DIY Portable Bike Repair Stand

I've been using my ceiling mounted bike lift to hold my bike when doing minor repairs or adjustments. I just lower the bike close to ground, it kinda works, but it's not portable and it's a little wobbly and not stable when you are cranking the wheels. After reading several post from a bike forum on how to built your own bike stand, I decided to make my own. I wanted it to be portable and able to adjust the angle of the clamp to accommodate different bike geometry and able to tilt the bike at a certain angle.

To make it portable, I decided to use a PA tripod speaker stand as a base. I found a good deal from Craiglist. New ones from Amazon will cost you around $20 to over hundred dollars for the fancy ones. My goal is to keep it all under $50....and Craiglist is a life saver. The tripod is the key part for this built; if your getting one make sure that the tripod top tube can accommodate a 1" diameter pipe. Also, the pipe wall thickness is crucial for the design to work, the 3/4" diameter pipe should be able to fit inside the 1" diameter pipe (if you look at the pictures below you'll see what I mean). I got black pipes from Home Depot and it is a perfect fit.