..and the solution.. hopefully.
View attachment 138135
With bar tape covering
View attachment 138136
Interesting solution to a horrid problem. Saddle appears to be somewhat higher than the bars. I'd want it at least as high as the saddle for day-in-day-out rough stuff. Can we airlift our hero a highrise stem, or one of those wackey steerer extenders. At least he doesn't have one of those godawful Jamis proprietory kludge steerer stem combos that my 'Rora came with.
What the hell took you so long?Bars and saddle are pretty much the same height, but the weird Jamis stem lasted all of ten minutes once it was built up.
What is likely to be available in the next bit of civilisation? It looks as though he is currently running 700c? If so, as he is using disk brakes, I would consider a rebuild with 26" MTB size rim and take the opportunity to fit flatter tyres.
Welding aluminium is way more specialist than welding steel.
Are there bicycles there? If so, what size rims and tyres do they use?