Cicli Tomi Part 3

Here are more photos of Serafino Tomi demonstrating some of his frame-building techiques. He shows his very basic jig for raking fork blades while explaining how difficult and time-consuming it was to get two to match exactly. Under the bench is a set of jigs to prevent the tubes from bowing outwards as they're bent. A complete fork is shown so you can see the small pins used to hold the tubes into the fork crown before brazing. Tomi's a big believer in the pin method (just like our good friend Antonio Mondonico) where tiny holes are drilled and pins inserted to hold all the parts in perfect alignment, eliminating any tack-brazing and subjecting the material to only one round of heat, brazing the joint completely in one operation. Filing the pins away (a box of them is shown as well) was a time-consuming operation especially as Tomi used just a hand-held file. The other photo shows some tiny frame fittings (brake bridges and reinforcements for bottle bosses, etc.) that Tomi purchased, usually from his mentor Cino Cinelli. Next time we'll see the beginnings of an actual frame.