schWINn or Lose *5/15 ridden

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N8NBOX

N8NBOX

Joined
Feb 3, 2009
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...its all about having fun right? Anyways, I know mine wont be able to compete with all of the old school cool and high dollar/crazy fabricator skills builds...but ill enjoy it. Anyways, im super broke but help manage a non-profit community bike shop so have access to a ton of junk parts (99% Wal-mart BSO's). We have had this frame up at shop ive been meaning to build for almost 3 years now so here it goes. Should be pretty fast since I won't be doing anything fancy.

Your standard Schwinn Diamond frame.
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Love the patina!
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Some parts I picked up, the fenders don't fit but thats what hammers and grinders are for right :mrgreen: ?
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Re: schWINn or Lose

Yeah and the fillet brazing always makes it feel better knowing someone actually spent some time working on each one by hand. SO, started taking everything apart and I guess water collected in the top end of the headtube but not the bottom...
IMG_20120512_203954.jpg

The bottom bearings cleaned up pretty nice but the top as you can see were completely obliterated. Also took apart the bottom bracket, pulled all of the balls out, wire brushed and polished them all up. Going to pick up another top bearing race this week and start greasing and putting everything back together when I can find the time.(maymester starts tomorrow so will be doing school 8-12 and work 3-midnight.)

So, one thing im debating on is polishing up all of the chrome parts or leaving them a bit rusty. Thoughts?
 
schWINn or Lose

I only comment on the low budget builds. The expensive ones are soo overrated :) can't wait to see how it turns out :D
 
Re: schWINn or Lose

Threw it back together for now with the only pedals I had that fit. Going to start hunting for a set of pedals and debating on recovering the seat white. Had built up an old schwinn mesa runner MTB with these 700c wheels but didn't really like it so going back to 26" on it and going to use these on this build :). Had to take a dremel to the dropouts a bit to get the axles to fit but they went on without too much grinding and prying. Next on the list of things to do is figure out how to make those fenders fit.
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-Hooked up my trailer and rode it a few miles and its a ton of fun to ride, really like the bars in that position, stretches me out a bit since the frame is so small, and think it gives it a nice agressive look.
 
I love that I'm not the only UberLowBudget guy here...Makes me feel more comfortable. I can't wait to see how your bike comes out!
 
Yeah I might end up splurging on a set of pedals but I capped myself at $20 for this build so hopefully I can just dig some out of a pile somewhere for free or super cheap. Started photoshopping things and think I will stick with the black seat, might re-cover it with something fancy and replace the padding though, its all rotted out underneath so not very comfortable at the moment.
 
looks like you could hang a bungee net from grip to grip for a makeshift front rack too. Love the look of the bike !!! Nice work :)
 
Nice diamond in the rough. :roll:
 
Thanks :p. It has been a blast so far and worked through some problems I ran into and came up with solutions I can use in the future. Primarily with that destroyed top bearing cage....tried finding a replacement but nothing fit so tried taking out a ball and triming down one I had...which caused binding...so then I ended up just using the old balls with a couple other ones I had that were the same size, globbed a bunch of grease on the race and squished the balls into the grease. So now its a loose ball bearing setup up top but it works great! From what ive read loose bearins are actually better since you have more bearing surface and less friction from the cage. No luck with anything else yet but should have some time this weekend to make another push.
 
Been slow going trying to get our community bike shop on track on top of full-time work and summer school but found some pedals and a set of fenders I like much better, will figure out how to mount them and snap some pictures(no tabs in the front so might weld on something?)
 
Re: schWINn or Lose

Peatbog said:
I think those "standard Schwinn diamond frames" are actually pretty good looking. The radius on the tubes connected to the head tube just make the entire frame look really nice.
Click to expand...
+1 there is nothing wrong with those frames.When schwinn fillet brazed a diamond frame adding smooth transition from tube to tube they turned it into a classic.
 

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