Desert Danger

[LAGreg]

This will be my second ever build. My only goal is to finish within the set parameters. I'm starting with a nasty cruiser frame I bought for $5 from a bike shop in Palm Springs. It literally had desert sand inside the bottom bracket. It also had at least three layers of paint on it, maybe more. I can't get the seat tube out AND it's misshapen at the top. So that's fun. But I found a little girl's bike and I'm using the 18" white rims and pink tire as my front. And a 26" rusted Huffy one speed as the rear. After that... the bike will take the shape of whatever parts I can find that fit the rules.

 

[Short Stuff]

Good luck with that one Greg. It looks like a fun project. OT here but only slightly. I once bought and old 870 12 gauge police cruiser gun. It was kind of dirty on the outside. But you could hardly work the slide. I bought it accordingly. I took it apart and got a whole lot of white sand out of it. I had to completely dismantle and all the inside parts - clean 'em, teflon flat black coated, and then baked on. It is now slicker than the proverbial snot on a door knob. That was my experience with buying something cheap with sand in it. And by the way I know of NO white sand in the state of Misery where it was purchased by me, just north of Kansas City. Be Well, SS.

 

[CRASH]

Are you sticking with that... uhhhhh... "paint"? lol

 

[LAGreg]

The paint will be coming off for sure! In fact I already stripped it twice and sanded a bit and got through much of it. I may go with a desert themed color when I get there.

 

[Verrt]

 

[MattiThundrrr]

I don't like bad star wars movies. Worse than sand in your bottom bracket

 

[LAGreg]

I don't like bad star wars movies. Worse than sand in your bottom bracket

I was able to get the sand out of my bottom bracket. But I can't get Attack of the Clones out of my head... no matter how much I drink.

 

[MattiThundrrr]

 

[LAGreg]

Turns out there’s a steel frame under all that paint. I was also able to get the seat tube out with WD40, ice, a pipe wrench and vice grip. I gotta say, there's a lot more sanding in this hobby than I expected.

 

[LAGreg]

I picked up ape hangers and a banana seat from a local repair shop - of note, the owner was wearing a chicken suit. No judgment there. The handle bars are in pretty good shape once the rust was removed, with some chrome loss here and there. The seat came from your grandad's bike. The foam, such as it is, will be like sitting on a 2x4. It's already 20% electrical tape and since I'm going for a camouflage paint job, I may just cover it entirely in camo patterned duct
tape.

I temp assembled it to see what I've got and so far so good.

 

[LAGreg]

My attempt at a camouflage pattern paint job. I realized very quickly that I'd never have the time or patience to do ALL the squiggly blobs that are in a real camo pattern so I went for green/tan under colors and brown blobs, and honestly should add more of those too.

 

[Bike from the Dead]

I don't like bad star wars movies. Worse than sand in your bottom bracket

Not gonna lie, some of the memes that came out of those movies are pretty good.

 

[sdframe]

Hey, it's shaping up nicely!

 

[LAGreg]

Getting there... Seat taped up, sissy bar in place, green grips, bullet shaped valve covers fixed to former break stems, bad-a$$ soldier skull gear shift cover attached to handle bars. Waiting for my pink rear tire and I’ll have all the pieces in place.

 

[LAGreg]

Well I have an issue. My new pink back tire came in and unfortunately the old front tire is SO faded that they don't look good together. Also, I really liked the idea of the camo, skull, bullet theme with the pink tires. But the more I look at it them, the more I don't like it in action. Even if someone knows a way to bring the life back into the faded tire, I think I'm just going to go with standard black on both and save the pinks for something else.

That being said, does anyone know a way to bring the color back into a faded tire?

 

[RustyGold]

I'd try Aerospace 303.

Maybe atf or marvel mystery oil.

*No warranty implied or expressed*

 

[LAGreg]

Nearly done. Black tires are much better than pink which looked good in my mind but not in the real world. Road it around the neighborhood last night. Very fun to ride and got stopped several times by neighbors asking about it. Once the sun set though I realized I was essentially invisible with one meager reflector, and no light. Not to mention it's Camouflaged!

 

[LAGreg]

After my evening darkness ride I decided to add lights. These were harvested from old Halloween decorations. I haven't road tested them yet but they're LED's and should be plenty bright to be seen even if they don't light my way. I'll also add some type of red light or reflector on the back.

 

[LAGreg]

I’m nearly done. It seems though there could be endless tinkering if I’m not careful. When I was a filmmaker (in another lifetime) I would say, “The movie’s never done, but eventually you just have to stop.”

I didn’t like the camo pattern of the tape on the seat. So I got some matching camo fabric and am trying to cover it. We’ll see how it goes.

 

[LAGreg]

I watched a couple YouTube videos and here’s what I got as a result. Cut, glued and clamped the heck out of it. And it turned out OK. I couldn’t get out all the wrinkles but for a first ever re-cover I’m pretty happy. Much better than the tape pattern.

Also, I’m pretty much done. Anything else would be tinkering. I don’t really how to post a finished build. If I understand right there needs to be a “completed” thread. Do I simply start a new one in the Build section? And do I need to do anything special to indicate it’s my completed project? I can’t be the first to finish can I? Am I simply not seeing the other finished threads?