adventures riding a Weed Whacker

Okay the bike is complete. Now it's just a matter of what I am going to do with it. For those of you who didn't follow the build. It is a 26" bike frame, with a 24" front wheel with brake, a twenty inch rear coaster brake wheel, and a Ryobi Weed Eater engine.
Uploaded with ImageShack.us


I'm just guessing but it seems to do about twenty miles and hour on the flats of which there are very few in a town called High Point. It will climb most hills unassisted, but on the long hill that bleeds off power, then gets steep at the end it requires a little pedal assist. It is just enough to remind you that it is a bicycle not a moped.

I built this one because the Ebike I ride in the park is too short ranged for anything but the park, or maybe a ride to the mall and back. I live almost downtown in our little town. I tried to ride the Ebike out to the walmart but it left me pushing on the way back. This one did it easily. You can't see it well in that picture but if you go to the build thread you can see that the motor had only minor modifications. So it still has the original gas tank. I have kind of a working estimate of seven miles on a single tank. So I probably will need extra gas on any longer trips.

So far the longest I have done is a ride out to the marina. Round trip it is about six miles. I rode the bike with an absolute full tank and I got home with an inch or so of gas in the bottom. The marina as you might guess is down in the bottom of a soup bowl kind of geography. There is one nasty hill each way. It was a good test of the bike and of me. We both survived it, and breakfast on the veranda overlooking the lake with my wife. She drove and stopped at Hardee's for the best biscuits in town.

After breakfast I rode it home again and declared it a keeper. Since then I rode it to the hardware store for pipe nipples for another motor that I still don't have running. But to be honest I have to admit I'm in no rush to mess with another motor. For several reasons.

First of all:i f this motor blows, craigs list if full of ryobis with bad carbs. Most under thirty dollars. I have two working carbs since there are two style motors switching them out is a five minute job.

Secondly: the bike is built with the lift mechanism attached to the bike. It is totally independent of the motor. Two 3/8 bolts and the motor is off. With a little luck the same frame that is on the motor now would go right onto the 'new motor'. so in a day im back on the road. There are two different syle Ryobi motors so I have a mock up for the other style frame also ready to go.

I guess there is no need to get a spare motor ready unless a good deal comes along near me.

So anyway keep an eye on this space and see what the old fart and the cheapo motor bike is up to next.

So far it is a fun ride and attracts a lot of attention on the test runs. It will not run with the traffic but it will outrun all but the most dedicated bicycle riders. I have been banned from automobile driving not by the cops but by my wife and doctor, so this is my answer. Yes it can kill me, but most likely not the bus full of preschoolers that hits me.

So from time to time I will post observations and stories from the rider of a WW bike.

this moring i took the bike to home depot. I is about five miles round trip I think. On the way back I was on a four lane road with a fifth lane now and then in the middle for turning vehicles. So Im in the right lane on the outside where I should be on a bike.

then a car passes me while it is side my side with a car on his left going in the same direction. This car passes me staying in the same lane I'm in. The driver puts the car within a foot of me even though she has plenty of room if she had slowed down just a little. It is scary how little respect a bike gets on the road these days.

I ran the bike up bike killer hill. That is a hill more than ten blocks long. It is bad enough that it choked my china kit bike down to a walk before it got to the top. On the WW bike it was slowed to a walk most of the way up the hill but it did pull it with very little pedaling. I consider that a success.

map bike, I was able to tap a 5/16 set of threads into a clutch bell from a Ryobi but the motor for some reason conked out on it. So I ended up with a non clutch model. Even if you pull the clutch off, you can put a drive spindle right against the flywheel and secure it with the clutch nut, It had a 3/8 24 thread on the clutch model I think. That one has a larger drive shaft I think. It should last longer than the one I have on my bike.

Had one, the motor isn't the problem. It did no better. The problem is probably my weight, the geography of the place where I live and the sla battery pack I use. I have used hub motors, that motor, (I still have the wheel that goes with it) and the scooter motor at 600 watts. none of them run more than five miles on the 24v 12 ah sla pack even when new. The better batteries are way too expensive for me.

It's hard for me to carry a quart of electricity.

yeah but I'm not sure i'm up to the hills here after two heart attacks and enough blockages left. so that the doctors ran a pool on which would be my last follow up exam. I passed on the bypass surgery 15 years ago so they didn't get that new car for their kids. The motor bike underpowered is about as much as I can do if I want to actually get somewhere.

I usually do about five miles in the park on the ebike pedaling only. Then bring it home up the big hills on the batteries. It is a comfortable way for me to get a little winded without the chest pains. I'm down from 70lbs over weight before I bought my first bike, to 20 pound over weight now.

"Don't have a motorcycle complex, I like to pedal some just not to bust a guy doing it.

good bit of info there.

My wife and i were riding in the neighborhood in her car of course, and I found a neighbor five or six blocks behind me pretty much hidden from view. He works on small engines. I bought a 32cc craftsman blower from him. So after I got it home and took most of the junk off it, I got on my bike and rode back to his place. He was fascinated with what I would do with his motor. I can see him now building and selling these little bikes from his front yard.

In north carolina where I live they require that a trailer have a safety chain as a back up to the hitch. I have lost enough trailers to know that a bike needs one as well. Today i used some brake cable and the hook off a broken dog leash to make a safety backup for my bike trailer. It is small but with my luck one day it was going to brake away and run into a BmW instead of harmlessly off the road.

I towed it and the WW motor actually feels like it runs better with the extra weight for some reason.

They have closed my park ride down to work on the crossing intersections. So I have been missing my morning ride. Nothing seemed to do the same thing for me. But then my wife made a suggestion. It is only a mile to the almost deserted mall., the economy being what it is. They have a long loop road around it. Since I have a gasoline bike and it is a road, I might be right at home there, she reasoned.

So this morning I rode there. I even rode some of the way over with the motor up. Okay it was all downhil,l but still the motor was up and on idle. I had already decided where I would start my exercise part of the ride so when I got there I lifted the motor and began. Most of it was on a very slight decline. It got to one long climb and I made that. When I cleared it I dropped the motor I was a little out of breath. I rode the bike home with a few pedal assist hills along the way. It seemed to be a pretty good bit of exercise. At last more than I get sitting here.

So for a while, at least, I will be doing that ride every morning before there is a lot of traffic.

ah the beauty of the interchangeable disposable motor bike. I rode to the mall this morning and the bike's pedals locked up. I managed to get it home mostly with the motor an very minor pedal assist. So I went to the thrift shop and bought a almost new 20" bike for ten bucks. I switched out the front and rear tire for the ones on my motor mike and now it is as good as before. Do that with any car. over the weekend I bought a replacement motor. I drained the gas from the tank and ran it out of the carburetor so that it should be easy to mount and then bolt onto the bikes universal motor mount.

I did get the bike back to pedal around the shopping center's loop for some exercise. I should take the rear wheel, with the distroyed bearings, to the bike shop to have it fixed but it would cost me at least twenty bucks, I know from experiences. It is cheaper just to leave it for the metal collectors along with the frame from the bike I bought for the wheels.

today I got a flat tire then the tire i put on didn't seat right so I spend a couple of hours in the 90 degree heat trouble shooting problems that weren't real. It was just the tire thing. Well I did make a few adjustments that were needed anyway.

I rode my WW bike yesterday and it was great fun. I am going to make some much larger grips for the handlebars though. I think I have arthritis in my hands these days. They really hurt after I ride a while. Of course i tend to hold the handlebars in a death grip.

I rode the weedwhacker five miles round trip to get biscuits for breakfast and surprise my wife. Now that i have a little more faith in it, I will likely do more of this kind of thing.

I needed a place to ride. A purpose if you will.. After I got the spring reconfigured I was test riding the bike for tension. Guy follows me a block in a big SUV. He pulled up beside me and shouts. How much you want for that bike?

Not for sale, I said. He wanted for his son of all things.