Little Bubba

[rickpaulos]

Been real busy fixing kids bikes for xmas. I have 127 bikes ready for Toys for Tots so far. 4 working days left. But I took today off to do this one.

Mongoose Lil' Bubba. 16 x 3 fat tire kids bike. July 2016 serial number. Got it two years ago and I had the idea of this sort of build right away. Just been on the back burner ever since.

came with a spare gooseneck.
seat shot.
and yes, the colors faded big time. Even under the grips. My camera doesn't show the original neon yellow well so it's hard to see just how faded it is. Too cold to do any painting here so it just got some cleaning.

 

[rickpaulos]

A complete tear down. All the bearings needed cleaning and regreasing. The crank bearings were falling out and the left cone was worn very unevenly so that got replaced. Kids bikes have so many different "standards". It took a bit of mining in the parts bin to find a cone that fit. Chain guard mounts cut off and filed smooth. Wheels and tires were in good shape aside from the bearings.

 

[rickpaulos]

parts!

 

[rickpaulos]

Well the stem was the wrong size. A .833 when the fork needed a 7/8. Horrid plastic no ball bearing pedals replaced with some semi decent cast aluminum full size (with ball bearings!) Seat post replaced with a much longer post.

Test rides. Well the cranks are too short but nothing can be done about that. The juvi size bb shell means standard cranks won't fit.

 

[rickpaulos]

Done!

Fun to ride if you don't go far or up hill with those short cranks.

 

[Captain Awesome]

Done!

Fun to ride if you don't go far or up hill with those short cranks.

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That's rad

 

[rickpaulos]

Found a stock photo showing the color. yes, it fades.

 

[rickpaulos]

One adjustment I made was to reverse the seat clamp the post to move the seat and center of gravity forward a bit. The front wheel was coming up off the floor just sitting on it.

 

[Bike from the Dead]

No kidding. Hey, at least they gave a heads-up!

I don't think I've even seen a 16" fat tire bike before! That's pretty cool! And it's strong enough for an adult to ride?! Dang, now I want to build one of those! I think you did a good job fixing up that little bike! And massive respect for fixing 100+ bikes for Toys for Tots. To me, that's even cooler than the Little Bubba bike.

 

[Pondo]

Great job on the build, it came out great! Great job too on the Toys for Tots bikes!

 

[twojs.bike]

Agreed. Massive respect for building that many bikes for toys for tots!

 

[rgrrbt]

What a great project. Your going to bring a lot of smiles to the recipients of these bikes. Good on ya!

 

[rickpaulos]

140 bikes transferred to Toys for Tots today. Whew.

 

[rgrrbt]

Wow! Congratulations. That had to be a lot of work.

 

[Pestcontrol02]

That’s beautiful man.
God bless you

 

[rickpaulos]

Final count is 140