Blue Meanie Mod's

Picked up this thing at the recycle shop $10, it has a real sexy frame IMO and I may convert this into a 26" single speed BMX, maybe even a cross over klunker style???
Its a brand ive not seen, possibly an Ebay cheapie as its only got gears on the back! the frame is steel so im turned on by that (can weld or chop it)


But I really bought it because it came with these monstrous set of forks! they look cool and I really want these on the Blue Meanie project, they have the size and look im after without going to a triple T etc etc!....... BUT........ BUT....
They are just plainly too short, I tried to run the original front wheel (26") but its just way to small and really rude to look at, I have to stay with the 29" wheel of which it was designed to have! I considered modifying that support bar that links the forks together...... Nah too cosmeticly challenging to tidy up!


So the question im going to ask is ..... Can I extend the fork drop outs about 15-20mm, theres plenty of meat on the dropouts, I have to cut them and weld an extension in.... in fact ill probably cut the old dropouts half way and source a longer set to replace rather than cutting and slamming something in the middle and welding all together. so is it feasible to extend a 26" set of forks to accommodate a 29" wheel, I may have to change the disk size of which I got a few. there will be no torsional pressure on the welds, the bike will never be jumped and the front wheel will never in its life leave the ground!.

Ok so I sit and say to myself...."am I a backyard bike builder or not" Yes I am LOL, and with that I went about modifying those monster set of forks!
The pic shows the cut off drop outs from and old set of forks and how theyll be placed, Im welding in a 10mm bar through the old axle mounts this serve's as a packer to bring me out 10mm and hold everything lined up n true, and then ill shave it down flat to flt so I can snuggly fit the new piece's in, then weld it together at which point i'll cut away the 10mm bar inside and out leaving just 5mm packing of the bar itself which is already welded in etc,
hope the pic clears this up.

and just like that it now fits, a bit rough yes but..... anyway it wasnt all plain sailing,
you can see the disc is now not even close to the caliper, If I cant source a larger disc I may have to move the boss's down a bit!
the ever trusty "Eyeometer" failed today, after all intesnsive efforts to hold the forks true and fabricate both new dropouts exactly to the same dimensions, well it ended up once I put the wheel on it was leaning to one side, one of the drop outs was a whopping 5mm longer than the other, I spent an age measuring everything to find where the excess was.... couldnt find it, I think ive overheated some of the welds and warped the steel on one side.
So after deliberation with myself I decided to add a couple spot welds inside the longer drop out! then machined it to shape n size, I considered drilling out the shorter side but if I did that and make an error I now cant go back, by packing out the longer side I can grind that out and be back to square one if all go's pear shaped.
Well it worked and I now have the desired look im after for now.... thats coz im gonna take on the bars next!
And thats a purple led rope going around the real wheel, was mucking around with it, was a bit of a failure but @ $3.50 with its own battery pack inside the wheel it was a great attempt! just wasnt bright enough!

Ulu said:

I would definitely lose the caliper bracket.

View attachment 225837

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I looked at that but I was unsure of the structural integrity of the forks if I chop that caliper bracket that holds the two forks together, the bike wont be jumped and only ever cruising speed so would they be strong enough without that bracket.

as promised I attacked the bars last night. rain in brisbane means no work for me so its out to the man cave!
The reversed headstock was starting to annoy me so I hunted down a suitable replacement... once again only sourcing whats available in the shed, the original design had the bars welded to the reversed headstock, this brought the bars back for a laid back riding approach. but it was really bogan and horrid so to have it facing the right way meant finding a replacement that didnt protrude too far forward, all I could find was this squreish headstock and bars off the southern star drifter , hanging in waiting, a BMX styled one.


I chopped the bars back a bit and chopped the old bars off the welded headstock. Then got em just right....well for me anyway! and used the molecular displacement tool (hammer) to push the old bars onto the revamped bars off the drifter. then welded it all together, ground back for prettyness then some silver hammertone to protect from the overnight rain and moisture!
this morning I chucked em on and are quite plesed with the result. Although cosmeticly still a worry to look at I may even break out some hard epoxy and smooth those welds before final paint!




This restyled top end has given the bike a bit of beef and compliments the new forks quite well! Its given the bike a tiny bit more visual presence! not so drooped back, which I did like but the new forks kinda kicked things in this direction! I dont mind at all!
Im also gonna look at lowering that seat a couple inch's, got a couple ideas in mind there! and once this stupid weather settles and work picks up I can finally buy that back wheel and re-do the rear end frame n drop outs! I'll still keep the straight line design from headstock to rear drop outs, I just love that styled frame.... in either bicycle or Motorcycle!


The rear shot shows that tiny bit of rise at the front form the bars , just lifted enough to change the look of the bike the headstock facing the correct way helped greatly here, they are a touch wider than I wanted but now ive sat on it it gave me a real HD Fat Boy feel , all thats missing is the wide front tyre! (never owned a harley, Just dreaming of them)



So now im really undecided about the square heastock, I do have a rounded sort of hex type one that would fit the bill better, its rounded at the back but hexagonal at the clamps but its off the Hot Wheels Drifter, its an original front end on that machine so sadley it has to stay there!
In any case Im gonna spend this week painting and tidying up everything, hope to have it all done by next weekend!
Oh and ive removed the light for now, ive decided to splash out and buy a nice light for the front! might be better that way LOL! and pay no attention to the wiring clutter, all the LED strips on this bike are just experimental at this stage!

OK so rains on the way so I have to get this part done real quick!
Chopped out the old seat mount,... WOW I exposed some of the earlier welds of my bike building journey! the T intersection has a huge part missing, this happened because I didnt have the room to get right in there with the welder, it was a mammoth task cutting all this out, I stopped before I started cutting into the welds that were holding the bike together, ive left plenty of meat to re-attach the backrest , which has to be cut down a bit too.
Here's a bit of history on that back end. Towards the back, just after the 30mm verticle mainframe pipe, ive used parts of an old air compressor handle to join the seat and chain stay assemblie's, as they had to be widened, the compressor handle's attachments to it's tank were chopped and used as the angled supports from the seat stay corners to the top tube , this gave sideway's support and snuffed out the dreaded "wobble through the frame" which can affect extra long bicycle's.These had to be married to the seat and chain stay's , all over this bike ive had to join all sorts of different sized steel,tubes and supports to one another! its been a hard task and this is the reason that whole rear assembly looks wonky and horrid, just joining too many different shapes n sizes. Ive repaired 1 stress crack through the top right corner but other than that she's held solid and strong! yes its probably got 3x the amount of welds on it but like I said...its a whopping solid thing!

toro1978 said:

Or remove the brace and weld a horseshoe in its place.

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I really like that one!....Hmmmmmmm, I used to deliver horse feed to the stud about 2km from my place, I may take the pretend "whizzer" bike (F6 Typhoon) and go see them, they have a mutitude of different designed ones, as in hole arrangement / pattern. hmmm yeah i'll bring that one to the front burner for closer analysis. thanks!

Ulu said:

Maybe just a headlight mounted there....?

But I'd shave it.

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yep the lights comming back, I looked at light placement last night, your right that it needs to be there but its the height of the light that i'll be playing with. meaning I dont like lights reflecting oft the front wheel!, I like to have my lights way forward! its the mullet styled big front. if the lights too low we get reflection.. im still thinking hard about a front and rear wheel guards!

OK so the seats been dropped about 2", cut the backrest down also, I sat on it and it felt lovely, I had finally achieved the look I was after!
Again pay no attention to the GREEN GRIPS!!! and ORANGE HEADSET!!!! they will be changed. So I sat there looking at it taking pics etc etc, got the wife n kids out to look at it too....it was all on, I had a feeling of accomplishment and the sun was shining on nobody but me!..... I then took it for a ride!


Something has happened that I ...DID foresee , but thought it would only be minor....I was wrong!
With the lowering of the seat ive now done myself out of the power stoke in the legs! I can still comfortably ride the machine but after a whopping 150 meter jouney down the street I was tired as all buggery, my legs were now using muscles that didnt really come into play before, the knee bends too much and im at the bottom of the crank but still got a few inchs of power in that leg... so it was 300 meters all up return and it felt like i'd been hit in the thighs with a baseball bat! I even stopped twice! the third time was to look at a "for sale" sign on a house, wasnt even interested, just wanted another rest!
So I really only have one option here and thats to add a seat post n pole where the solid seat pole is (seat and pole is off wifes exercise bike, has to be super extra HEAVY DUTY!! for the use it gets!) uh oh, scroll, scroll here she comes LOL.

The plan here is to cut through that top tube where the solid is and install a short seat tube for adjustment up and down!


I know I know my welds are like solidified lava flows LOL But I have decided to rob yet more parts from the sons old BMX
I'll chop out that seat tube n pole, i'll try to leave a bit of meat around it so I then can decide if I want to bore a hole through the top tube on the blue meanie and use the smaller diameter seat tube to slide through it and weld there, or cut out a section of the top tube and weld the larger diameter top tube from the donor bike in its place! this would have the seat tube n pole assembly in place already .. 2 ways I could go but the boring a hole sounds a bit stronger but it will be really finicky and fiddley! im also eyeing off the crank case, cranks and sprockets for another build later in the year!



I also did some work on the disc brake front, rather than cut off the boss's and move them or cut off another set and weld them on all I did was used the bottom hole to mount the caliper in its top hole, then made up a crude but effective steel extnsion and welded it in place to reach over and meet the bottom caliper hole., looks really bogan but it'll get prettied up later in the next couple weeks!


I did have to use the molecular displacement tool to make some minor adjustments with those disc boss's but thats life LOL
But I thought i'd share a close up of Blue Meanie's rear brakes, has anyone ever seen such an atrociously designed rear brake! I tried to have them going against the rim but it was too bigger job when first starting this a year ago, I wont do it now coz a new wheel with a disc brake will take its place and besides the rubber on rubber effect pulls this thing up well, accompany the front disc and we have adequate braking for a machine that really will hit a top speed of 30kph, its just a slow cruiser LOL they do ware, ive been through a few sets already! I eventually found they worked best against the top of the sidewall , its a really hard part of the tyre, I had them a bit further down but the sidewalls a bit softer and they really didnt work well!

And heres more sad new for every one Ive since discovered that my beloved F6 Typhoon with the small 100cc 2 stroke is not allowed on the roads,
Heres the official wording from Queensland main roads, who police the roads etc!
No "Bicycle" or "Tricycle" may have an "Internal Combustion Engine fitted" and be used on queensland roads, foot paths, bike Paths or Bikeways. Even if the bicycle or tricycle is purchased brand new with an internal combustion engine already fitted it is still unable to be registered for use on the road and therefore is NON COMPLIANT! blah blah blah...(please refer to "when is a bicycle not a bicycle") and they rabble on about this n that .
BUT.... heres the reality of it all, you can go buy an electric bike or make one at home and go way faster and further than a petrol bike.....and thats just fine, no problem there!
I had every intention of motorising blue meanie... and still will but its gonna have to be 3X the cost and go electric, I even had the rear cog set up for the predator clone motor to attach, heres a vid, it was supposed to simply idle and the chain wont run on the motor because I built a left hand freewheel into the big silver dual sprocket, as you can all see, so when I pedaled I wouldnt turn the chain on the motor but when you accelerate the motor the cog picks up and the opposite side (pedaling side) begins to freewheel, to me anyway it was great plan but ill never get to go on with it! like I said a new wheel comming soon, and i'll try n make this same system work but off the jack shaft that steps around the wide wheel!

Had another change of plans, instead of cutting into the solid seat post I decided to leave it there, was too much work to get in and around everything and then tidy it up so what I come up with is I used that torch.... and heated it up just about 1 inch above the hiddeous backrest weld! and bent the backrest back a tiny bit, it worked a treat the seat now has good clearance as before it was quite tight against the backrest but the bonus here is the top part with the cushion has moved about 2 inch's back, this has actually moved me back a wee bit but not far enough to be comfortable.


so then I made this seat post extension, Just a cut down seat pole with an 8mm hole drilled in it and a nut welded over the hole. I then cut down an 8mm stainless allen head bolt and this is now used to secure the extension in for when I ride the bike. If the young bloke or any of the daughters , wife want to ride it I can then remove the extension!, they sit a bit lower and look way cooler but they can pedal in the sweeter spot as opposed to the high knee style if its too close!.... for me its left on so I can pedal in that sweet spot...it makes a huge difference, I have never come across this before LOL, so its good to problem solve!



So now we have two distinctly different looks, I actually love the lower look but for me to ride it this low would of meant moving the cranks forward , which promoted front Tyre strike when turning, or extend the back... which was an option but as said earlier when the new back wheel comes a new back end will also be made, those mods will be what they are gonna be but for now its just get it comfy till the cash frees up a bit, still getting hammered by 1 or 2 rainy days a week so after bills theres really only spare cash for beer and kids pocket money.....3 teens..=$50-$100 sometimes LOL
But back to the bike!..... I dont mind the look the new seat post give's, its actually tidied that seat area up a bit, made it a bit cleaner, but theres no denying that when the kids ride it they will look cooler coz the seats lower LOL.
if you compare the backrest to earlier pics from a few days ago you can see the extra room its created and now follows the frames line a bit better!

OK so with the finishing of the mini quad drifter I now move back to my beloved Blue Meanie Project!
Im a real big fan of those "Steam Punk Harleys" I love the way they use air bags to lower the bikes right down to the ground when not in use! Ive now decided I want to add this feature to my project, while not using compressed air I have another idea that I really do hope is gonna work! As per usual "Son Of Kradus" styling will be in play!
1st up is the removal of the pivot joint out the old Mongoose 1.5 downhill!,,, I tried for an age to remove the sprocket side but it was jammed solid, i used heat, hammers etc but it just wouldnt budge, I also sprained my wrist trying to punch it out with solid bar! in the end I had to cut it all away and remove the bearing case's from the crank set! once that was done I fabbed it up a bit and sleeved the end and prepared it for insertion



The MTB pivot joint will go here....... in this fashion.... sort of!


so that was the low part pivot.... Now I start on the .... "OFFICE CHAIR SPRING" these are great coz they got a good strong adjustment and very easy to trigger and install, the hard bit is fabricating the spring to fit on the bike... remembering ive just added one to my last project so im quietly confident this is gonna have some sort of success at actually working ha ha ha!! it really is an experiment....again!
in the next pic you can see ive already trimmed the top trigger part of the spring and shaped it, the handle get bent down to be parallel with the ram for cosmetics. we dont want it protruding way up like that!
Im gonna flare open the end of that yellow MTB spring bracket and weld it to the bottom of the chair spring, the top end gets a fabbed up special cover that protects the trigger mechanisim and a lug is welded to that!
So the general Idea of this is to have the spring fully open and thats the riding position but when parking up I pull the lever and the top tube shortens and pivots on the bottom tube, this brings the entire headstock, bars, forks and all, to fold back 4"-5" which will kick out the front forks which in turn will lift that front wheel up ,therefore lowering the crack case onto the ground.... or close to it, then when ive had my beer or whatever I can return to the bike, pull the lever, up she comes and I ride off... everyone will be cheering and singing as I ride away!..... maybe not but the intents there LOL.

Part 1 completed!, it went together surprisingly well! ive ridden the bike around the yard and it feels the same, lets hope its like this once ive put the adjustable spring in the top tube!



while looking horrid ive intentionally left all welds undressed, I dont wanna hide anything here but the horridness is due to me going over the whole thing and tidying it up, the welds close to the pivot could only be done in small lots, due to the inside plastic bush's, so theres a lot of starting and stopping to clean up with water in between to keep things from getting too hot, which is a nightmare .... but it is what it is LOL!
Ive managed to keep the lines in tact so far! the new joint looks ok where it is and im not minding it at all!
Tomorrow i'll start on more spring mod's, the attachment of the brackets to hold it in place, both ends must be able to swivel but have ZERO sideways movement! its the exact same mods I did on the mini quad rear spring!

only had time to finish the bottom bracket on the spring, as usual ive chucked on some blue hammer tone (sigh's.. again) to protect until final pain and in SOK fashion I got carried away and painted over half of it, which is a waste coz ive still got to modify the opposing end and its gonna get all scratched etc...anyway!!!
it cam out looking really good and should blend right in, the holes are slightly off set so i'll work around that when its due!
I tried to heat the end and flare it open so it fit the end of the springs outer tube, the cro moly didnt want to play at all and began to crack and fray. So I chopped a wee bit more off and restarted, I ended up cutting small slots around the end of the tube and then flared those, I only had to make up 1.5mm of space around the edge so this worked really well, I welded over the slots once I attached the 2 parts and it went according to plan, remembering I can only weld 1cm at a time then I quickly cool off with a spray bottle, then move to the opposite side or furtherest away space and weld there, this is to keep the heat inside the springs outer tube low, its a sealed unit so if it heats up too hot it can pressurize and blow etc etc so this is really the only way around it but it does come out a bit messy due to constant restarting of the welds as opposed to a long clean continuous weld, of which im prone to overheating and warping Grrrrr.
so tomorrow ill start on the top end which is really fiddly!