This bike has been a LONG time in the making, and I actually started the build back in August. But since my Navy duties took me out of the scene for a couple months, the bike went to a friend (RonK) to get some fab work, powdercoat, and sent to Adam (karfer67) for graphics and pinstripe. The bike came back into my hands tonight, so I decided to chronical the last days of the build. My deadline is Christmas morning. Let me get you up to speed.
This is for my middle son. His initials are L.A.C. So... BLACKJACK. The concept: This is some sort of 50's 20" tank bike. No one can give me an answer as to what, but oh well. So I want to stay with a 50's theme. I'm going with a 50's hot rod cruiser look. Satin black, red rims, white walls, springer fork, pin stripes. Sure, it's a concept that's far from original. But my son is 8, and there is nothing like it where we live, so it will be unique for him, and that's what matters.
Here's an initial mock-up. It's a 26" Monark guard. I got a lot of positive response about using this guard full length, and maybe using the back end to add a read light. However, due to a mix-up, this chain guard didn't get powdercoated with the rest of the bike and parts. That's going to be rectified this week, but it won't be ready in time for Christmas, so I'm using a chrome Wald guard I have, and I'm going to rattle can some black on it to blend it with the bike for Christmas morning show. Or maybe I'll go guardless at first. We'll see.
I worked with a graphic artist friend and came up with the following:
I tossed around some tank ideas. I bought a little tank here on RRB from a girls bike with the thought I could tweak it to make it work.
Utimately, it just didn't have the look I wanted. So, I went with plan C. Plan B was to have a tank constructed from sheet metal. A guy on RRB did one for his kid's bike, and it looked awesome. But in the interest of not going totally broke (Which I've horribly failed), I opted for plan C, which was just a single piece of metal filling in the gap. All the joints were re-welded to clean up the 60 year old welds. This is actually the third and final attempt. The first two with a thinner sheet resulted in warping when the sheet was cut. So we had to go with thicker.
This is how the frame and rims looked back from the powdercoater.
karfer67 gets started:
karfer67 finishes:
So, I've got it back. I've got about 6 days (to have any cushion). Time to GET TO BUILDIN'!!
This is for my middle son. His initials are L.A.C. So... BLACKJACK. The concept: This is some sort of 50's 20" tank bike. No one can give me an answer as to what, but oh well. So I want to stay with a 50's theme. I'm going with a 50's hot rod cruiser look. Satin black, red rims, white walls, springer fork, pin stripes. Sure, it's a concept that's far from original. But my son is 8, and there is nothing like it where we live, so it will be unique for him, and that's what matters.
Here's an initial mock-up. It's a 26" Monark guard. I got a lot of positive response about using this guard full length, and maybe using the back end to add a read light. However, due to a mix-up, this chain guard didn't get powdercoated with the rest of the bike and parts. That's going to be rectified this week, but it won't be ready in time for Christmas, so I'm using a chrome Wald guard I have, and I'm going to rattle can some black on it to blend it with the bike for Christmas morning show. Or maybe I'll go guardless at first. We'll see.
I worked with a graphic artist friend and came up with the following:
I tossed around some tank ideas. I bought a little tank here on RRB from a girls bike with the thought I could tweak it to make it work.
Utimately, it just didn't have the look I wanted. So, I went with plan C. Plan B was to have a tank constructed from sheet metal. A guy on RRB did one for his kid's bike, and it looked awesome. But in the interest of not going totally broke (Which I've horribly failed), I opted for plan C, which was just a single piece of metal filling in the gap. All the joints were re-welded to clean up the 60 year old welds. This is actually the third and final attempt. The first two with a thinner sheet resulted in warping when the sheet was cut. So we had to go with thicker.
This is how the frame and rims looked back from the powdercoater.
karfer67 gets started:
karfer67 finishes:
So, I've got it back. I've got about 6 days (to have any cushion). Time to GET TO BUILDIN'!!
