Autobike Cruiser Build

[Sidewinder Jerry]

Blue when you're going down hill and coming to a stop you'll need to pedal as you're slowing down in order to get the derailleur to shift back to first gear. You do have to have movement in the bicycle drive chain in order to make it shift either by pedals and/or engine drive. Still I always pedal as I ride anyways. On the LandRider derailleur there's a cadence adjustment screw. I've set mine to where it up shifts at 7000 rpm and down shifts at 5300 rpm or a cadence cadence of 140 and 105.

 

[CTripps]

Minor update... the shift kit has been ordered, should be here by the end of next week. I'm going to stick with the stock 10T sprocket for now. If I need to I can order the 9T or 11T later.

 

[CTripps]

My shift kit arrived today. I wasn't expecting it until the end of the week, so that's a good thing.

Now I have to actually figure out what I'm doing to this build.

 

[CTripps]

The weather's variable, but we had a few decent days in a row so I got a bit done..

• Stripped all labels and the headbadge off the frame
• removed everything I could, sanded and primed frame and parts
• applied two coats of black

Waiting for the paint to set nicely before I do more on that aspect.

To do most of the painting, I hammered a 4' piece of rebar into the ground, put the frame upside down onto it using the seat tube. Hanging in the garage there, it has a different (shorter) piece through the head tube held by the straps.. also was a good position for touch-ups.

 

[maniac57]

looking good!

 

[Sidewinder Jerry]

The weather's variable, but we had a few decent days in a row so I got a bit done..

• Stripped all labels and the headbadge off the frame
• removed everything I could, sanded and primed frame and parts
• applied two coats of black

Waiting for the paint to set nicely before I do more on that aspect.

To do most of the painting, I hammered a 4' piece of rebar into the ground, put the frame upside down onto it using the seat tube. Hanging in the garage there, it has a different (shorter) piece through the head tube held by the straps.. also was a good position for touch-ups.

Here was a trick which you may want to use drill a hole the same size in the jockey pulley arm a 142 degrees from the original hole for the tensioner spring. By tightening the spring it'll hold the chain tighter to the sprokets. Otherwise the chain tends to jump off the high gear to the right instead of down shifting when starting to climb a steep hill.

 

[CTripps]

Here was a trick which you may want to use drill a hole the same size in the jockey pulley arm a 142 degrees from the original hole for the tensioner spring. By tightening the spring it'll hold the chain tighter to the sprokets. Otherwise the chain tends to jump off the high gear to the right instead of down shifting when starting to climb a steep hill.

Interesting.. when I get closer to reassembly I'll look into that, thanks for the idea.

 

[CTripps]

Yesterday I got the dremel going and cleaned up the molding ridges in the ports on the jug. I also ran a flat file across the intake and exhaust ports on the outside of the jug to make them flat. No pics as my camera was in the house and my cell's camera wouldn't show anything very well when I tried it.

Next up will be trimming the intake side of the piston skirt, followed by lapping the head and jug.

 

[furament]

my last bike was 1 of thoes never could get the shifter to work with the motor tho, motor brought the rpm of the rear wheel up to fast

 

[CTripps]

Some pics... let's start with the piston..

1. Marked to be cut.
2. Rough cut - I cut slots as close to each other as I can with a disk, then remove the comb-like teeth with a little side-to-side motion with the cutting disk.
3. Smoothed out with a drum bit.
4. Reinstalled.
5. Heated up the soldering iron and removed the white wire from the mag while I was there.

 

[CTripps]

Over the past few days I've cleaned out the ports on the jug, smoothed out the ridges, and filed the intake and exhaust surfaces flat. Today I lapped the head and jug.

1. Exhaust port filed flat, used a long file and simply went back and forth (gently) until no paint remained. There was a 'low' zone above the port.
2. Intake side, same treatment. I had access to a bench mounted belt sander a while back, so I smoothed out and evened up the fins on the jug then.
3. Head and jug sitting on my lapping slab...
4. ...after some time at 400 grit, dry then wet.....
5. .....and after more time at 1000 grit, again dry then wet.

 

[CTripps]

I want to do something different on this build, so I'm painting the engine. The paint I used is VHT Engine Metallic, "Fiery Red." I don't know if I'll paint the whole bottom end or just the 3 covers at this point.

1. Masked off and ready.
2. More masking..
3. Paint can caps make ideal spacers/rests for this. The base I'm working on is a turntable made of a couple of metal plates and a bearing ring between them. I found it somewhere, it might once have been the base of a rotating display for a store counter. I foill covered it so it wouldn't get oversprayed.
4. After the second coat. It's a bit more orange than I expected, but I like it.
5. Back inside on the bench to let the paint set.

 

[CTripps]

Well, time to bring you up to current status on this build..

I've been a little busy, and doing things a bit at a time.

I stripped the frame right down, even broke the 'factory' bike chain and pulled it off.

The originaly metallic grey didn't work for me. Everything got sanded, primed, and then painted black.

 

[CTripps]

So, once the black coats were done it was time to get creative. I used a trick I saw on a show some time sort-of recently. It didn't work out perfectly, but I'm satisfied with the results.

Wrapped the pieces with fishnet material, using copper wire threaded through the material to pull it together, along with a bunch of small 'binder clips':

 

[CTripps]

So, the second colour is metallic red. It's the same brand of paint, and despite following instructions in places the first coat lifted right off, leaving a strange blend of black and grey under and between the red:

 

[CTripps]

It isn't ride-ready yet, but it's close.. So far I have started it a few times with a drill turning the mag shaft. It stalls out quickly though, as it isn't quite together right yet (air leak near the carb, among other things).

I also still plan on a custom exhaust, I want to bring it down along the left chainstay and back.. and probably a laid-back seat post (the little voice in the back of my head is trying to vote for a banana seat). Probably a bunch of other tweaks and things to properly personalise it.

At any rate, it went from this:

To looking like this now:

 

[Dan]

Wow. Looks great, CT.

 

[Sidewinder Jerry]

How smoothly are the gears shifting?

 

[Powertool]

look batman , spiderman has a motorized bike