Off Road Toad

[Anonymous]

The old school Off Road Toads were made by DeKerf, Brodie and RM.
Rod Kirkham is not the main man behind the new ORT. He told me who he is, but I forgot his name. The last I heard was the new frames were tested and raced. 26'ers and 29'ers.
Not Tony, but Toby Cycles. He made the UFO's.
Kirk and Toby are buddies dating back to Bicycle Sports Pacific.

 

[subzilla]

Loved these BITD, never saw one in the flesh, I liked the minimal styling and low budget approach, maybe the new guys are replicating this. Give them a chance, anyone who has ever tried to revive a brand will no how difficult it can be and the idea is often driven by the heart and not the head.

Anyone who tries to build a new business, let alone revive an old one in this day and age has my full respect, there business model may be flawed but at least they are giving it a go.

 

[Rampage]

 

[FMJ]

Of all the posts in the thread they have to crop mine for their tweetie image. They need to learn how to read. I'm not exactly Euro. In fact, I'm a little closer to them than I am to anywhere Euro.

 

[dekerf]

truth about toad

So just to set the record straight, I (Dekerf) will not be building the Off-Road Toads, nor painting them. I did build 2 prototypes recently, one was a large 29R and the other a very small 26" wheel. I put some real care into those 2 frames so they're definitely built to a Dekerf standard.

I also wanted to address the comments about price. (A toad can be bought for $1200 but Dekerf costs $1750). Well to put it simply, price is a big part of why I will not be building them. I was told my quote to Michael (formerly of Spot, now of Toad) was simply too high to enable the $1200 price they are being offered for. It might have made some sense to get the quote from me before putting the price on the website, but alas, that was beyond my control.

Why does the Dekerf cost so much more, well for starters they actually exist! (If my name is going to be used on this blog I might as well get my own plug in!) You can phone up right now, place an order, and you'll know it will be well built, with the best of materials, beautiful paint, and you'll get it on time (about 5 weeks at present). 9 out of 10, you'll even speak with me on the phone; no question about whose going to build it. You won't have to wait until we get enough orders to build your frame. It will be built specifically for you only. This is a real shop, with real equipment, and real people that make a living (and not a great living!) building bike frames; and that costs some money to do; hence the price. I've been doing this for 22 years and anyone who knows me, knows that my work is the real deal.

It's not my intention to say anything bad about Toad, because I really don't know what they're plans are or who will actually build them. I am sad though that they won't be done here. I was there 25 years ago when Rod Kirkham walked into the shop and had those first Toads built. In the years thereafter I built a lot of them and they were great frames. Rod was also and continues to be a great guy. I hope he benefits from Michaels endeavors.

Cheers.
Chris Dekerf.

 

[Rampage]

Welcome
It's really good to hear your story on this.
I think most people on this site know how good your work is, a lot of people aspire to own a DeKerf frame on here.

There's a DeKerf thread with a lot of pictures of members bikes if your interested in how your early creations are being used these days:
http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=81863

Chris

 

[dekerf]

Thanks Chris (Rampage) for the kind words.

As you know I'm new to this forum, but I do follow the posts from time to time. I just had to speak up on this one.

I plan to weigh in a little more in the future; especially with the Dekerf specific posts.

Cheers.
Chris

 

[gump]

Welcome Chris, thanks for your comments.

As stated, theres a lot of love for your frames in the many guises you have built for. You gave new Toad a lot of cred, sadly I think this has just about lost it all for them.

Enjoy the site.

 

[andrewl]

Re: truth about toad

I was there 25 years ago when Rod Kirkham walked into the shop and had those first Toads built. In the years thereafter I built a lot of them and they were great frames.

On the subject of the older Toads do you know or remember when they changed from a seatstay U brake to cantis?

 

[dekerf]

Hello Andrew.
I'm sorry but this is a question I can't answer very accurately but I'll try. I'm pretty sure all, or mostly all of the Rocky Mountain built (Derek Bailey to be specific) Toads were U-brake. These would have spanned 1986-1988. I was an apprentice working under Derek at that time and worked with Rod Kirkham on the details of his orders with us. As an aside I fondly remember celebrating Derek Bailey's 50th birthday during that time!
Derek begrudgingly did the brunt of the fillet brazed Toads during those years. He was still adjusting to building mountain bikes and much preferred to build more traditional lugged road bikes. He liked Rod though, as did most everyone, and therefore did it anyways! Cantis may have been an option but not request very often in those day.
I started on my own in the fall of 1989 and built a good portion of the Toads thereafter. Toby from Toby's Cycleworks did some too. Cantis was definitely an option then. Hope I got those dates right!
Sorry for the rambling; fond memories!
Cheers.
Chris