my tomos chopped moped (cho-ped)

figured this thread belongs in the tavern, because you gotta be drunk to get this involved with a moped...

i picked up this running 1977 Tomos 2 speed automatic moped a month or so ago for 200 bucks and decided to make it better.

i raked the front end out by making my own triple trees for the forks. normally you'd cut and rake the neck, but the frame/tank wraps around the neck and is all welded up so i couldn't do it without basically building a whole new front part of the tank, buying a new headtube, and a whole lotta time consuming fabrication.

i wanted to keep this cheap and easy.

added a 24" worksman wheel and it's done. more or less. i'm gonna swap out the dynohub that's on it now for a non-brake hub. old school choppers don't have front brakes. or fenders.

the rear end was stretched 6'' and i made some strut rods to replace the shocks to make it rigid. i'll be throwing a Pirelli ML75 tire on the rear.

boxed in the rear triangle with some sheet metal, and made it so the whole thing comes out as a unit.

chopped the top of the seat section a few inches and made a mount so the seat flips forward. i'll weld a lid on the bottom so the rear triangle becomes a storage box.

the Tomos engine starts by kicking the pedals backwards like a kickstarter, so i'm gonna ditch the cranks and make a custom kickstarter, and weld on some footpegs.

for the rear drum brake, i'm gonna make a linkage set-up and have a foot brake, so the only cable will be the throttle.

i'm gonna paint it a spraycan metalflake fade, from orange to blue to green for that 70's LSD look.

my only cost so far has been for the moped itself, not counting parts i have on hand, and i figure by the time it's done i'll spend another 100 bucks. like i said, cheap and easy.

picture one is the stock moped, pic 2 is moped superchopper mock-up so far...

thanks guys.

speed-wise, i don't think i'm gonna hop it up. even though i welded the crap out of everything so it won't fall apart, i think it might be pretty squirrelly at high speeds. it's a 50cc and i think it tops out at 40.

but if it ends up riding smooth, i might splurge for the 70cc kit...

no flames or hippies, tom. i'm going for the "corvette summer" look.

steve, when i first got it i thought about calling cristophe at tomohawk to power it up for a race bike, but i've never tweaked out a moped yet, and all the "customized" ones i've seen is just someone welding a toptube on with a big tank and some clip-ons.

i'm making something that'll blow minds.

found a wiring diagram today. didn't realize the magneto powers all the lights so i can make this street legal without having to hide a battery somewhere.

worked on it all day, stripping paint, laced up a new front wheel after polishing the big drum hub it came with (after removing the shoes and brackets, 'cause no front brake.)

spent 60 bucks on paint and $4 on new bolts for everything. there's only about 10 bolts holding this thing together. it really couldn't be any easier...

no new pics 'cause it's all in pieces.

i'm hoping to finish it this week so i can ride it to the donut shop and show it off saturday morning.

all my other bikes are on hold because i just need a break from motorized bicycles...

silverbear, myron's mopeds has the diagram. i'll pm you when i'm done drinking.

when i first got it i thought about restoring it. i was missing so many parts, not to mention the crappy paint it would cost me a lot more to make it stock than i could ever sell it for. and it would just be a stupid looking stock moped that normal people would laugh at. 'cause seriously, mopeds look pretty goofy.

but when i'm done with this it'll be freakin' awesome!

ok, so i just spent 12+ hours working on this bastard. and 12 hours yesterday.

had to completely redo the rear fender/box set-up, because i pulled a bonehead OCC choppers move and welded everything up without mounting the fat pirelli rear tire.

spent way to long trying to get the original moped fender to clear the tire. rolled the edges, bent it, tweaked it, cussed at it, but nothing worked. so i chopped it off and stuck an old 20" bicycle peaked fender from a 1940's JC Higgins on it and tack welded it up.

perfect.

used up the last of the way overpriced dupli-color burnt copper metalflake paint and it was done.

side note on that paint. dupli-color metal specks sucks. i mean, the blue's ok, the burnt copper is a cool color, but it costs 12 bucks a can, clogs up easily, splatters, and really isn't worth it.

and the green is green. no metal specks. looks like crap. waste of 12 bucks.

ended up putting the cranks on 'cause i really wanted to ride it to the donut shop tomorrow morning.

then i spent a few hours trying to kick the #%!& over.

the petcock leaks bigtime, and it's some weird kind. instead of the standard NPT pipe thread, it has a compression-type fitting with a left-hand thread petcock. the barb is loose, and it leaks like broken moped from the 70's.

besides that, i still wanted it to fire up, but it's not getting gas into the engine. rebuilt the carb again but still no dice. the carb is even simpler than an NT, so i've got no idea what's up with it. there's like 3 parts to the whole thing.

it fired up by spraying carb cleaner right into the throat, and i'm assuming it went straight into the intake, but died right away.

oh well, guess i ain't makin' it to the donut shop tomorrow.

and i gotta make a chain tensioner. chain's pretty long.

here's some pics. at least it looks awesome...