The first three bikes listed on Weis Manufacturing’s line-up are fixed-gear track bikes. That’s a fitting introduction to their focus on pure speed.
Weis set up shop in the heart of Brooklyn in 2008. The company name comes from a wagon manufacturing business that co-owner Cole Bennett’s great great grandfather established. Bennett is therefore following a family tradition of wheeled transportation.
New York City was once home to several velodromes, in Harlem and at Coney Island, and from 1899-1961 Madison Square Garden hosted 73 editions of the New York Six Day races, whose competitors were household names.
Nowadays, only much-maligned Kissena Velodrome on the outskirts of Queens remains in the city. So track racers, even in a mega-city like New York, are a small population, but Weis counts competitors in alleycat races, fixed-gear criteriums like Brooklyn’s own Red Hook Criterium, and a thriving messenger community among their clientele. Quickly delivering packages and important documents matters in a city that never sleeps.
Weis’ focus on speed stems from a meeting between Bennett and his business partner Rob Bezrutczyk while both were Industrial Design students. Bennett’s experience as a bike messenger got in his blood, to the point where today he still cites the streets of Manhattan as his favorite place to ride a bike.
Form follows function at Weis. No intricately carved lugs or pinstriping adorn their frames, but a devotion to getting power to the pavement guides their design and manufacturing efforts. Frames are TIG-welded from aluminum or steel, and feature Weis’ signature asymmetric seat stays. All tubes are ovalized, oversized and beefed up in those areas critical to transferring pedal power into forward motion.
At this year’s NAHBS in Sacramento, Weis displayed a prototype Hammer track bike built from Super Magnesium tubing, a high-strength alloy that is lighter than aluminum, titanium and steel, and less expensive than carbon fiber. Plans to offer these frames to the public are still being developed.
It’s not all about fixed gears at Weis. The Hammer Road model is constructed from super-strong 7005 aluminum with aero tubes and a tapered head tube all designed to propel you forward – fast. Should you need to stop, that’s a quick proposition as well, with integrated flat mounts for disc brakes and thru-axles front and rear.
Weis is so committed to keeping you moving forward on two wheels that they strive to offer all of this hand built excellence at affordable prices. And while they offer full build kits, they don’t push customers to buy a complete bike, so you can build your dream machine part-by-part or use your existing gruppo.
With Weis Manufacturing, there are no barriers to speed.
