BACK IN BLACK (klunker build RRBBO#9) *NAME CHANGE*

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Earlier this morning I put my seat post in the lathe and cleaned it up, and I also straightened it.

It turned out beautifully. Then I went up to the bike shop and picked up my bottom bracket adapter. When I was getting that, one of the mechanics asked me if I'd be interested in the old crank arm puller, since they got a new one. Yup! I took it home.

I'm happy that I got the bottom bracket now, I think I'm going to do my first mock up tonight.

The crank arm puller is broken, but it's still useable, and it's definitely a better tool to use than a ball joint pitch fork for removing cranks!

Ccd
 
I got the first mock up done today

I'm happy to be able to see what this thing will hopefully look like when it's done.

The whole rear end assembly fits good, which really made my day. I just need to add a second little tab on the derailleur hanger for the adjustment screw.


I also got the rear brake cable hanger put on, it's kind of hard to see there at the seat clamp

The forks fit good too, and they also look good on this frame.

But I'm not really liking the kawasaki bars on this thing now. I might dig around my parts pile for more options.

That's all I got done today.

Ccd
 
LukeTheJoker said:
Have you thought about changing the stem instead of the bars? One with less reach could look much better...

Luke.
Click to expand...
I'll half to check tomorrow if I've got any other threadless stems in my stash. But the bars themselves are bent, and the perfectionist in me is kind of annoyed by that. I don't know if I want to try to straighten them. I might just look into buying a pair of bars similar to what's on a felt vintage iron.
 
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Scored another parts donor! This one turned out to be a huffy Savannah, which I think is from the early 80s. It's going to give up its handlebars, suntour mighty thumb shifters (recommend klunker parts straight from Marin county!) and its cool old-school grips.


I haven't gotten much of anything else done pertaining to the build, but if it stops raining for long enough for me to dry out some sand to re-blast the frame I'll send it out to be powdercoated soon. I might borrow the fork off of the huffy just for an experiment on looks.

Ccd
 
GTB Buddy!
 
As an old MTB racer I can tell you that those Kawasaki bars would have sucked to ride with. On a motorcycle wide bars can work because the bike is providing power. But you'll lose a lot of fine control spread out like a cruiser. Your donor bike bars are better. Still a little wide for my taste, but the geometry of your cruiser frame probably won't allow for the nimble response shorter bars would give.
 
Thanks for the proof of idea, crash!

Today I drug my donor bike into the shop to harvest my needed parts.

I blew the grips off with the compressed air, and a habit I have is to blow thru the handlebars to eliminate any insectoid dingleberries that might be inside. This time I'm glad I did. Because an inch long plug of dirt and ants shot out across the floor!! All the little specks are ants... yuck.

After I opened the big door to let them out, I took the handlebars over to the vise to grind the spot welds off the shim on the bars to let them fit into the stem I have

Turned out good

And with that piece of metal gone, I went up to my garage and began to clean everything up with a little bit of liquid wrench and a scotch brite pad.

The bars and shifters had rust on them, but I scrubbed the heck out of them and they came back to life. I put them on my new stem, which is the stem I used to have on my bmx bike. It's a Sunday freeze top load, and it'll bring my bars up a bit but oh well. Here's a fresh mock up

I really like these bars on here, but I think they'll look betterwith a cross bar in them.

I love the look I'm getting out of this now,
and I can't wait to be done! I'm going to send it off to be sandblasted (again) and powdercoated very soon, because it's starting to flash rust. I still need to add the waterbottle cage mounts, but I'm debating on having just one on the seat tube, or one on the down tube and one on the seat tube.

Just a cool picture lol. Peace!

Ccd
 
Well seeing as there's only 6days left in the buildoff, I cant get my uncle to blast my frame and sneak it into the powdercoat room for me, so I'm stuck with either having a rusty frame or doing a full custom pain job,,rattle can unfortunately. I'll get the first coat of paint on it today hopefully and let it dry. And then I'll half to worry about the checkerboard pattern, which might not happen due to the fact that I've never painted a checkerboard pattern before. Wish me luck, and sorry for the severe lack of updates. I'll have a fun day today, that's for sure.
 
charliechaindrive said:
Well seeing as there's only 6days left in the buildoff, I cant get my uncle to blast my frame and sneak it into the powdercoat room for me, so I'm stuck with either having a rusty frame or doing a full custom pain job,,rattle can unfortunately. I'll get the first coat of paint on it today hopefully and let it dry. And then I'll half to worry about the checkerboard pattern, which might not happen due to the fact that I've never painted a checkerboard pattern before. Wish me luck, and sorry for the severe lack of updates. I'll have a fun day today, that's for sure.
Click to expand...

I hope that you are able to do the checker board pattern on your bike. It will really set it off! I have fooled around with it on a few builds including the bike I am doing for this build off. The process to do it is quite simple just time consuming. if you are interested here is a tutorial I made on how to do it: http://www.ratrodbikes.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-paint-checkers-on-your-seat.18260/
 
Well finally today I got paint on this thing, and I was very satisfied by how it turned out even when it was just a frame on the paint stand

After letting it dry a few hours I put it together again, and I'm glad to present the 98%complete checkered flag klunker.

I'm actually seriously considering leaving the check solid black and just changing the name to honor one of the best AC/DC songs there is, back in black.

That's one of my favorite pictures I've taken of any bike I own. Only problem is, I lost one of the head badge screws.

That's the last picture I took before I got tired of feeding the mosquitoes. Tomorrow I'll run all the cables and hook the chain up.

I'm going to wet sand the whole frame and give it a few more coats of gloss black before I lay down the checkerboard patterns. I'll be doing some heavy riding of this thing, and if I can get it dialed in before Saturday I'm going to ask my mom if she wants to head out to the mountain bike trail' s so I can get a few good finished photos.
 
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LukeTheJoker said:
Looking really good, if you still want the bars lower you could flip that stem over couldn't you?

Luke.
Click to expand...
I could. But I don't think it'd look very good. I'm eventually going to buy a new stem for it though.

Today in town I picked up a can of black and white paint and a repair link for the chain so I'll be doing the final assembly tonight. She won't get the checkerboard yet, but it's going to happen. Just not in time for the buildoff unfortunately.

Ccd
 
Nice looking build! I have been thinking about doing a klunker for a little while and seeing how good some can turn out helps that direction.
 
Thanks guys! As soon as my cellphone charges up I'm going to head out to take some finished photos. Probably going for a roughly 13mile ride on this thing, hopefully everything will go smoothly. Last night I got all the cables hooked up and the chain on, and a halfway decent adjustment for the rear derailleur.

Ccd
 

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