Pardon the Interruption, but we moved and stuff

I'm not even sure the last six weeks really happened. Somehow between May 15 and now we manged to get our selves, our household, and the entire shop moved to Richmond VA, 180 miles away from our old home base in Salem. The moving part was pretty painless, with only one major box truck fire and one shredded trailer tire. Pretty typical and uneventful.

After a week spent getting everything here, attention turned to renovating our commercial building which was last used in 2007. Turns out after meeting and talking to a lot of our new neighbors, this building has had a pretty interesting list of tenants including a non inspected (read: illegal) catering outfit, a counterfeit (read: illegal) DVD burning operation, and an "underground" (read, yes, illegal) strip club complete with a galvanized water pipe for a pole. So, yeah, we ought to fit right in.

Now it's ours. Walls were knocked down. Plumbing was repaired. 14 gallons of paint were installed, just on the inside. Wires were added, removed, relocated...lots and lots of wires because Atom Bomb has lots and lots of power requirements. The compressed air system was plumbed. The HVAC (yes, in the WHOLE building) was tuned up and brought online. A hand painted sign went up out front.

Truth be told, the last six weeks has sucked so badly (and I've slept so little) that I don't remember the specifics of a lot of it, just a fog of a "This Old Building" meets "Groundhog Day", specifically where Bill Murray slugs that guy in the street. The one thing I DO remember is all the folks that have helped over the last six weeks with moving, working on the building, moral support, wisecracks, etc. Old friends, clients, and folks we'd never met until we moved here...the list is so long that I don't want to even try to thank everyone by name but you all know who you are, please know that Erin and I appreciate the hell out of it.

So tomorrow I get to work on bikes again. I've got a lot to do for a lot of patient folks, thanks to all of our clients for putting up with us and our move. It'll be a minute before I start on any "new" projects, I've got some loose ends to finish up from before the move, but there's plenty of new Atom Bomb builds in the queue for later this summer and well into next year (maybe even some stuff with rear suspension!)

So enough exhausted rambling, here's some pictures of our new digs. We've still got a few tiny things to do like outlet covers and whatnot, but I HAVE to go back to work before I go more insane. And our awning for the front isn't here yet, but there's one coming. Supposedly. Don't get me started on the damn awning. The pictures get larger if you click them, it's magic.


The front of the place before paint. It looks narrow because it is, only 22 feet wide. 150 feel long though, so it works out.

Front after paint:

Hand painted sign, y'all:

Pics of our lounge and showroom area. Soon to be chock full of goodies and my collection of vintage stuffs:

The shop, from many angles:

That's all folks. You don't get to see the offices, or the storage area. We're mysterious like that. Huge thanks again to everyone that lent a hand!!