17" Cadillac AV Sport

This is my new caddy.Then, and now.









This bicycle was just too good a deal to pass up. Just in componets alone it's worth a lot more than the $260 I paid for it. It's the last of them too, because the Cadillac's are now discontinued. The only size I could find has a 17" frame. It's going to be a bit of a challange to fit a motor in it, but with a little luck and maybe an offset manifold I think I'm up to it. I think this size bicycle will make a very good MB.

This is a list of stock features,

Total Weight 33 lb - Custom Aluminum 6061 Frame 
- 21 Speed Shimano Revo Shifters 
- Adjustable Alloy Stem 
- Fork: Zoom Suspension Fork with 40mm Travel 
- Wheels: 26" Double Wall DeCOSTA SE 08 Alloy Rims, Black Stainless Steel Spokes 
- Hubs: Aluminum Disk Hubs, Front & Rear Quick Release 
- Tires: Kenda 26" x 2.0" K-934 
- Rear Derailleur: Shimano Alivio
- Crankset: Suntour Aluminum 28/38/48T 
- Cassette: Shimano 14-34 
- Saddle: Cadillac Custom Memory Foam Black/Silver with Cadillac Seal on Rear of Saddle 
- Pedals: Resin No Slip Platform 
- Seatpost: Alloy Suspension Seatpost 
- Handlebar: Aluminum Half Moon 
- Stem: Adjustable Quill Alloy 110mm 
- Headset: 1-1/8" High Stack 
- Brakeset: Front and Rear Tektro IO Disk Brakes 
- Included Extras: Kickstand and Reflectors

I think the hubs are sealed bearing. The BB is a sealed cartrage.

So far I've had it 2 days. I have little experience with a derailleur, or bicycle disk brakes. It took me about 3 hours to figure out how to set everything up. One hour of that was looking at youtubes explaining how.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixWf2XMsfV8

I finally made some progress. I thought mounting this wide mount motor, in this frame would be a snap, but it turned out to be a little more trouble than I thought. There were a couple of problems. For one thing the frame down tube is sort of 8 sided, but the motor mount is a semi circle. Since the frame is sooo small, there's not even one mm to be wasted.

I tried and tried, unsuccessfully to fashion an adapter that would fit between the motor mount, and the frame. I was able to make one that was only about 1/8" thick, but when it was in place it made the motor have to sit about 1/2" higher in the frame. As it is the carb will be trying to share space with the top tube.

Then I decided to go for broke. I got another brain storm that told me to just grind the motor block into a V shape, which is what I did. This had the effect of dropping the motor down about another 1/2" lower in the frame. Now there's a chance, although a slight one, that with a MM manifold the carb might fit with the stock air filter.

If you think this mounting technique will fail please let me know now.

Pilotgeek said:

Looks very nice so far. Taking the extra time to do it right is so worth it in the end.

Click to expand...

So far all I've accomplished is mounting the motor to the frame. Just that has taken me about 20 hrs in the last two days.

F_Rod81 said:

That looks like it will be a fun build. I'd suggest on getting rid of the rubber between your mounts and frame. That has been disputed over and over; it will lead to many issues that you don't want

Click to expand...

Thanks, I appreciate the input. Most of what you see is heat shrink tubing, one thickness thick. There's only one small piece of inner tube between the front mount, and the frame. It kind of needed something a little thicker than heat shrink there. When you're grinding and filing the motor block by hand it's difficult to keep the mating surfaces perfectly parallel, especially when everything is at about five different angles. The inner tube rubber, which is one thickness, just sort of fills in some the low spots, and acts more like a gasket than a rubber mount after it gets clamped down tight.

Today I addressed exhaust issues. I heated the header pipe and bent the exhaust out of the way of the crank arm. Now there's a 1/4" clearance.

I've learned twice now that a propane torch isn't quite hot enough for exhaust reshaping. Oxyacetylene is better.

Looks like I've gone from this,



To this,



I don't know if the carb will like that angle or not, but it fits.

No you don't have double vision. This is how I decided to run the cables, levers, and shifters, and throttle. I moved the front brake to the right side. The Caddy has a real mess of controls, and cables doesn't it? There's not even any room for my bell. How will I warn those little old ladys to get off the sidewalk?

This is how it seems to be evolving so far.

This is how the ignition is ending up.

Man that's straight. I think mounting the sprocket on the disk brake hub is the shizzle. Andy's hub adapter and sprocket are beyond awesome. They make my MB seem like a factory build.

95% complete. I already have about 20 miles on the motor. Still need to install the rear V brake.

I installed a Avid SD 7 rear V brake yesterday. It looked like getting the rear disk to work was going to be a expensive, but another thing I didn't like most about the idea was that a rear disk rotor would hide the beautiful top hat adapter, and sprocket from view. These kind of brakes work better than disks anyway.

This bike can now be considered 100% complete,except for break in, and tuning. There is one last thing I'm planning to do but it's just a slight cosmetic change.

This bike feels very solid to ride. Total weight with gas is 57 lbs. The ride is quite smooth compared to the Atomic BB. Suspension forks vs rigid frame. Now I have effective brakes with a 160 mm disk in the front, and a V brake in the rear, compared to only a coaster brake.

Of the 21 gears the Cadillac has I only ever use about 4 gears, all on the middle chain ring. Even though I drove a small screwdriver through the baffle, exhaust noise is still slightly less than the Atomic BB, which isn't all that loud itself. I think I'll leave it this way, because I like quite on my MBs.

happyjourney said:

sweet bike. what kind of hub adapter did you use? can you put up a picture?

Click to expand...

It's called a Top Hat Sprocket Adapter, from Kings Sales and Service. It only fit's on a disk brake hub. They come in 1/8" and 1/4" offset. Mine is 1/4". The sprocket came from the same place. There's pictures of it on their website.

Top Hat Sprocket Adaptor | King Sales and Service

I've started the tuning process. It moved the needle from the middle position to the leanest position. Looks like it might be running slightly rich, but pretty close.