Western Flyer

[ingola]

It looks like one of the many English bikes from the early 60's. Hercules, Phillips, BSA, Robin Hood, etc, all the same frames. The genuine english lightweight decal is fairly common. Wards Hawthorne also sold those bikes. I've had several of them, good quality but less than a Raleigh. It has a Bendix red band one speed hub, that's a plus. It probably came new with a SA one speed hub. There's no marks from a 3 speed cable or hand brakes. Someone redid the bike and added 80's reflectors, but it has a lot of good original parts.

I thought all those lugged frames were brazed.

Early BSA pre Raleigh were actually better built bikes. BSA was also some of the first bikes with a geared hub.

 

[Ulu]

I haven’t decided to enter this in the contest yet, but I did not put a wrench on this until October 1.

So if it’s not worthy at least it will be legal. If I make a decision, I will paste this stuff over. I’m still deciding which category, mostly based on what gear we have already in stock.

Here it is, yesterday evening at my shed getting a shot of oil on everything that turns.

The chrome was scarred up badly on the gooseneck and the handlebars especially. Someone had taken a hammer to this.

. Yup that’s a Whitworth.

I’m just gonna probably sell all of this stuff. One of the bottle caps is missing from the pedal and the other one is beat up.

I spread the drops and filed the fork, and mounted these 7-speed aluminum alloy wheels. These are from the fake Schwinn, and I had purchased new tires for them when I was thinking of the Accordo build. They are too fat for the skinny bike category.

These wheels weigh over 6 pounds less than the original set which has worn out tires on it. Big Win! They are almost an inch shorter however. 559 vs 579. (?)

Amazingly, everything came apart easily with two exceptions.

The right cup on the bottom bracket is siezed.

So was the right cotter, and I struggled with it. This crank assembly is in pretty good shape and I did not want to smash it up. I ended up extracting the cotters without wrecking them.

The first cottter came out with a small punch & a few taps of the ball peen hammer. The second one would not budge. Volkswagen ball joint separator fits right on there, but it wasn’t enough power.

This is a ball joint separator for old English cars & it has Whitworth machining. In fact this is my only English Whitworth tool.

It worked to press the little cottter into a nut. I set it up tight and rapped it with a hammer & I used a 4 pound hammer for back up so I wouldn’t just bounce things.

It still did not go.

Finally I took out the propane torch and heated it up. Then I chilled it with an air hose, and a cup of ice.

Then I torched it and chilled It a second time.

The second cycle of heat usually works and it did. I managed to save everything without beating it up.

I did one heat cycle on that drive side bearing cup last night, and decided to let it cool all night, because I was tired.