Jamis and some Kabuki theater

[fouts14]

Found this 80s Jamis Earth Cruiser recently in pretty good shape. Sometime in its past someone messed around with it as it has redline cranks and grips.



The kabuki theater is this frankensteinish road bike I picked up a little while ago - mostly for the parts that didn't belong on it. Its a 1975 Kabuki Skyway, made by Bridgestone.

The Persons seat found a home on my schwinn rat right away. It also sported a double clamp stem and Finish Line grips.
The bike itself has some oddball features. No seat post clamp, the seat post is held in with a wedge like the old stems, and it had a disk brake in the rear(1975!)


It also has one of the coolest head badges I've seen

Kinda Darth Maul looking.

 

[Bicycle808]

Insidious I

 

[LukeTheJoker]

Both awesome finds!

Luke.

 

[Robertk]

Put the disc brake on the Earth Cruiser maybe?

 

[rickpaulos]

I've owned several of the Kabuki / Bridgestone bikes. They aren't made like any other bike. The aluminum lugs are cast in place around the steel frame tubes. The bb has a threaded insert, also cast in place. The lugs often have spear points on the surface that are just for looks. The internally expanding seat post is needed because you can't flex cast aluminum without it breaking. IMO, The coolest Kabuki is the Submariner. Same basic construction but the main tubes are polished stainless steel and they slightly upgraded the parts. I've pasted in a photo of a decal that was on a few of the frames that shows the construction. The tubes are crimped at the ends for 2 reasons. One to keep them from sliding out of the lugsand second, to trap a disk (plug) in the end to keep the molten aluminum from filling in the tubes. The only "welding" on the frames/forks are the fork ends. Even the fork crowns are cast in place. No welding means the steel isn't over heated and loses strength. The bikes tend to ride kinda stiff. I've never seen one fail despite the unusual construction. Many odd ball bikes have a pretty high failure rate but not these.

That unique disk brake has the mounting tab welded to the seat stay. The disk is threaded onto the hub.

Rick

 

[LukeTheJoker]

I've owned several of the Kabuki / Bridgestone bikes. They aren't made like any other bike. The aluminum lugs are cast in place around the steel frame tubes. The bb has a threaded insert, also cast in place. The lugs often have spear points on the surface that are just for looks. The internally expanding seat post is needed because you can't flex cast aluminum without it breaking. IMO, The coolest Kabuki is the Submariner. Same basic construction but the main tubes are polished stainless steel and they slightly upgraded the parts. I've pasted in a photo of a decal that was on a few of the frames that shows the construction. The tubes are crimped at the ends for 2 reasons. One to keep them from sliding out of the lugsand second, to trap a disk (plug) in the end to keep the molten aluminum from filling in the tubes. The only "welding" on the frames/forks are the fork ends. Even the fork crowns are cast in place. No welding means the steel isn't over heated and loses strength. The bikes tend to ride kinda stiff. I've never seen one fail despite the unusual construction. Many odd ball bikes have a pretty high failure rate but not these.

That unique disk brake has the mounting tab welded to the seat stay. The disk is threaded onto the hub.

Rick

That is really interesting!
Thanks for sharing!

Luke.

 

[BlueFlame]

Love that disc brake ! Nice bike

 

[ChimeraCycle]

I have an amf roadmaster road bike, made by bridgestone. Phenomenal rider. After owning for over a year, i discovered some of the tubing is aluminum, or (perhaps painted stainless??). I judge my bike to be late 70s. I wonder of they share genealogy?

Sent from my SCH-R970 using Tapatalk

 

[rickpaulos]

I have an AMF that was made in England so they certainly did some outsourcing/importing.

You can try a magnet. Good stainless steel isn't magnetic. Regular steel is. And of course aluminum isn't.

Rick