Lost Your Head (…tube badge)?

If you’ve ever seen a beautiful head tube badge that’s just the icing on the top of a perfect bicycle restoration you’ll know how sad it is to see a classic frame that’s without such crowning glory. Head tube badges are just one of those things that are so easily misplaced as time goes by. So if you have a frame that’s missing a special badge, or you have a custom build and you’re dreaming of how rad it would look with a your own monogramed custom head tube badge – the news is good!

 

Julian at Griffin Engraving and I just finished a little experiment to see whether, if we combined our skills, we could produce custom engraved and hand finished boutique head tube badges. We trialled the LixBMX logo as a custom design and the old Crossrider badge as a test to see if we could recreate something close to the original pressed badge with modern methods. The results and feedback have been fantastic!

 

Here’s a little sneak peak into the process…

 

How the badges looked freshly machined in raw aluminium…

 

Raw freshly machined head tube badges

 

 

Hand cut with a piercing saw (aka ‘jeweller’s saw’)…

 

Cutting out custom bike head tube badges

 

 

Sanded lightly, buffed and coloured, ready to be cut out by hand…

 

Custom engraved bike head tube badges ready to be cut out

 

 

Cut out and ready for shaping and finishing by hand…

 

Custom bike head tube badges cut out

 

 

Finished and fitted….