Category: Uncategorized

Inside the Mosaic Finish Department

Posted on by Mosaic Admin

Look good, feel good, ride good. Apologies to the great Deon Sanders, but his famous quote really does apply to bikes, especially handmade bikes.

An exceptional amount of craft goes into the process of building every Mosaic frame. It’s only right that we devote the same effort to the finish process. No matter if your Mosaic has a classic raw finish or a jaw-dropping paint scheme, it looks as good as it rides.

Here’s a walk through the Mosaic finish department to explain how we go from a raw titanium frame to a bike that turns heads on the daily.

Off the top, we have to be clear that we do all of our paint and finish work in house, right here in Boulder, Colorado. This gives our team complete control of the process. It also lets you personalize your frame as much as you like. We have five proven finish options that always look good. And any of those layouts can be painted with hundreds of different color combinations.

Is there a car paint color that catches your eye? We can match it. Want a painted stem or seatpost to set off the build? We do that too. Pearl glitter, color shift, and other options are also on the table.

Prep Work

After you’ve settled on your paint scheme, the raw frame is prepped with one of two media blast machines in our shop. The titanium frames will get either an etched, brushed, or satin finish, depending on the plan. Our raw frames rely on a combination of those finishes, such as an etched logo on a satin frame. If the frame is going to be painted, it needs a fully etched finish to ensure the paint adheres to the frame. Along the way, we also sand any carbon fiber components for paint.

Most of our painted frames have sections of raw frame at the bottom bracket and along the chain stays and seat stays. Naturally, we mask off that portion of the frame before going to paint. That titanium will eventually get a satin finish.

Painting

Time for the fun part. Just like you’d do to paint a wall in your house, we begin with a layer of primer. Then, there’s a multi-step process to paint the frame. Often, the first layer of paint is the color used for the Mosaic logo. Then, the logo is masked off, and the background color is applied. It’s far easier to mask the logo’s letters than it is to do an inverse mask.

Once the paint is applied, the frame goes through color sanding to prep it for clear coat. We apply two layers of clear coat and sand after the first to ensure the finish is perfectly glossy and smooth. The frame is baked in a specialized oven to cure the clear coat.

Finally, the frame is given a three-step buffing process to make it shine, and we perform a final quality control check.

Thanks to an efficient process of batching frames through the prep, prime, and paint steps of the process, we can usually finish a frame in 1 week. With two painters in the booth, things can be pretty efficient!

Making Your Mosaic Your Mosaic

As we mentioned at the beginning, whether you opt for a Made to Order frame or a Batch Built frame, you can go as far as you want in personalizing the paint and finish. And of course, this applies to any kind of Mosaic frame — road, gravel, mountain, and more.

Need a little more inspiration? Stay tuned for a re-launch of our standard color line, as well as the extended line of premium colors. Check out the fresh hues below and start your dream build this spring.

A visit to Bicycle Speed Shop in Houston, Texas

Posted on by Mosaic Admin

The black and white art deco façade doesn’t match any other store front on E. 11th Street. The 12 foot tall graffiti style tiger face doesn’t help either. The sign on the front door says to use the side door. And upon entering Bicycle Speed Shop, you know your stepping into a unique bike shop.

When you walk into the store, straight ahead of you, the owner Brian Jones is likely to be in the bike fitting space. To the left, towards the front of the building is the service counter where you’ll find Ryan Strayer building a custom wheelset or dialing in a customer’s bike for their next race or weekend ride. And to your right is a long, live edge wood community table with a coffee bar and small selection of the latest riding apparel where Casey and Carson will get you ready to ride.

Brian had invited Aaron and myself down to Houston for Bicycle Speed Shop’s 5th anniversary party. They wanted to celebrate five years of “making fast bikes faster” as they say and show off some of the Mosaic builds they have done along the way. They also just launched as a Rapha retail partner so it was an opportunity to show off some new kits as well.

As a performance-oriented shop, Brian has placed emphasis on fit and service for the shop. So where does a Mosaic, a built to order titanium or steel bicycle, fit in the lineup of tri bikes and aero road bikes queued up in the service department? The best way to be fast and comfortable on a bike is to ride a custom built one Brian says. And at Bicycle Speed Shop, the team lives what they sell.

In the lead up to the event, we talked about doing some wild paint job for an upcoming customer’s bike or updating the finish on of the shop guys’ bikes. But Brian wanted to do something different; he wanted to build his own RS-1d. We set about fabrication and called upon the paint team for some design work. We also called in an early order for a yet to be released set of Chris King Bourbon hubs, headset and bottom bracket to finish off the build. We wanted the bike to be uniquely Bicycle Speed Shop.

We rolled out on that Saturday morning with a group of about 50 riders, customers from across the Houston area that call Bicycle Speed Shop their local shop. Half the group split off for some off-road adventure and the rest of us rolled through the warm, fall morning for a proper 65 mile ride. It was nice departure from riding in Colorado where we’d already had one good snow fall and a series of snow storms were in the forecast the coming week.

Both groups managed to meet back up on the road and we rolled back into the parking lot all together. Ryan and Casey set about pulling together the Mosaics together and amassed almost 20 bikes to show off, each one unique to the owner. Tucked away inside was Brian’s new RS-1d, the first steel bike for Bicycle Speed Shop to build, dressed in paint so fresh it might have still been wet. Hints of the art deco tied in with the tiger face on the fork legs and a series of lightning bolts- the distinct mark of a Bicycle Speed Shop Mosaic build.

That afternoon Brian and I read through the list of Mosaic builds they have done in their first five years and it’s a healthy list of some really awesome bikes. The team at Bicycle Speed Shop has done an incredible job building deep connections with their customers to draw them into the shop and elevate their riding experiences from day one.

This is just a sampling of the bikes the team at Bicycle Speed Shop has put out on the roads of Houston. We are incredibly lucky to work with them to get customers on the right bike for them.