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| - Brent Racobs is a bike geek. He buys, restores, sells and services bikes out of a blue ramshackle house on Main Street. There is no sign. You will know the house when you see it- just look for about 250 bikes outside in various stages of undress and Brent probably farting around outside (or just inside the front door) in bare feet and covered in axle grease.
He carries all sorts of bikes, but his absolute favorite bikes to work on, and the specialty for he is known for around town, are English-made bikes that feature Sturmey-Archer 3-speed internal shifters. These bikes were built extremely well and last forever. He will tell you all about them whether you want to hear it or not. If you have one, he wants to buy it. If you want one, he has a dozen or two at any given time for between $125 and $350 or more. He tries to match the bikes with original pieces, repairs what is broken, gives them new tires, etc, repaints them (usually more than 1 color) and gets great results.
I purchased a bike from Brent that is older than I am and looks great. Its fast as hell, has a comfortable, smooth ride and looks great: I feel like a right proper English gentleman toodling along to work at the scrivener's shoppe.
He basically does all maintenance on all bikes that he sells. He will explain to you that he will warrant the powertrain of the bike forever, but if he keeps talking, he will tell you that you are always welcome to bring your bike in for a fixin, or a lube for free or real cheap if new parts are involved. He insists on this, actually. He cares so much for these English three-speeds that he wants to make sure the maintenance is done right. I really think he cares more about the long-term care of the bikes he sells than customer satisfaction, but your byproduct is great maintenance service (he will even pick you up in his truck if you are stranded somewhere) so who's complaining?
A word of warning: he doesn't like to think of what he sells as "cheap bikes", so if you don't want to hear about why the bikes that he spends hours and hours restoring are not cheap, just ask what he has in a particular price range. Also, be aware that the first floor of that blue house is absolutely atrocious. It is not a pretty sparkly showroom, but it is filled to the windows with all manner of partially assembled cruisers, road bikes, and curiosities from the past 70 years or so.
I highly suggest calling ahead to make sure he is available before stopping by, as this is a one-man operation. Do not plan on getting in and out of there really fast, as he will want to get to know you to help you pick the right bike, and once you decide to buy, the purchasing process takes more than a while. He is anal about keeping track of who buys his bikes, so if you buy a bike from him, he's gonna take your picture (and email it to you), record the serial number, etc.
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