ready for everything you can dish out. Dirt Jumps today, Skate Park tomorrow, it's the bike you ride hard, put away wet, and it will keep kicking session after session, year after year.

Check out the abuse of Brooklyn grassroots rider Dan Bohwers testing out his new Brooklyn Park in our own backyard.


Bike Check:
Brooklyn park Frame w/Lifetime warranty
Prototype Brooklyn Machine Works Seatpost
Profile Cranks & BB
Hope pro trials hub,
Animal sprocket/ DX32
Eight track front
DMR 20mm fork, king headset
Zoo bars

Free Flow Fridays: Monstertrack

Monstertrack didn't happen, and this is not a prizebag for being the fastest Bike Messenger in New York City.

This one goes out to all the Baby Mommas, and the Babies's Momma's Mommas.

Despite 2 days of awful weather and the official cancellation of the main race, a whole lot of people are congratulating Brooklyn Gangsta rider Austin Horse after Monstertrack weekend.

Way to go , Champ!

(Photo Courtesy of Will Sherman. Glasses Courtesy of...nevermind.)

In other NYC news, SID'S bike shop in Manhattan is one of three finalists for a Microsoft Small Business Summit $100,000 technology grant, and they need your votes!

Founded in 1979, Sid's has been ranked as one of the top 100 bike shops in the country for three years in a row. More than "just a bike shop", local establishments like Sid's are what turn people onto bikes in the first place, and keep them riding for years to come. As far as we know, Sid's has been the only shop in the five boroughs to pay their employees for their time and effort building the first legal mountain bike trails in Manhattan. Whatever views you have of Windows, please realize that a vote for Sid's is a vote for sustainable trails and transportation in NYC and cities around world.

For all our overseas readers, here are voting instructions with all the grace we have trying to buy 50 cent dumplings in Chinatown.

> CLICK HERE TO VOTE<

Vote for combo #1, " Sid's Bikes, NYC"

No registration necessary. Free derivery $10 minimum. No MSG.

Domo Arigato.

Given this weekend's Monstertrackness and the dollar's craptacular exchange rate, we've had a lot of visitors from Japan swing by the shop to check out and place orders for the both the Gangsta Track and these beauties to the left that we'll be releasing later on this month.


Our friend Tak came by to take a few shots of the 08 lineup, including the new DH prototype that's waiting patiently for the season opening at Diablo.
Gangata Team rider Austin Horse was around to show off his haircut and entertain some fellow competitors from Japan and NYC locals @ DQM. Good times.

Best of luck to our boys Austin and Tom this weekend. If you're in the city, swing by and show your support.

Lil' Jay says...

... everyone better HTFU because Monstertrack is less than a month away.




In it's 9th year, the NYC original is already prepared to greet racers from around the globe with a full schedule of side events, gold sprints, and moderate revelry.




Betting pools have been opened, and the smack talk has been heavy.With the arrival of a few fast 07 newcomers to the mix, the top three could be anyone's game this year.
Brooklyn rider Austin Horse will be there on his custom Gangsta, defending his title as the fastest bike courier in the world.
For all of you that aren't lucky enough to make money by riding your bike, imagine it's like this, but in our fair city a instead of a cubicle:

Three Gs.

As per the requests of all you lanky folk, we've moved forward on the prototype frames for our extra large Gangsta Track. It's desinged to be the longer, taller compliment to our smaller Gangstas, rounding out an impressive threesome.

(like Pavarotti minus the lechery and heart condition)

Check back for the final builds and updates on production.

Thursday Trifecta.

The extended runs of the SR6 came back from paint, and we're offering them as a frameset including drive, floating brake mount, and the Fox DHX 5.0 coil (other shocks availble by request), all with our lifetime warranty.

The three color options this round include Jet Black:Fire Engine Red:

and Battleship Gray:

Complete builds and custom colors are available. Call or Email the shop for pricing and color availability.

In other news, Factory Rider Tom LaMarche emailed us to let us know that the Bootleg Sessions is already accepting submissions for a second complilation. If his spot in the first DVD wasn't sign enough, Tom has been beating parts into submission trying up up the ante.

Proof in proverbial pudding.

Free Flow Fridays : Kowa Suspension

As a new feature here at BROOKLYN, we're devoting a few Fridays every month for in depth, long term reviews of the products that get sent our way.

First up is the Kowa Suspension 160s Air single crown fork (not to be confused with Showa).

We've always been impressed with the manufacturing capabilities of the Japanese, and first impressions of the Kowa didn't dissapoint.

The beefy box section crown is hollow to save weight, and holds in 35mm "sima" hard ano coated sanchions....






...that enter the lowers at a bulged section, providing space for the substantial seals, and probably (we're guessing) some huge bushing of some sort.






In conjunction with a standard bolt on 20mm thru-axle, these features certainly contribute to the incredible torsional stiffness of the fork which , to our surprise, was close to par with that of a 888 triple crown even at it's highest travel setting (more on this later).
Compared to the Fox TALAS 36 we've been riding all season, external adjustments on the Kowa seem sparse, and are limited to 2 stroke adjustments and 1 travel adjustment:



Positive progressive Air via a shrader valve at the bottom of the left leg.










External rebound via an aluminum knob on the bottom of the right leg.




On the top of the left leg is an aluminum knob for travel adjustment, which functions a lot like the older Manitou IT travel adjustment. Turn the knob 180 degrees to the open position, and the travel can be adjusted from Fully Extended:



To Fully Compressed:
...and anywhere between 20 and 160mm of travel. Then you just turn the knob to the closed position and ride.

Some minor complaints are the Boxxer disc mount, which is less of an industry standard in North America and had to be purchased separately. Lack of external compression damping of any kind is a little worrisome, but the lack of bells and whistles doesn't detract from everything else the Kowa has going for it so far, and should appeal to those riders with a K.I.S.S. mentality.
Another gripe is the user manual which is probably well written in the native Japanese, but if you speak English something was lost in translation.

According to the site, the fork is designed for "Downhill, Freeride, Urban, Park", which we'll take to mean that we have liberty to wail on them all season and report back with updates, including a obligatory tear-down and rebuild of all its juicy innards.

For pricing and availability, contact Kowa's US distributor Covic Racing.

Big Jim Davage.

New factory rider Jim Davage has some big moves to share from across the pond...
...the biggest being the addition of another lil' huck monkey, Ezra Louise Davage.

Big congratulations to Jim and Kelly!

We'll post pics and a ride report of Big Jim's custom dirt jumper as soon as it rolls in. Check back for updates.

Let's Go Giants...

Only a day after New Yorkers celebrated their team's NFL upset, our neighbors in Boston mourned a second loss with the passing of iconic cycling curmudgeon, Sheldon Brown.

More old school than Biopace.
1944-2008

From one of the many written eulogies around the world:

This is quite a loss to the world of cycling. Sheldon Brown helped cycling enthusiasts through his sort of ad-hoc online compendium of bicycle information, from the basic to the esoteric. Whether he informed or irritated, Sheldon's verbosity and hideous-but-functional site design have left a broadly-received imprint.
-Malcom