The 442

[CRASH]

I’ve been hired to build a bike to compliment a collector’s prize muscle car. He’s got an Oldsmobile Cutlass 442 in Matador Red. So I found him a 1969 Huffy Slingshot. It’ll be brought back in Matador red and will have white accents!and fresh chrome.

The current state of the bike:

 

[The Renaissance Man]

This should be good!

 

[Captain Awesome]

 

[kingfish254]

Way to go man! This should be a slick commission piece!

 

[ifitsfreeitsforme]

oh ya. Fun.

 

[CRASH]

Tore it down. I’ll get the frame and fenders blasted this week. I’ll take the parts in to chrome, but going to have to evaluate some of them. The pitting is pretty deep on some of them.

The rest are just a mess with no finish left on them at all.

 

[CRASH]

The bolt on the seat post bracket was totally wrong. I thought I had an original, but I was wrong. So I’m going to switch it for a little extra bling. I just need to file out the round hole to fit the square recesses.

 

[CRASH]

Dropped off parts to chrome.

 

[CRASH]

Speaking of chrome, the console is a little rough.

So, I need to get the old chrome off so I can send it off to get refinished.

Should be ready in a day, but I’ll leave it till the weekend.

Lowes only sells this is 2 gallon packs, and I’m only using about a half gallon. So I guess I’ll donate the rest to a pool cleaning guy.

 

[CRASH]

The front fender isn’t correct for this bike. If you know my builds, you know I’m a stickler for authenticity as much as possible. The real 16” front fender for a Slingshot is very hard to find, but I happen to have one. But the one I have was trash, which is the reason I have it. My original hope (from the picture I bought it from) was it was salvageable enough to rechrome. That was far from the case as it was horribly pitted. So I hung on to it just because. So now I have this project, which will have painted fenders. So here is an opportunity to use the correct fender in poor condition. So I really need to engage my body work skills.

Today I blasted off the corrosion. The blasting revealed deeper weakness in the metal. So now it looks like Swiss cheese.

So… bondo will be used liberally.

 

[Ulu]

Where do you get chrome done in Visalia?

 

[CRASH]

Where do you get chrome done in Visalia?

Visalia Custom Chrome

 

[CRASH]

Got both the tires. They'll need some cleaning and love, but will make a great pair.

 

[CRASH]

The seat mount bolt now fits great!

 

[CRASH]

I checked on the shift console this morning and I think this muriatic acid is weaker than I’ve used before. Here’s how it looked when I opened up the top.

That’s disappointing, so I scraped all I could off it and stuck it back in for another soak.

 

[Ulu]

It probably needs to be warmer. Chemicals work slowly when cold.

 

[markthatcher1]

That’s true, they do. Or the government changed the strength limit!

 

[CRASH]

It probably needs to be warmer. Chemicals work slowly when cold.

It has been pretty cold here. Good to know. I'll check it again tonight.

 

[CRASH]

I'm going to add some flare. The '70 442 this bike is meant to compliment has a disc brake addition. So I'm going to add a disc brake to the bike. The guy really likes this brake system...

So I found this exact system.

And the front rim of the Slingshot is an Araya, so I found a 36h Araya 20" rim to match the front. (Since Huffy didn't make a 36h rim in 20" with the Huffy drop center.)

This is going to fill up the back end, but will look really cool!

 

[CRASH]

Blasted.