Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Drawings: HK Man Cave Mk.III











The process of going from my mind's eye to the above (get it drawn), then to the below (get it built) is always a fun one. In this case the 'brief' was to provide a two in one partition wall that would split our rather odd spare bedroom into half bike room and half utility / helper's room. Without fixing into the floor, walls or ceiling...

This brief dictated some a slightly slimmed down bike storage footprint (if I was to maintain the workbench from man cave Mk.II), which all led towards suspending my bikes vertically from the partition wall to both save space and use the dead weight of the bikes to stabilise the wall against an effective ground up trussed cantilever. A bit of a gallows aesthetic allows me to lift two bikes up suspended from hooks and stagger in elevation. The other three are then secured with back to back angles fixed one tire width apart with their back wheels on the ground. This allows me to fit five bikes in a space three road handlebars wide and one bike deep, with an extra row of wheels up top / some spare frames above the door. Trust me when I say it is better to work these things out on paper first before committing the saw to wood.

The extra good news is that I did all this for less than 1000HKD (about £75), and it only took two weekends to build, with time for riding either side. I make that less than one of those silly Topeak poles that only store two bikes on top of each other, and I got a free partition wall in the process! Vive la DIY / forza mia man cave.























Torre David vs Walled City







































I'm a big fan of 'City of Darkness', and once I'm done with Gina Ford I'll be more than happy to switch onto 'Torre David'- the story of the crazy Caracas Tower featured in Homeland now in the process of eviction. This article has an interesting comparison of sorts between the two:

http://archidose.blogspot.hk/2014/08/book-review-torre-david.html

Monday, August 4, 2014

Bamboo Opera

















Some blue skies and an out of season Chinese Opera bamboo pavilion at Sha Lo Wan village, Lantau.