I love selling the bikes we make, obviously but there are so many cool options for steel right now with some young guns just killing it!
I have a semi-chubby for a bike from this dude who builds bikes in Maine under the Dornbox(
http://www.dornboxbikes.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;) name
He builds good shit and sells bikes with wicked cool paint
much cheaper than he should.
Give that dude a tip if you buy one of his bikes- at that pricing he's giving you a bike for free!
Also- Mike Zacanato is doing tig work now, and damn well to boot. Zank knows his shit! He likes lower, slacker and longer compared to me but a double oversized or Max-mix frame from him should be on anybodies list, especially if you want something capital-S stable. He makes some sweet lugged steel forks- I'm partial to the straight bladed stuff personally.
There are so many options for tig steel bikes here in New England these days. It's hard to build a bad one, go with your heart and buy as local as possible.
We do have 2 pretty sweet models(although I never make 2 bikes exactly the same) that are conceived to do what you want.
I try to use downtube shifter bosses on all of our bikes. Having the ability to throw a pair of cheap shifters on a bike let's you have a lot more bikes!
My personal version of a pretty lightweight but stiff and durable steel bike looks like this-
Schweet looking steel fork made with MTB blades for plenty of strength, Columbus MAX tubes mixed in with Spirit, parts from the parts bin(a nice parts bin) really strong brakes with lots of clearance(just barely wedge in some fenders or 34c cx tires) and a really fast set of durable wheels.
Last time I weighed it was floating around 18 pounds. DT shifters save SO MUCH weight.
It's a pretty strong and confidence inspiring bike...