1968 ZZR Pionier

[Spike Spiegel]

Hello everyone.

I'm new here but I've been following this site for quite some time now, and I decided to register and post some of the projects I'm working on.
I'm a rat-style enthusiast from Warsaw, Poland, and I'm in the only polish club that specializes in this style, the Ratlook.pl.

This project could be called a stretch limo I wanted to experiment with building such a thing but I was looking for a perfect frame that would be a. Polish made b. old as hell and c.It would be something very original. A bike that has been forgotten in our country. One time I was serching an abndoned basement where I found this:


It was some leftovers from an old polish bike "Pionier"(Pionieer) made by ZZR ( stands for Zjednoczone Zakłady Rowerowe - United Bicycle Factories. They had 3 major plants in Poznań, Bydgoszcz an Czechowice, later ZZR was renamed to "Romet"). The frame numbers suggested it was produced around 1968. It was a small bike for children of age 8 to 12 and it had the rare 22" wheels. It had the orginal straight pinstripes left on the frame and the orgiginal stencil + some stickers from the mid '70.

I had some experience with these bikes since I found a simillar bike - the ZZR "Szarotka" (Edelweiss) wich was identical except the frame was for girls , and the Szarotka I've found was almoast complete.
The frame was in pretty decent shape but the fenders and the steering bar war badly corroded, because the basement was flodded many years ago.


Through the years I've collected many bicycle parts and complete bicycles and decided to give a try and make something out of nothing. I had the 22" wheel leftovers from my '59 Szarotka and, while helping my neighbor with cleaning his apartment I found an original 22" tube that was brand new! It's a very rare loot since the 22" wheels were not made since circa 1986. So the first thing I came up with was to make it look like this:


The original frame, steering bar, front wheel (I had a complete front wheel, 2 tyres, a rim and a tube, all sized 22") and a 20" wheel from a Wigry - a classic and common folding bicycle from the same producer, and a fork fitted for a 28" wheel. I collected all the parts and put it together with slight modification. The steering bar was from a Simson Enduro motorcycle, the stem was from a mountain bike, the cranks, crankshat and pedals came from a 20" wheel BMX made also by Romet. The saddle and handle bars came also from a Wigry bicycle. The biggest problem was the seat post. ZZR bicycles used a 25mm or 28mm posts that were narrowed to 22mm on the upper side to fit the saddle. This one had 22mm all-round :| The only bikes that came with this kind of post were the BMX bicycles from Romet. Ofcourse I could buy a new one but I decided to do it better an cheaper It took a lot of measuring (and a lot of thinking ) to find the solution - the stem from the Wigry bicycle is nicely bent at the end and it has a measurment of 21mm. So i cut down the part where you mount the handle and wraped it up in aluminium I recycled from beer cans :mrgreen: (Yeah, that helped me think on it A LOT :mrgreen: ). I rode it for a month or so, and then a terrible thing happend. The front tyre was in very bad shape and it exploded along with the tube . I left the bike for a couple of months and decided to make it look better. My idea was to make something longer but with no modification to the original frame. So I cut down one of the spare frame of a Wigry Bicycle and came up with this:


The idea was to make a bike with rear suspension mounted instead of the rear wheel. Those plans where bad from the beginig. After a lot of working and welding it came to me that the spring is not bending in the right way :| So the project was abandoned for another couple of months. A few weeks ago I decided to finally make it work, and just build it as a hardtail. I found some frame leftovers, a couple of hours working with the cutter and an electrical welding machine and voila!


I took it to my workplace and had it washed (yeah I work at a Car Wash - Robo Wash Center) with Forlega acid normally used to intense wash very dirty alloy wheels. It burnt down the original paint to flat I know that the welds look awfull but from one side the tubes are put into one another, and on the otherside i welded 10mm in diamater and almoast 8cm long screws so that it would not collapse . The front light is from an unknown bicycle (I bought a package containing 5 head lamps, 2 generators and 3 sets of wheel pump mountings from old bikes, on a polish auction page called allegro, for a price of 30PLN (Less than 10$)), the rear fender is original, only shortened, the chain is made from 3 chains, and ofcourse I had to replace the front wheel with a '24" wheel made in Chechoslovakia that I found on a pile of trash. The project isn't finished yet, becouse I'm still working on many details, but till now it costed me almoast nothing. You could call it a "leftover junk bicycle", The only thing that I paid for is the steering bar (That i bought back in '04 for my custom Wigry bicycle) for 70PLN (about 20$) and the head lamp that came from the 10$ package. Hope you enjoy this build :mrgreen:

 

[kingfish254]

I like the way your longtail is looking!

 

[OneHorsePower]

be care full , if those rear tube fail .... you get the picture
but i like it , a litlle sanding and painting and it shoud look pretty sweet

 

[Spike Spiegel]

As i wrote earlier, theres no way that it would brake And no sanding and painting for it - it stays as it is Original Rat-Rod patina

 

[Spike Spiegel]

Ok, here are some updates!

I rode this baby for over 500km since it was finished, and it drives nicely, but I needed some lights, mostly because I work till 21:00, and since my car needs some body work I need to ride 15km daily to work, and home. I still wanted it to be as cheap as possible, and to go along with the style I want it to be. So I went to a local store and bought this for only 5.98PLN (witch is less then 2$):

It has 7 LED's for the front with a reflector, 5 LED's in the back (that I used for the rear light) and 2 additional LED's in blue/red colors to imitate a police light. I found, that the original switch, was still in pretty good condition, but still I decidet to use some acid to make it nice and clean., after a few hours of working with a hot-glue pistol and some soldering I got it up and working.

Still I had no light in the back, so I used a tin can, that was used for tomato paste I then found a plastic light cover and cut it out tho the shape.


And this is how they work :

And the "Police Mode" :

As you can see on the photos, the switch has 3 positions - Center - OFF, Right - MAIN LIGHTS, and Left - POLICE MODE (only front light)
I also got a big problem - the element, that I used to mount the front light and the front fender was to thin to handle the weight of the big lamp, and also the fender (it was desinged to mount a little plastic lamp) + the bumpy roads and sidewalks of Warsaw made it broke in half So I had to make a better one... more solid... and also give that repair more Ratty-look :


I also found some new/old pedals. The plastic ones looked kinda' weird on it, so I found a set of these:

The sign is in Russian and it says: Zdielano w CCCP wich means Made in USSR. They were originaly for most russian bikes including the most famous bikes - The HWZ Ukraine and the HWZ Ural.
I also mounted the original reflector on a piece of the original fender that i shortened:

I used some polishing paste to give it that shiny look. I also used some of that paste for the wheels and bullet shells that work as covers for the valves:

Sadly I had to bent the seat post straight because it couldn't handle my weight (oh well... need to lose some of it ) You can also see the cables that I used - They're from a broken PS2 keyboard (my friend spilled hot coffe on it ) And I fited the battery compartment (I used the one that was in that chinese lamp) inside the tool box underneath the seat.

I also found a mirror that was made as an universal part for polish bikes. It was made in the city of Gniezno, and it's dated 1978.

Unfortunetly it's made from aluminium, and it was originally painted (despite the YT Polish movie called "To je amelinium", where a drunk old guys goes about "This is made from amelinium you can't paint it!" ), but I plan to strip it from the black paint and polish it to high gloss.
I found this in my basement (that's full of old bicycle parts ) :

It's an original Plastic Water Bottle with an universal rack that was made for the ZZR Hurricane racing bicycles in the mid '60, and it's signed with the ZZR logo
And this is how it looks overall:


I still need to buy new whitewall's for it, and make a licence plate

 

[GTR]

looks pretty cool. i'd try a piece of flat stock to reinforce the fenders. put a little radius on it and weld it in place. should make it sturdy enough for the lights.

 

[kingfish254]

The build is looking good Spike.
I just saw that you are from Warsaw. My wife and I plan to be there for Christmas this year. Maybe we can meet up for a beer and talk bikes?

 

[Spike Spiegel]

Why not kingfish254 Also if you need to get your car washed I know the best place for it :wink:

GTR - I thoght about it, and there is one major problem with it. After the basement was floded year ago, the fenders got very badly rusted :? The rear one was breaking in one place, so my friend tried to weld it so it would not brake while I ride it. He turned the welding machine to only 20Amps and it still burnt through the metal liek a hot knife through butter. When I striped some of the rust with a grinder I found, that the metal is as thin as a beer can :? Sadly, the whole bike has the worst paint I ever saw on bikes, It comes of with just about anything, including fingernails, I guess the main problem is, they didn't use no primer on this bike, and the paint has nothing to hold to.

I'm also thinkig about making a banana seat. I recently found an original seat post made by the ZZR, but I can't find a seat that would fit it (absolutely no banana seats in polish bike shops ), and I also found an old chainsaw that i striped down for the engine. I'll try to make it start trough the winter and maybe make the Pioneer a motor bike But first things first I bought a car that needs a lot of work with the body (that's corroded badly), a new clutch and a new rear axle, but I don't mind that, because i bought it for only 400PLN (about 100$)