My homemade WOODALPS wooden bike

Arnaud_Wood

Hi there, here is my last bike, machined, tested, varnished, and photographed in my garage...


I've been building and improving my own MTB and road bikes for years, the result start to be pretty cool.
This one is an evolution of my previous model that I have been using since 2017, but I was not 100% happy with the design, so I did not showed picture of it.

The frame is hollow, made of 10 wood pieces (ash), with CFRP inserts at the interface with the headset, seat tube, bottom bracket, ahd rear axle.
It is equipped with Shimano Ultegra Di2 group, Ultegra carbon wheels, an integrated cockpit.



You can find some additionnal pictures of my homemade bikes on my instagram:
woodalps_wooden_bikes

super_davo

Why did you have to post this on April fool's?

Looks gorgeous. Seen wooden bikes before but never an aero wooden bike. How much does it weigh?

I am just waiting for the first "another soulless Ultegra bike" comment...

Arnaud_Wood

It is not a joke, it is a pure coincidence, it is real wood, not painted CFRP as some people think..
The weight of the frame is 1.950 kg. A bit more than CFRP frame I admit, but still reasonable.


For the Ultegra, what i like in those wheels is that there is no big sticker with written ROVAL or ZIPP, and it is also a good value for money, I do not have an infinite budget...
And the new Di2 is really cool.

daniel_b

That looks stunning - chapeau.

That's quite an achievement to manage to get all of the cables at the front fully integrated - that must have taken some work?

How does it ride, comfort wise, for acceleration and flexing or super stiff?
I like the marrying of the frame with normal finishing kit.

Arnaud_Wood

Yes, in fact it is two shells bonded together, so the cables going through the upper bearing, then goes inside the down tube via a hole inside the CFRP insert in the head tube, then are routed around the bottom bracket, then go through a small hole and arrive along the chainstay, where they are routed externally, but on the inner side of the chainstay, so quite descrete.

It represents a lot of design hours yes... but now the design is done, and the manufacturing operations represent about 40-60 hours. I'm currently making one for my wife, but in size S.

Every person that tries the bike is surprised by the stiffness and reactivity of the bike. The bike is also a bit more confortable than a CFRP bike, as the wood has some vibration damping properties.