The Benny.. Or how I spent my Sunday.

karfer67 · Aug 4, 2008

stunning bike hope you dont mind i am going to be making my own jig and i have taken notes

MonsterMetal · Aug 4, 2008

karfer67 said:
stunning bike hope you dont mind i am going to be making my own jig and i have taken notes

Heck no... why would I mind? I ripped off the uni-strut idea from someone on the chopper forum..

Uncle Stretch said:
Since you have the tools ,and the skills ,I'm surprised you messed with cutting up a frame. Its just pipe ,seems like with that jig you would just build a frame.
I had pretty good luck designing my own. :wink:

Yeah... Its not so much about that. It was suppose to be a quick and dirty one day "mod" bike using all the original parts. Well one thing lead to another, the way they usually do and then you got this. I still really dont have that much time in it and the only other money spent on the bike was for a $20 1 1/8" threadless headset when I decided to chop off the 1" headtube and build the fork. The rest of the parts came off donor bikes I already had.. It took longer to build the fork and machine the new head tube than the whole rest of the bike. I'll probably pull a couple of the more expensive parts and give this to a neighborhood kid at some point, that's what happens to most of my build bikes.

I got a couple projects in the works that will be full custom (scratch built) that are more for me. But they take time. I got $600 worth of wheels and tires and $400 in crank, BB and pedals for my next "real" project... I bet by the time I'm done I'll have $1500-$1800 in hard parts alone.. So you gotta think more about those. And truly they are not as fun. Chopping up a $100 bike and coming up with something that is much cooler without spending big bucks is way more gratifying really. When you get all that money invested it really takes alot of the fun factor out. Really out of the several thousand dollars I have spent on bike stuff in the last couple months that $100 "Benny" bike has been the most fun.. And like at the Dead Baby Downhill... Part of the fun of the bike was that I could tell people that last Sunday I bought the thing at Freddys for $100. There was a guy on a hand built ti cruiser that was freakin awesome. One of the coolest bikes I have ever seen. 29'er mt bike wheels with wide road meats. hydraulic Hope disk brakes with huge rotors & braided stainless lines. Downhill bike drive train that looked bulletproof... It was the best of the best on one of the most beautiful hand built bikes in bare, buffed Titanium you could imagine .... I would guess a $5000 bike easy... and people walked right by it to check out my $100 clunker.....

Anyway. Once I start putting a scratch built bike together I'll shoot some build photos and post them. I am hoping to have a bike ready to enter in the Seattle deal next month but Id say that's a long shot...

OUTLAW · Aug 5, 2008

well if ya build a full blown custom, ya still got to put benny in with mine. see, they walk past those out of mine bikes an look at rats. ya goota luv it.

Outlaw 8)

MonsterMetal · Aug 12, 2008

Ok... So I FINALY got the springer to work like I wanted. I forged a new spring that is less than half as thick as the orignal and drilled a bunch of 11/16 holes down though the center... Springs like a champ now. Has about a 1 1/4" of movement and handles nice..

Also machined a stepped seat post and moved the seat a bit to the rear... did some forging on it to make it a bit cooler

Forgot to take a pick of the bike as a whole now... I like it better with the black cheapo wheels..

bring.doom · Aug 19, 2008

Mr. Farrell said:
hey, for anyone who has Academy sports store in their area... they carry a Kaluna cruiser for $89.99. i was real close to getting one before i found my murray.

Thats what I bought but it was from dicks sporting goods.