RRBBO13 Ankle Biter

[kingsting]

Frame after being stripped, bent, twisted, pried on, abused, re-aligned, sworn at, cleaned, and polished. The original paint is in really nice shape!
I ended up reusing most of the original headset. One thing I found with Rollfast/Harris/Snyder is that nothing is really standardized with them. All of my spare headset and BB cups fit too loose in the frame, none of my crown races were the right profile, and the seatpost is an oddball size. Could be why you don't see many of these turned into klunkers.

 

[kingsting]

Some of the easier parts are installed. We now have an idea of what it will look like!

 

[The Renaissance Man]

That looks awesome! Love the way these little bikes look.

Nice collection of Park tools also.

 

[OddJob]

^ Yeah. I was going to ask if you had stock in Park Tool.

 

[SSG]

That paint really cleaned up well.

 

[kingsting]

^ Yeah. I was going to ask if you had stock in Park Tool.

I just now noticed there is a lot more Park stuff in my pictures than I thought. My tool obsession is getting out of hand!

 

[kingfish254]

Frame came out great. It was fun watching you use all of your killer tools.
Love the wheels/tires on that frame!

 

[SkyknightJohn]

I just now noticed there is a lot more Park stuff in my pictures than I thought. My tool obsession is getting out of hand!

I allow myself one “fancy” tool a year. Slowly growing the collection. I know there are so many ways to do things, and if doing that thing rarely it’s fine, but having the right tool sometimes is so nice compared to ‘hammer it!’ method when you have to do it frequently.

 

[kingsting]

Not much building today, just some more parts scavenging and another cool tool shot...

I had been saving a Brooks B-72 for my next klunker build but it just looked too big for this little bike. I thought a narrower one from a road bike might look better and remembered I had this old, well-worn Japanese Belt saddle stashed away.

I wanted to use some 70's style rat trap pedals for this one since all my good platforms were the wrong size (9/16"). It took some searching but after digging deep into one of my buried parts bins, I came up with these! Perfect!

Another tool I bought that I didn't think would see much use is a set of pedal taps. These get more action than I ever imagined and have saved a lot of time and quite a few cranksets over the years. There are an awful lot of ham-fisted home mechanics out there that booger up pedal threads. The taps do a great job of cleaning them up.

 

[OneHorsePower]

nice little bike ! lovin all the specialized tools too

 

[kingsting]

nice little bike ! lovin all the specialized tools too

Thanks! I love my tools too but this was supposed to be a quick simple build. I didn't think I would have had to use any of them on a fairly clean, single speed kids bike.

 

[SoulGarageOH]

What size are those rims? I can't imagine there would be much clearance with those beastly tires.

 

[kingsting]

What size are those rims? I can't imagine there would be much clearance with those beastly tires.

These are 20" heavy duty steel wheels that showed up in the late 70's on some off-brand BMX and full suspension bikes. I remember seeing them on Rampar and Fuji bikes when I was a kid. The little Rollfast frame and fork has plenty of room for fat tires.

 

[kingfish254]

The pedals and saddle should work nicely on this lil bugger

 

[Funkme]

I'm with RM on this want to see you ride it...
And of course with a wheelie in the mix...
have to admit,the kids bikes are cute.

 

[kingsting]

I'm with RM on this want to see you ride it...
And of course with a wheelie in the mix...
have to admit,the kids bikes are cute.

The bike is pretty much done. I'm still working on a cleaner solution for some seatpost shims that aren't made from beer cans (The short stock post is a strange size - smaller than a standard BMX but bigger than the Schwinn sized posts I have) and I want truss rods on it but will have to make something there...

And yes, I can ride it. Here is photographic evidence of my fat self zipping around on it!

You might be asking a bit much for a wheelie. Humpty Dumpty on this little bike with short cranks may have trouble cranking one up!

 

[Funkme]

Look you still have a smile like a kid with his first BMX.

 

[kingsting]

Look you still have a smile like a kid with his first BMX.

But of course! The little thing is a fun ride!

 

[kingfish254]

Clean little bugger!
Truss rods will definitely make it even cooler

 

[kingsting]

The truss rods are proving to be more of a headache than I originally thought. After a couple false starts with an old sissy bar that was too short and an original set off of a JC Higgins that was too long, I decided to use some materials I had laying around and wing it...

I have some 3/8" OD aluminum rod and some 3/8" ID steel conduit which should work. Going to make the axle end out of the conduit and do an interference fit with the rod.

Made the dropouts by smashing the end of the conduit. High tech stuff going on here...

Drilled and smoothed out a little bit...

Completed! The little "socks" press fit nicely onto the ends. I even got a nice 45 degree bend in the rod without breaking it!

I needed a way to fasten these to the steerer tube. Had this in a parts drawer. It's probably some rare, valuable pre-war item but It will work for what I need it to do.

The top ends need drilled and tapped then they'll bolt on to the bracket. I plan on painting them an ivory color to match the stripes.