Chopper for son's 13th

[michaelscycles]

I hope no one minds that I post this here. I thought you may like it.

You here of people looking for their childhood bike, well I wanted to make the one I never had. I always wanted an old school chopper when I was a kid and never was able to get or make one. I decided I would do one now and give it to my son for his 13th birthday.

It is my first attempt at doing anything like this and after a lot of planning I am very pleased how it turned out. It is almost complete, but two things I will change are the bars and grips. I had ordered bars for it and found out too late they were discontinued. I have ordered some others but they won't be here in time, so I borrowed the ones off on of my 2007 Krates for now. The other thing is I got him a set of the grips with skulls on the end. They will go on with the new bars. He may want to add some more like pin stripes or decals, but I will leave that up to him once he gets it.

This all started with an old mountain bike I found. It had a very different fork and I decided to build a bike around that. It was a suspension fork, but I took it apart, cut the lower tubes as short as I could and bolted it up solid. I then welded it together plus added the bottom part of a set I cut off a 27" road bike. The top part where it goes in the head set is exactly how they were on the mountain bike. It was a Magna, and I wish I could find some more like it.

The frame is a huffy 24" mountain bike. I didn't change it at all other then removing the brake mounts and cable guides. I had planned on using a different frame, but I thought it would flip to easy so I tried tis on and it works great.

It has a 16" front wheel and a 20" rear. It is very comfortable and cruises great. I had hoped for a taller sissy bar, it's 36", but this is the tallest my supplier sells.

I always liked the old choppers like "Captain America" from Easy Rider". That was the style I was going for and I can't believe how it worked out. Now I hate to give it to him. I am sure he will let me ride it sometimes.

 

[insomniacshotrods]

Looks neat, and i bet your son is loving it. Surely a birthday he will never forget.

 

[sensor]

looks great(and congrats you nailed the late 60's-early 70s look :mrgreen: ) im sure he will love it

 

[michaelscycles]

A little more detail of how I did it. After cutting the road bike forks off, I ground the bottom of the mountain bike's forks a little to fit inside of them. I welded it together and it seamed pretty strong but when I looked at the shape from the front, I wasn't pleased. I then took some small pieces of steel, rounded them by hammering them over a piece of pipe, and welding one to each side of the fork. That made the transition between the two look much better.

Also I wasn't sure if this would all work out and I liked the forks so much, I wanted to be able to use them on another frame if needed. The Huffy head tube is shorter then the threaded part of the fork. I didn't want to cut it down so you will notice a spacer I added to the top. I am a plumber and what I used is a short piece of an 1 1/4" 17 gauge tube from a sink trap. It fits good,and should hold up. I added a lock nut at the bottom so it doesn't support anything.

The black foam that is on the tubes at the top of the fork, They were on there originally. I thought about taking them off but they do a great job of protecting the frame when it is turned the hole way to one side, and I was planning on painting the bike black anyway and they matched perfectly. When you park the bike, the forks need to be turned all the way to the right or it is too top heavy and tips over so I am glad I left it on.

The last thing is I believe this is by far the best paint job I have ever done. The pictures don't do it justice. Because I was trying to not spend too much on the bike, I went cheap, well except for the primer. I used self-etching primer followed by 3 coats of the $0.95 black and then 6 coats of the same cheap clear coat from WalMart. Total mayerial for the paint job- less then $8.00. I will have to see how it holds up. He can be a little rough on his bikes so it wouldn't matter what I would use, I thing he could chip chrome .

He did see it for the first time last night and took it for a short test ride- loved it. He has a strange sense of humor and you should have seen him. He grabbed a piece of foil, made a quick helmet out of it complete with a big spike sticking straight up in the air and took off. It looked hilarious, I wish I would have gotten it on video.I am sure it will be thoroughly tested today.

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[michaelscycles]

Just a bigger pic.

 

[rick74304]

Very cool, good way of using what you have and making it special. My son and I did something similar last winter, heres a link if you're interested;
viewtopic.php?f=22&t=6132
Why wait to ride his though, have him help you build one for you! :mrgreen:
Rick