The Rustoration Build Off

[silverbear]

Weekend Fun,
Sorry for your setbacks, but you'll be building these things for a long time and I look forward to your next project. If I were moving to California I think I'd have a big smile on my face. You've got a lot of good riding weather coming your way, my man! Now when you get where you're going you've got to establish your own turf for bike work... you need a workspace! On the down side, I know that moving is kind of hard when you're a kid. I moved around a lot when I was young and usually had a new school each fall. It's hard making friends and then leaving them behind. You'll be making new friends and I'm pretty sure you're going to have others to ride with. How cool is that?
SB

 

[silverbear]

Fasteddie,
I'm looking forward to a progress report on that Monark and some pictures! How's the painting going? And your chrome work will be ready soon! Man, you must be excited. That is going to be just awesome, seeing that classy old bike restored to its glory days connected to the electric pusher sidecar, all gleaming mahogany...
SB

 

[silverbear]

Barely,
That jawdropper is surely the Rolls Royce of Rollfasts. Your Rolls is just .... I don't know, man, it just makes me smile when I look at it. I would be so proud of myself if I had done that. When you're all done have somebody snap a picture of you smiling on your bike. You, too, Bairdco! A picture on your bike!
SB

 

[bairdco]

looks great BA. i know what you mean about "the looks." i get stopped all the time on my 24"er. but when i put the copper bike together, people just stop and stare at it. that thing really stands out. there's no more "just a quick run to the bank," 'cause i have to sit there and talk to 5 people about it. hopefully, some of them will turn into customers.

i've got a lot of interest on that bike, just waiting for someone to commit.

as for a kill switch, did ya see this?:

 

[BarelyAWake]

hmm... *much beard stroking*

I say again... hmm...


Perhaps I'll hafta dig up one of those groovy old NOS toggle switches we've got at work (erm, that's "new old stock" heh) and tuck it away somwheres 'cause yet again - I like yer idea

Problem is oil contamination - more precisely, chain lube. Addicted to the stuff I was a lil reluctant to put the CDI where it is, generally I'm tryin' to keep the electricals to a minimum. I'm not sayin' it will be a problem (defo not w/yours) - I'm fully aware of my own paranoia lol

Still - it'd be handy as a security device if for no other reason (hidden and toggle) - I'm assuming yer red button a momentary switch?

 

[weekend-fun]

great. now you're gonna be calling me up all the time to come over and fix yer bike...

just kidding. what part of CA?

Hey dude, surfs up!

Hope it all works out.

fasteddy

thanks

were going to Palo Alto, about half an hour away from San Franscisco (did i spell it right? lol)
See ya soon

 

[fasteddy]

Silver Bear ,the Monark is slowly getting to the point where I not afraid of posting photos. Working the few dents out of the fenders and have to weld a crack in the frame and then I can prime it. Have the paint and everything is set up to finish it.

Trouble is my old pal Art Rytus has paid another call and the bum doesn't show any sign of leaving. The worst part is the Doc, great guy that he is, insists that there is a pill to get rid on him but in that it also manages to get rid of me also until the pills wear off,I prefer not to take them.
Really thinking of trying the Rum cure. At least when you feel like cr*p there is a good reason.

Seems all those checks for wildness I wrote at twenty, I'm now cashing at 66.
What no one sees is the fact that I am to a degree, messed up and have to get around with a cane and a long walk is anything over 30 ft.
I'm thinking when they mention powered wheel chair they better be talking China girl!

Will do my best to get photos on in a couple of days. I'm off to the shop now.
Nothing like the smell of Bondo in the spring air.

Steve.

 

[fasteddy]

BarleyAwake, got a shot of the gray paint on your bike in the photo and that looked great. You, Silver Bear and Bairdco are going to have to ride them at night to be able to get where your going. Other wise it"s questions every half mile if your lucky and get that far.

Trying to get the bike done as soon as I can. Got some wild sidecar ideas that I want to see if I can build.

Steve.

 

[bairdco]

i'd guess your climate has something to do with oiling your chain all the time. i haven't oiled one yet. the first kit chain broke before all the oil came off it, and the new 41 i have is still greasy.

in fact, my bike never gets dirty unless i'm working on it, then i gotta wipe all the fingerprints off it. i'm glad i don't have to ride through salt and slush all the time.

yeah, mine's a momentary. i had a click on/off button for a day, but sometimes it wouldn't click back on. now i just reach down and kill it, kinda "suicide shift" style.

even though my bike never gets wet, i seal all the wires with heat shrink, as well as the plug wire at the CDI, and i even slip a piece over the white cloth wire all the way up to the magneto. don't think any water's gonna get in there at all.

 

[fasteddy]

Well after the meltdown I went out and did the things I've been putting off because I was unsure that I could do it.

#1 proved I'm not a welder. Everyone that saw it agreed. Well it was just my brother and he wasn't going to let a chance like that get away.

#2 if you set the welder up the way the welding sites tell you to, you are a lot better welder that you thought you were.

It was so much fun I welded up most of the sidecar frame. I do think the beer and I will be safe coming home from the store.
I had a thing about welding which I chronicaled in my now out of print book "Steve and Mr. Toad Take a Wild Ride", about a boy and his not well built go cart. Another, why are you still alive moment.

Silver Bear mentioned in another thread that he wanted a China Girl on his wheel chair.
When we get together this summer we will have to compare plans. I'm thinking 80cc., fat tires and lots of metal flake paint. Oh yes, wheelie bars.Mabe a Bairdco/BarelyAwake design?

Got ready to prime the bike and the rain started. Chrome comes at the end of the month
but now that the sidecar frame is on the way I can start on trying to tie it all together.
Want a simple design that doesn't require a machine shop to build.

Steve.

 

[bairdco]

Colson mades some pretty bad a$$ wheelchairs, too.

in the catalog, they're called "cripple machines." i guess people weren't so sensitive back in the early 1900's.

 

[weekend-fun]

Weekend Fun,
Sorry for your setbacks, but you'll be building these things for a long time and I look forward to your next project. If I were moving to California I think I'd have a big smile on my face. You've got a lot of good riding weather coming your way, my man! Now when you get where you're going you've got to establish your own turf for bike work... you need a workspace! On the down side, I know that moving is kind of hard when you're a kid. I moved around a lot when I was young and usually had a new school each fall. It's hard making friends and then leaving them behind. You'll be making new friends and I'm pretty sure you're going to have others to ride with. How cool is that?
SB

Actully, I know some people were we are moving.

When I was in 1st grade, we lived in cali! We then mOved to Texas, then here in mo, and now back to Cali!
I'm exited, but that's to the topic of this thread

 

[silverbear]

Fasteddie,
Sounds like you're getting close to some cool stuff on the bike. Paint is a big step, of course and then you start putting it together, then the rechromed pieces, those Worksman wheels... and one fine day the sidecar gets married to the Monark. Woo hoo! Is the sidecar set up now with the electric wheel, batteries installed and all that? That's right, you just now got the frame welded up. Will that wheel also be braked? Having to go electric to be in compliance with the BC legislators sure complicates things, doesn't it? If I couldn't use an inexpensive China Girl I couldn't afford to do this. Actually I can't afford to do this anyway, but I feed my habit as best I can. I know I'd better sell some bikes this summer to pay down the credit card or there won't be any builds next winter... and I do want want to do this again. Two projects in mind are my 34 Elgin and the other 63 American which won't involve much investment of money, just time and energy. Maybe a real sidecar...
Is the Ontario rally still on do you know? I do want to know that I have nothing to worry about bringing a bike over the border at Grand Portage. I wonder if I have a bike registered, licensed and insured in Minnesota if Ontario will honor that?
Regarding the wheel chair, I think it will have to be a cool Colson, maybe with a pusher wheel powered by a china girl. Bairdco's chair with two little wheels up front would be better cornering and could be set up with an axel and a steering tiller/handlebar. And I think "cripple machine" is appropriate. Oh yeah... geezerdom seems a little better if I can have a gas wheelchair when the time comes I can't ride my bikes anymore. "The Colson Crippler". I like it.
SB

 

[fasteddy]

Silver Bear, Yes, I get a laugh out of the proper terms people use. I prefer the term, crippled. I'm not physicaly disadvantaged, I'm crippled. The worst part is I did it to myself, unlike you who was an innocent victim.

The Colson Crippler! Lord I love the sound of that. Think we should order two? Handle bars or steering wheel? We can get a diferental rear axle so we would be good for direct drive to the wheels. Now the question is 2 wheel or 4 wheel drive, mabe with a lazy boy on top? How about the patented Bairco copper gas tank and the BarelrAWake paint. Killer!
Doctor says I may need it sooner than I want.

I've asked about the Ontario meet a few times but haven't gotten a reply. The fellas who wanted to do it haven't posted on here in a very long time so I would think it may well be over with.

Far as I know Ontario would treat a legal in Minnesota mb as they would anything else such as a motorcycle. They are not legal for a Canadian to ride on the street. What they would do if you did I am not sure. I'd e-mail the Ontario Provintial Police and ask before I was using it to ride off private property. Bringing it in with no registration should be OK if it is only used off road. You may need proof that it is made in the US when you bring it back.
I'd register it with US customs before I took it over. Thats what I'm doing with the Monark here in Canada.

Ya,I understand what you mean by credit card crunch. Any time I buy something non bike related they call to see if it is me or some one else is using my card.
This thing is now over the $4,000 mark. The electrics are $1,800 of it.
I also did things like buy two nearly mint tank medallions for $75 so yes, it could have been done a lot cheaper but I'm only going down this path once and then I'm riding this thing until the wheels go square and fall off.

I went with the top of the line LiPoly battery. It can be charged up to around 5,000 times in it's life time where sealed lead acid batteries will last a maximum of about 300 charges.
I'm just paying up front and getting a size and weight pay off. The battery is about 20 pounds.
Like I have said "It doesn't always pay to be Canadian but it surely does cost".

All the wheels have to have a brake here so the sidecar wheel has a disc brake with a power cut off built into the brake handle. That,s the law too.
Putting both bike brakes on one handle and the sidecar on the other.
The one benefit of no clutch.

I'll post photos of were I'm at , the end of the week.

Colsun Crippler!!! Thats making the week go faster. LOL

Steve.

 

[bairdco]

this one looks like it would make a good candidate for a two-stroker:

 

[fasteddy]

Bairco, is that the original Colsun Crippler?
Front wheel drive, rear steering, lots of room for the seat for a Happy Times. Man what a ride.
Got to keep an eye on E-Bay.

Steve.

 

[fasteddy]

Other than the support for the wheel on the sidecar the frame is done. The welding went better than I had hoped.

Learned a few things along the way.

#1 is that the weld stays hotter, longer than you think. This is in direct proportion to how fast you have to grab it so the piece doesn't fall over on top of you. It seems to stay even hotter if you have taken your glove off to do it.

#2 the carefully fitted joints you put together when you cut them, won't be, when you go to weld them. Marking each one doesn't help.

#3 one piece will be too long/short.

#4 your brother will ask you an involved question just as you pull the welding mask down to do a weld you just built yourself up to doing.

#5 you can still give your brother the finger even if your wearing welding mitts and he will see it.

#6 your very devoted Christian neighbours will hear and understand every word coming out from under the welding mask after you discover you pants have been on fire for a while.

#7 after the fire is out your brother will say "Bet that hurts"

#8 there really are laws about beating your brothers brains out his ears after a remark like that. The police will tell you this as they put you in the cruiser.

#9 the job is about done and I'm as glad of that as can be.

#10 next week I start on the Colson Crippler. 0.0

fast"not a welder"eddy

 

[BarelyAWake]

ROFL fasteddy - please say it's ok fer me to print out the above and stick it to the wall next to the welding booth at work!

I think it conclusive proof that you are indeed now a welder

 

[silverbear]

"It doesn't always pay to be Canadian but it surely does cost".
That one cracked me up. So now you a wlederman. "Born to be weld" or something like that. Good deal on the sidecar frame... then the wheel mount... then the fittings... then the paint and after that affix body to frame... and oh, yeah, then there's the bike to do. You're not bored anyway. My theory is that people who say they are bored are boring people. It seems like I never have enough time, energy or money to get everything done. Just saw a local news clip showing geezers in a nursing home... old ladies looking vacant in wheel chairs and old men looking off into nowhere- the past I suppose. It's good I'm poor as I never want to be in one of those places. I somehow never counted on getting old, but it is going to happen at this rate. I want to be active right until til crashing my bike at 95. That's the way to go out. All this talk of wheelchairs ain't good. I'll work on mine when I can't climb on the bike anymore.
Got some sunshine and a big warmup coming this week. I believe I hear the sound of a China Girl in my immediate future! Couple days away now, woo hoo!
Silverbear

 

[fasteddy]

Barely AWake, please feel free to use it. Anyone else please help yourself.

I figure the pant fire started when I was using the grinder to shorten the length of tubing. Dead nerves in my leg let it get a little warm before I got a sniff of it.

Our good neighbours did come over after I patched myself up and ask if I was OK and he mentioned off hand that I may not get to Heaven if I used words like that often. I didn't have the heart to tell him I had a better chance of waking up in the morning in bed with Paris Hilton.
Of course if I could remember the night before that might have been like Heaven!

Steve.