Silverbear's American Flyer #2

fasteddy said:

Silver Bear, the bike came this afternoon. Was everything the seller said it was.
Great person to do business with. He has over 200 bikes he has to sell because the government is taking his storage over to build a road.

He packed it like they were the crown jewels. Took lots of pictures and now the bike is together I will take more and figure where to post them.

I'm going to list every one who I have dealt with and tell how good they have been. No bad apples yet.

Liked your post. Could put my self in some of it. They can never knock a good man off his horse. You proved that.

Heard that that the Air Stream wasn't as good as yours but always put it down to brand preference. Your holding the proof.

Steve.

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Oh, that's great! I wish I could have looked over your shoulder Christmas morning to see it come out of the box and wrappings. Santa's elves were busy. Yes, do take photos. If I'm telling you something you already know, ignore this. I use a free photo utility from Google called picasa... free download, as I said. This is the best photo program I have used and I've been doing this for awhile now. The propitiatory programs that come with a camera are usually bloated and cumbersome. Picasa is intuitive, lean and user friendly. Through it I have found that posting re sized pictures here is simple. When the time comes and if you want help, I can walk you through the few steps in Picas from downloading into your computer to our seeing your bike pictures here on the forum. If you already know how to do this stuff, good, ignore the above.
So it is all there as stated. What will you do first? Put it together or what? Will it need new paint? I've been thinking about your comments regarding the pros and cons of installing an engine. I am trying to be careful on my old bikes, although not jewels like yours, to be respectful and not make changes which can not be reversed. That is one reason that welding is out for me (aside from not being able to weld anyway), and wanting to be careful about even scuffing the paint if possible where things attach to the frame. I'm thinking to use leather, contact cemented to the frame where the engine mounts... just a thin layer of elk hide for protection which I don't think will make the connection less secure. We'll see. Anyway, back to the motor. In their own way the restrorers can be as rigid as the spandex peddlers, as if this were a religion of some kind with rules to be followed exactly. I don't see it that way. I'll bet you can mount a motor, gas tank, etc. without any permanent changes to your bike. One thing I remind myself about is that Whizzers came not just on Schwinns, although that was most common. Other cruisers were used, too. And I wouldn't be surprised to learn that a Monarch Silver King was taken to the next level by somebody back when it was new with the addition of the Whizzer motor. Anyway, I think you should do whatever you want. This is your Christmas present after all and you know best whatever you decide. I also don't have the kind of money it takes to restore multiple bikes to just the way they were new, so I approximate without destroying. Can't wait to see photos.
My own projects are moving along in spite of come and go rain the past several days. Some things I can do inside in between rain drops. I finished the seat for the 40 Schwinn DX. The original "padding" was one thickness of burlap. I added two layers of carpet padding foam and then covered it in black elk hide. The way this seat is made no stitching was required, which actually made it more difficult. It isn't perfect, but looks real good and is more comfortable than when it was new. I like it and look forward to the first ride on it. Yesterday I finished stripping it, priming in gray and then gave it a finish coat in black engine enamel. For a rattle can paint job I think it looks great. I won an eBay auction a few days ago for the original feather chain guard and last evening ordered an American Flyer head badge. I've also been researching gas tank options and am about to bid on a couple of old brass fire extinguishers which I think I can make over into behind the seat tanks. I'm not much of a fan of the stock peanut tanks. To each his own. I've been working on an aluminum cylindrical tank which was dented. I've been doing the body work on this thing and have invested much more time than it is worth, even if it was a freebie. It still doesn't look good. It is hard getting it really smooth on a curved surface. So, I'm thinking to upholster it in good old black elk hide(what I happen to have at the moment). I'll pick up some glovers' needles in town today and give it a try. I've also been thinking about custom grips for the throttle and handlebar, using middleweight Schwinn grips covered in leather. They are pretty comfortable to me and with leather would be more so. So, I think I'll do some experimenting this winter with tanks and grips and such. I can also picture leather grips with just a little bit of bead work to give it an Indian touch... as if to leave my mark that "Silverbear was here". Wish I could go ahead and order another set of heavy duty wheels for the DX, then I could mount the new chrome fenders and get more of an idea of how it is going to look, but I've been spending too much money on bike stuff this summer and fall... so when funds permit. That is going to be a nice bike. The cheaper DX model was a stripped down version of the top of the line "Motorbike", so I think this one is going to be a DX/Motorbike with a HT motor. I'll attach a couple photos of an original Motorbike... pretty neat. I won't attempt to make it look the same since I couldn't afford it anyway, but I really like the tank decal. Cool.
Have fun going over your "new" bike.
Silverbear

BarelyAWake said:

Hey Silverbear, I just wanted to chime in on the leather "guards" you were considering - I used that idea myself with my bike build.

While nothin' quite as fancy as elk hide, I just cut up a leather work glove that had long ago lost it's mate to the woodstove. A nice thick cowhide, it worked really well until the last time I had the motor out and forgot to put them back lol

The leather bits hardened with pressure/time and there wasn't much in the way of vibration reduction but the point was only to protect my paint and the aluminum underneath. For that - it worked really well.

I would suggest affixing them to the mounts themselves instead of the bike's frame - this way they're sure to be centered and you'll be less likely of a scratch while positioning the engine.

Hope this was helpful! Leather makes an acceptable intake gasket too in a pinch

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Thanks for the tip; it makes more sense than gluing it to the frame and you are right in that it would be less likely to scratch when fitting the motor, although I have every confidence I will manage to scratch it anyway. Still, ya try.
Nothing fancy about the elk hide. I make my own footwear because they are comfortable and I'm cheap. Also, I guess I just like making things. I've done a lot of leather work through the years, making ladies hand bags to sell, pony tack and all sorts of Indian stuff when I directed the Indian Education program for the local school district, teaching kids about their own heritage. Elk hide is a by product of hunting out west for meat that happens anyway and is much more durable than deer hide. Good for mukluks, too. I won't use moose, which is the very best, because I don't think we should be hunting them. Their numbers are declining on their own and may end up disappearing form the area, as did caribou a hundred years ago.
I knew a guy who made engine bearings out of leather for his Plymouth, I think it was... ran a pretty good while that way, too. Old harness leather makes good hinges, too.
Silverbear

G'morning, guys. Finally a patch of blue in the sky, so I should be able to get some Elgin stripping done today. I'm trying to grab every opportunity to strip paint and at least get projects into primer before winter hits. I'll be leaving for western Maryland in early November and want to have a couple projects to tinker on, so will take them with me. Probably the Elgin and an American do over. So that's two frames to strip.
Steve, these sure can be money pits if we get everything we want and it is all first class, etc. What I do is far from it and money is always a concern. With all these bikes and projects I must sound like Mr. Money. Not. Mr. Debt is more like it. Some of this I loaned myself through the credit card and this winter must pay the piper for my folly. Well, not folly exactly, but for this indulgence in a risky venture. I will have a business up and running by this time next year. Writing it out makes it sound so much more self convincing. That's what I'm doing with all this. I'm investing in myself. It is going to be a little business for Silverbear, to supplement my edge of cliff income from social security. $750.00 a month isn't much to live on, so even matching that every month would make a big difference. That's my modest goal. More on this later.
Steve & "Wakeman", I think you both need to get on the water. Dreaming is good when we find a way to act upon it. I think dreaming is something like a vision quest... seeking answers for oneself on how to live, who to be... which get answered sometimes in our dreams. Indians call it a "message in a dream" and give credence to what comes to us through that way of knowing. Somehow we have to act upon our dreams or our spirits dim. Steve, I hope you make that move or at least go far enough with it to feel like staying was an equal option. I call that being free. Maybe you can get that boat, bad knees and all, and make that healing journey. Even if you do it just once, it is still worth doing, don't you think? Buy something, have an adventure and then either sell it or keep it, but have the adventure.
Wakeman, Waterman, there must be a way to combine your knowledge and affection for motorbicycles and life on the water. If you had a regualr home port where you could work and build bikes... maybe folding bikes, or some other kind of stowaways for boat people and focus on those people. Maybe there is a way to combine things and earn a living while living a life of your choice. I hope you can find a way to do that and be Fullyawake.
Steve, take some pictures, please. I do hope you will give details as you go when you get to working on the sidecar. I have been thinking more about this and want to do that sometime. I want to know what I need so that I can accumulate things. I recall being in a welding shop some years back where the owner also did some aluminum repair work... lots of fishing boats and canoes around here, as you can imagine. On the wall was a Grumman "shorty" about eight feet long which was both ends joined together and showed off this guy's skill in welding. A square stern done the same way, but even shorter could make a pretty light weight interesting sidecar for a bicycle. I'm most interested in how the sidecar attaches to the bicycle. I was looking at a site on the old British Watsonians and it showed pictures of how it was attached, but I'm not sure I understand it. It would need to flex up and down for being able to lean into turns, I would think. Also it should be able to be detached easily. Some enterprising person could make up an undercarriage kit to sell, leaving it to the builder to come up with the body build. There must be something simple and lightweight. Somebody on this forum could do it and have a business.
Coffee cup is nearly empty and it is time for Aaniimoosh The Wonder Dog to take me for a walk. I'll take a couple pictures of the found it at the dump Schwinn, which I learn from Venice Boy is not a DX and is probably a 1950. He seemed to think it was maybe a Panther, but I still think they made a cheaper DX with the same straight cross bar as the panther. The paint graphics say "DX". Whatever, it looks like a black panther of some kind now that it's painted. I'll also take a picture of the 39 Elgin which came in the mail yesterday. The motor sits right in that frame perfectly... no fooling around mounting this one. Time to get moving...
Silverbear

Below are progress photos of the found-at-the-dump 1950 Schwinn Straightbar which I had thought was pre-war since my Schwinn book said if it had a skip tooth sprocket then it was prewar. Not so, since the serial numbers place it at 1950. I'll go with the serial numbers under the crank. I figured it was a DX since the paint scheme & graphics looked like the DX model. Venice Boy, who seems to know a good bit about Schwinns said it was a straightbar and DX models were not, but had an upward curve on the lower cross bar. He said the frame was like that of a Panther model. I tend to think it was a DX until I know otherwise, since the graphics are persuasive to me, much as I would like to claim it was a higher priced and more sought after Panther. Whatever it is, here it is, as I found it and to date. It has been stripped and painted, the seat has been rebuilt with all metalwork wirebrushed to bare metal, primed and painted in black engine enamel, same as the bike frame. I added carpet padding (two thicknesses) to the single layer of burlap which passed for padding as it came. The leather was torn, so I replaced that with black elk hide I use for making moccasins and mukluks. New Wald Fenders spiff it right up. I've added a front caliper brake adapter so that I can have a front brake to go with the rear coaster brake. It will get new heavy duty rims when I win the lottery, but for now it has old middleweight S2 rims on it. I'm working on the gas tank this evening which is a small cylindrical aluminum tank which will go behind the seat. I'm sticching it up in matching black elk hide in part because I think it will look good, but also because I couldn't fill the dents well enough to look nice under shiny paint. This is simpler for me since I'm comfortable working with leather. I've ordered an American Flyer head badge and a replacement newer version (non skip tooth) signature sweetheart sprocket so that part will look original to the bike. I also found a beat up feather chain guard as came with it... something else for me to strip down, straighten up and paint to match. That's about it on this one until much later when it is time to receive an engine. One other little thing I did was to give it early sixties Schwinn grips with a mini bike throttle. This has a metal throttle tube which along with a grip I heated in water until it was soft enough to force onto the throttle tube. Looks good and will make it look more like it came as a motorbike. I like the styling of the frame, but it will be a tight fit for the HT motor.
Silverbear

Pictured for comparison are a 1946 Panther an my who knows bike. Maybe it is a Panther. If it is, now it's a black panther.
Silverbear

fasteddy said:

Silver Bear, got a moose story for you. I'm sure you will understand.

This is about the time of the First World War. My Grandfather went out one morming to get fire wood for the cook stove and didn't come back. Grandad had a pretty serious drinking problem and my Dad who was about 12 at the time went out to find him.

Dad got out the door and was hit by a wall of profanity and looking around the corner of the house saw Granddad 20 ft up a tree with a very angry young bull moose thrashing the tree with his antlers. To make matters even better Gramps still had an arm load of wood which he was bouncing off the already angry moose, one stick at at a time, along with his opinion of moose in general. At that very moment it was not good.
Dad slipped back into the house, loaded up his shot gun and slipping back outside so he didn't give the moose a second target, waited until the moose turned to give him a lung shot and let loose with both barrels.

Now the fun part was this is in the days black powder and Dad had to run back into the house out to the front porch and peek around the corner to see if he had hit the moose.

Shooting both barrels produced so much smoke Dad said, that you had to run ahead 20 ft to see if you hit what you were shooting at. He didn't want to bump into a really peed of moose.
He spent the rest of the day cleaning moose. They hung it from the tree that Granddad was in.

The family story is that every time Granddad ate moose that winter he had an absolute wicked grin on his face.

Steve.

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That's a good story! They can be ornery for sure and aren't afraid of anything. I saw one this summer while bike riding with the dog... thought it was a big horse cantering along the side of the road at first... you know how your mind has to quick identify something even if it makes no sense. Even in the city I'll see a big dark dog in the road and my mind jumps right up and says "bear!" A couple of years ago we were motor bike riding along on the same road and came across two. I had just started on a decline at the top of a pretty big hill and there they were at the bottom standing there squinting my way. I shut off the motor, came to a stop and stayed still, hoping for the best and trying to figure how I would get the dog out of the trailer and climb a tree all the while carrying her. It didn't look good. I also knew I couldn't restart the motor without going their way to bump start it. So I waited for what seemed to me a long time, but no doubt was no more than a minute or two and the elder moose decided either I wasn't a threat or wasn't worth the bother. The other followed and like ghost disappeared into the forest. People who have not seen them up close have no idea how very large they are. We have a lot of dog mushers up this way and the great fear is that a moose will tangle with the team, especially a runaway team. The moose will stomp the **** out of them. I have a photograph from around 1900 of a team of moose pulling a cutter through the snow. A Finnish immigrant decided that his pet bull moose calves would make a fine team. Well, they made a team anyway. Unlike a horse, when a moose kicks out with the forelegs there is no rearing up. Rather, the moose kicks straight out with one leg like a karate kick... fast, sharp hoofed and deadly. Which is how the young immigrant teamster lost one eye. It's a pretty famous picture around these parts suggesting something or other about the pioneer spirit, boldness, innovation and going your own way. It also suggests something to me about being foolish in dealing with wild animals. We need to be respectful and let them be what they are, wild and free. I was given a malamute pup, once. Actually, I agreed to take care of it for a little while which became permanent. It was not my opinion that having a dog/timber wolf mix was a good idea, but there he was. I called him Maaingan, which means wolf in Ojibwe. As he got older he started chasing my Indian ponies and then they'd bust loose and I'd be spending the rest of the day finding them and bringing them home. Then I saw that he was nipping at their heels pretty aggressively and finally one morning I realized that I had to put him down. It wasn't fair. He was being what he was, a wolf. How could he be anybody other than who he was? He never should have been bred and yes, it was a purposeful breeding with the aim of making ultimate sled dogs. He was gentle with me, but very protective of the place if strangers came around. I never really trusted him around other people. If I kept him I'd be shooting a wounded pony at some time. How could I give him away? He didn't really want to go off into the forest on his own, but stay at my place. He was a misfit and it wasn't fair at all. I petted him and tried to explain why I had to put him down and what a fine creature and friend he was, but that this had to be. I said goodbye and shot him. I've gotten to where I don't even like to see birds in cages and find going to a zoo a very sad thing. I can not bring myself to see my elder brothers the bears (ni sigh yay mukwawug) locked up in cages. It is a wrong thing. What can you know about a bear looking at him in a cage? What can you know about mankind and the human potential looking at a man in a cage? Not much. I think we need more bears and moose and less people. Thanks for the story. Be careful, with me if you give one, you may get two back.
Silverbear

Ely, Minnesota is about a hundred miles inland from Duluth and a hundred miles east of International Falls, Minnesota/Fort Francis, Ontario. I can plan to go wherever would be convenient for you so you wouldn't need to dogleg down all the way to where I am. We could rendezvous at or near a border crossing at either Fort Francis/International Falls or at Grand Portage Minnesota, south of Thunder Bay or I could come further up into Ontario along whatever route you're taking. There should be a way for me to park my vehicle securely for a few days, don't you think?
Next time I'm in town I'll stop at the dept. of motor vehicles to see about the special driver's license. There is also a customs station in town for people coming through on canoe trips from Canada. They should be able to tell me if the dog needs any kind of veterinary paperwork. Best to find things out well ahead of time. How's your bike?

I was also thinking more about the sidecar and was wondering why one has to have just one wheel. If the connection at the bicycle allowed the bike and trailer to flex independently, why would it have to be just one wheel? I have a reason for wondering that...
SB