The Racing Pedigree
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Love the ambition,word of caution mig welds can look and feel very strong but fail.be careful make sure shees welded up good before blasting down the road.get a professional welder to check that frame.we all want you around for a long time so we can see what you come up with next. Nice design.
Hey, your getting there. A few good rules: 2 bad welds on top of each other don't = 1 good weld.
so if your not happy with it grind it off and do it over.
( I've been working with metal a long time and still do this)
Second: all ways clean you flux off in between welds, new welds don't like old flux.
In fact the cleaner the metal you start with the easier it is to weld and will be more
consistent.
But like I said "your gett'in there. don't get discouraged. It takes practice and we all go through
it.
so if your not happy with it grind it off and do it over.
( I've been working with metal a long time and still do this)
Second: all ways clean you flux off in between welds, new welds don't like old flux.
In fact the cleaner the metal you start with the easier it is to weld and will be more
consistent.
But like I said "your gett'in there. don't get discouraged. It takes practice and we all go through
it.
all right boys and girls, picture time! Here is the bike as it sits now:
I stripped the bike down to bare metal, added some tubes(still got alot of bracing to do) and made a special tank one side gas inside tubes and the other side for storage and parts for the electric motor. At least I can tell you one thing about this bike, ITS ROCK SOLID
I would like to add some of my advice, mostly proven experience.
As a machinist by trade, I can tell you I prefer to have all the welding on my project done by a professional. I could go and buy a welder, and learn how to weld, but the peace of mind will never be there. I will just stick to cutting metals for now... not to mention the weld shop across the street from the shop I work at does stuff for me for free... and asked me if I'm available to run their little baby Haas 15hp lathe :mrgreen:
In the past I used to build heavy-duty wheel for pedicabs (bicycle taxis). Let me tell you, an electra 26" cruiser wheel with a coaster brake is a piece of junk. For any motorized build with upwards of 4hp you need high quality sealed bearings and brakes. That coaster brake wheel is just fine for cheap beach cruisers rolling at 10mph and getting rusted sitting on the beach.. but when you go faster than 25mph the bearings heat up and your hubs will seize.
There were two kinds of wheels for pedicabs. 3-seaters (up to 300lbs per rear wheel) had 48-spoke hubs and rims (sun rhynolite) and would start to break spokes when loaded heavy or rolling off a curb when loaded. Replacing spokes was easy; the bike would still run OK loaded up with 200lbs per wheel with a few spokes missing. The 5-seaters (upwards of 300lbs per wheel) had HD worksman 36-spoke steel rims with heavy duty rims. I have never seen one of those fold. Get some stronger wheel and hubs for that motor! If you want to go with 48-spoke, I suggest going with Hope hubs (sealed bearings) and Sun Rhynolite 48h rims.
As a machinist by trade, I can tell you I prefer to have all the welding on my project done by a professional. I could go and buy a welder, and learn how to weld, but the peace of mind will never be there. I will just stick to cutting metals for now... not to mention the weld shop across the street from the shop I work at does stuff for me for free... and asked me if I'm available to run their little baby Haas 15hp lathe :mrgreen:
In the past I used to build heavy-duty wheel for pedicabs (bicycle taxis). Let me tell you, an electra 26" cruiser wheel with a coaster brake is a piece of junk. For any motorized build with upwards of 4hp you need high quality sealed bearings and brakes. That coaster brake wheel is just fine for cheap beach cruisers rolling at 10mph and getting rusted sitting on the beach.. but when you go faster than 25mph the bearings heat up and your hubs will seize.
There were two kinds of wheels for pedicabs. 3-seaters (up to 300lbs per rear wheel) had 48-spoke hubs and rims (sun rhynolite) and would start to break spokes when loaded heavy or rolling off a curb when loaded. Replacing spokes was easy; the bike would still run OK loaded up with 200lbs per wheel with a few spokes missing. The 5-seaters (upwards of 300lbs per wheel) had HD worksman 36-spoke steel rims with heavy duty rims. I have never seen one of those fold. Get some stronger wheel and hubs for that motor! If you want to go with 48-spoke, I suggest going with Hope hubs (sealed bearings) and Sun Rhynolite 48h rims.
Good news everyone, after sitting in my garage for literally 4 hours straight looking dumb, I got my rear drive pulley mounted. I have go buy some more sealed bearings to put in the wheels and new tires
But back to the pulley I unlaced a 26 inch bike rim and bought some self drilling and tapping screws and drill both rims together and cut of the excess part of the screw. Now all I have to do is put some jb weld on the screw ends to cap is off. It was a lot of work today.
But back to the pulley I unlaced a 26 inch bike rim and bought some self drilling and tapping screws and drill both rims together and cut of the excess part of the screw. Now all I have to do is put some jb weld on the screw ends to cap is off. It was a lot of work today.
Let me tell you a story, judging by the pictures, you see i have made huge progress. But those bearing housing, are the devil. After I installed them on the bike, i went on a quick gravity ride, and as i was going down the hill, the bearing housing bent and came apart(i had the belt connected.) So after this happening twice, I remove the bearings from the housings, and happily returned them to the store. Today, I went to essex, and found a electric scooter. Now my bike is a official hybrid, and now i braced my whole frame almost everywhere. Now i just need to figure out how to synchronize the throttles to work together, and how to build the gas tank for fuel and batteries.
Having built half a dozen custom electric powered bicycles from the ground up, i have to say, that electric motor your using
will do very little as far as increasing power and range...your running a 7hp ICE motor and what a 500watt if that
brushed electric motor thats waaay less than a horsepower...dosnt make much sense to me.. what is the actual point of
having the electric motor?
I also agree with the many that have voiced concern about the fabrication, those welds are very dodgy looking
you dont seem to understand how dangerous this can be, if that head tube breaks at speed at best you
will end up in hospital, worse the morgue... Do a course, learn to weld...read up on rake and trail
and at very least use some templates for your tube notching, at present they are far from satisfactory..
I do commend you o your enthusiasm but .... dude, the skills just aint quite there for this sort of power level your
using. Personally, i would be worried sitting on that bike standing still let alone racing down the road under power ::yikes::
Please listen to those that hav offered advice...they are only concerned for your safety.
KiM
will do very little as far as increasing power and range...your running a 7hp ICE motor and what a 500watt if that
brushed electric motor thats waaay less than a horsepower...dosnt make much sense to me.. what is the actual point of
having the electric motor?
I also agree with the many that have voiced concern about the fabrication, those welds are very dodgy looking
you dont seem to understand how dangerous this can be, if that head tube breaks at speed at best you
will end up in hospital, worse the morgue... Do a course, learn to weld...read up on rake and trail
and at very least use some templates for your tube notching, at present they are far from satisfactory..
I do commend you o your enthusiasm but .... dude, the skills just aint quite there for this sort of power level your
using. Personally, i would be worried sitting on that bike standing still let alone racing down the road under power ::yikes::
Please listen to those that hav offered advice...they are only concerned for your safety.
KiM
Hey everyone, I can honestly say that the bike is 90% complete, I did some frame strengthing and painting but I have some more to do. I've took this bike to some car shows and it draws a crowd everywhere it goes, its awesome. I'd like to thank everyone on here for their input, it helped a lot: and look at what I saw at a car show:
and look at what I saw at a car show:
and look at what I saw at a car show:
