Jimmy Röstlund of Melbourne’s Egress Bikes was drafting BMX components before picking up the torch, seeking to bridge the gap between the design stage and the finished product. It’s been a successful transition, if his latest ‘crosser is any indication.

Coincidentally, we’ve seen Jimmy’s BMX work on Cycle EXIF before, back in 2011 — the Simple EZ, built up with a number of the parts he designed, and his beloved Terrible One Barcode, the lab rat for his first experiments with frame surface treatments.

Jimmy is a few BMX and MTB frames down the builder’s path. His ‘cross Bike was only supposed to be a replacement for his big-brand off-the-peg bike, but a recent invitation to exhibit at The Makers show in Sydney motivated him to up the ante.

The frame was designed around a fairly standard geometry, except when it came to the chainstay length. “It seems 430mm is quite common,” Jimmy tells us, “so I made it 429 because my wife’s birthday is April 29”.

Jimmy fillet frazed the frame from Dedacciai’s Zero Uno tubes, flat mount dropouts, a 44mm headtube and bottle bosses from Paragon Machineworks, and a stainless steel seat binder boss from Darrell Llewellyn McCulloch.

At this stage, Jimmy is only building frames as a hobby, and working a full time job during the day. With the show’s deadline looming, juggling the build was a stressful but smooth operation, apart from having to add a few extra degrees bend to the seatstays.

Jimmy explains: “This was only because the tubes had an updated bend profile compared to the specs I had on hand when designing the frame. Luckily Mark from Prova Cycles was able to find the time to help me, despite him being only days away from heading over to Bespoked in the UK.”

The use of gun blue as a finish will always remind us of Ezra Caldwell’s TF5, but Jimmy evolved the steampunk result by adding a striking logotype graphic. We’re dazzled by the bright and blue contrast, and look forward to seeing what’s next from Egress Bikes.

Big thanks to Rapha Cycle Club Sydney where the Egress and some other bikes from The Makers event is on display.

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