2009 was a HUGE year for Fixed Gear Culture. I watched a screening of a MASHSF short film and like many others, hopped on the fixie bandwagon (I bought a custom SE Lager fixie off Ash Moon who was the head bike mechanic at MC Cyclery at the time.
I enjoyed the simplicity of riding fixed but I never loved the SE. It was too big for me and I hated the red and black theme. I could do mean track stands on it but didn’t get too good at doing skids (I had to run a front brake).
Anyways, now that I’m obsessed with bikes again it’s not taken me too long to check in on Fixie Culture and sadly it looks very much like Fixie Culture is dead. So many brands that sold fixie bikes and gear have long gone, existing fixie stores have little to no stock left and there’s not a single fixie specific bike shop in Sydney (they used to be everywhere!).
Whilst the fad may be over, there’s still fixed gear riders and culture out there. There are tonnes of cheap fixies on AliExpress and Fuji is still making and selling the Fuji Feather. I’ve spent weeks looking at cheap fixies on Facebook Marketplace, eBay, online and AliExpress. I’ve added stuff to the cart countless times only to shut the window once I realise I have more than enough bikes as it is.
I can’t stop looking though. From a design perspective there’s just so much to love about how fixies look. Less is more and they’re so minimalist. I’ve been wanting to ride down to the local supermarket instead of walking. They have a bicycle lockup outside but I just can’t bring myself to lock up any of my bikes so I’ve been looking for a cheap fixie to be my beater/pub bike, but even then I can’t help but be super fussy about how it’s going to look.
Alloy frame fixies on AliExpress will cost around $700 landed, the frames are OK but every single component is trash and covered with terrible Chinglish and branding. I know I’d end up replacing parts over time, then in the end I’ll have a shitty frame with bling bits (I always do this!). I could get a steel fixie from Decathlon for $400, it would never break and I wouldn’t give a shit if it was stolen, but again, once I start tinkering with it I’d be losing out.
Last night I had a TSUNAMI fixie in the cart. I was ready to pull the trigger, but after 5 minutes of staring at the checkout screen I shut the window, loaded up dosnoventabikes.com and pulled the trigger on this infra red DOSNOVENTA Los Angeles frameset.
Buy once cry once? It’s so porno. Fuzzy logic for sure as there’s no way in hell I’d leave this thing locked up outside the shops but I’m already hyperventilating over what parts to get for it. The wheels, crankset, bars… everything!
SPECS:
COLOR: INFRARED MATT
FRAME: COLUMBUS AIRPLANE TUBING . 7005-T6 TRIPLE BUTTED ALLOY
FORK: FULL CARBON FORK . TAPERED 1-1/8” . RAKE 45MM . 700X28C MAX
HEADSET: COLUMBUS COMPASS . 1-1/8″ CARBON
BB: BSA 68MM
SEAT TUBE: 27.2 Ø
GROUND CLEARANCE: 290MM
TIRE CLEARANCE: 700X28C MAX
FORK WEIGHT: 410 GR
