Space Patrol Bike

[pebblewurm]

I never really liked purple all that much, but my original intention was to keep as much of the original paint as possible, so purple it was! This shade/method is growing on me. I did get side tracked on a project with my daughter for a couple of weeks, but I am now back at it! We do have a presentable steamer trunk to stash things out of sight, out of mind now. Silver coat on the tank went on today.

 

[pebblewurm]

And the silver over the fiberglass looks less shiney than over metal... Hopefully the clear purple will do the same as a clear shiny coat and brighten it up. I still have some work to do on the lights.

 

[pebblewurm]

Still nibbling away on this. The crank I pulled off of a BMX bike was threaded for 1/2", and the nice East German pedals I am using were 9/16 so I drilled them out and re-tapped. The Harbor Freight tap wrench broke in the process. To keep priced ludicrously low they have to cut corners somewhere, and in this case it was the wrench-pot metal body and kinda skimpy and undersized all around. At least this gives me an excuse to buy a Greenfield. I also routed out a slot in the pedal blocks for some neat glass and plastic reflectors I found on ebay. They are held in by a somewhat tight fit and Barge cement. Look different, work very well as reflectors and don't look like normal pedal reflectors.

 

[Fv2]

Cool pedals you have there.

 

[kingfish254]

Cool fab work on those pedals!!!

 

[The Renaissance Man]

Checking in on the convertibles for updates!

 

[pebblewurm]

Still grinding away, but not spending as much time on it as I'd like. All the parts that need to be purple are now purple, but I've had some glitches in the finishing end. For some reason after the silver base was baked on, the purple clear started to wrinkle the remnants of the factory paint on the chainguard. In the past I've considered the factory paint to be an impervious base coat. Live and learn. So I'm doing some color sanding... And trying out some trim and decoration options:

Also, I got a little side tracked by an interesting piece of junk in a municipal metal pile near where I am working. Of course it was underneath a bunch of stuff and jammed up against the fence behind a pile of stoves and refrigerators, but by Friday they had taken a trailer load of white goods to the scrapper so it was MINE, all mine!

Some kind of restaurant or medical table base- stainless steel trim and a vacuformed plastic shell on the bottom. From the instant I saw it I thought it could make a nice fender tip:

Close, but probably harder to integrate than it seems. If I apply myself I could have this put together by the 31st, but I'm not sure I could call it done by then. But I'm having fun with it!

 

[kingfish254]

Those are cool table base pieces.
To me they scream tank side scoops.

 

[pebblewurm]

I like that idea! They are a little beat up, but they're going on a rat rod anyway...

 

[pebblewurm]

Well, I will not make the deadline. BUT I'm still having fun with this project and should get it finished up soon, depending on weekend plans.

 

[The Renaissance Man]

Looking forward to it, keep us posted.

 

[LukeTheJoker]

Looking forward to it, keep us posted.

+1...

Luke.

 

[pebblewurm]

I'll keep grinding away on this one- muscle bikes and BMX have always left me a little cold- I'm more of a commuter and tourer at heart.