The "Spitfire"

[SuperNiac]

Hey everyone, I'm starting yet another build, wich hopefully is going to be quick.

Here's my base!

This bent frame is the remains of what once was a sign bike for SBC Cycles in London.
The bike looked like this :

It was destroyed and then stripped before ending in my garage.
The whole build is based on this little thing most of you will certainly recognise :

The one and only Spitfire. The goal here is to have an aggresive looking cruiser with matching paint and aircraft styling.

I've started doing some minor stuff, mainly gathering parts from failed projects and getting the frame started. It all begun with fixing the damage on it :

With the help of my favorite tools (Hammer, Big'ol block'o wood,Peugeot 406 car jack) I straightened (kinda) the rear triangle and trued up the frame. It was a big mess and you can tell the frame was once twisted.

The wheels:

Bunch of random wheels I had laying around, the front one is getting a drum brake and the rear one a Nexus 3 speed hub.

I've managed to save most of what's left of the original springer, had to take some bolts from my own parts.

Drum brake for the front and bars off my failed boardtrack project.

And now for what's happening : I'm waiting on a shifter adn nexus hub, then a set of chop'd fenders. I'm going to fill the tank and hopefully do a pretty sick paintjob.
One thing though, I need you guys help here; I'm not sure about the chainguard situation, should I get a full lengh one wich is going to be painted, or a half lengh silver one?

 

[Starnger]

Great to see another european here
As you probably know already, RUFF cycles are having a sale now. And among the other beautiful parts they are selling this.
Amazingly nice piece of design, i bet it would look awesome on your bike. It is a bit longer then you need, but i can imagine it is not a problem and would add a streamline look to the bike even without being cut.

 

[Scribble]

Super cool

 

[SuperNiac]

Nothing ultra exciting today, I stripped the front wheel ready to be rebuilt to the drum brake. Thinking about it, I might just swap the two rims for wider ones, but I don't thing that's gonna look great.

Naked rim, cleaned up.

I found a used Nexus 3 bellcrank

I'm gonna try and take it apart to make myself a better one, cause I hate the way it looks, looks so cheap!

 

[SuperNiac]

Very good day, lots of progress done!

Santa claus came early from Germany...

Here's what I got : A set of shorty fenders, Sturmey stick shifter and Nexus hub wich strangely came naked without accessories (?)

I set on to build the wheelset. The spokes aren't tensionned yet as I wnated to start working on the frame.

Welding the tab for the shifter to mount on.

Shifter mounted

For the saddle part, I want it really set back, but the seat tube sticks out the frame wayy too much. Then I got an idea!

I chopped the top of the seat tube and mounted the collar under! It needs adjustement but it'll allow the seat to go lower into the frame.

Next on the action list is to fill the tank then fiberglass it, sand down all the rust and .... that's on the frame and do a blank build to weld the rest of the tabs needed. I also need to fabricate a tab to mount the rear fender.

 

[A.S.BOLTNUT]

Wunderbar

 

[SuperNiac]

"Nothing ever happens"

The winter hit us like abitch and temperatures dropped so low it's impossible for me to work on the bikes as .... is freezing inside the garage.

Built the tank today but couldn't get it the way I wanted since it was too cold for the foam to harden.

I will probably call it quits on this build for the winter since everything missing needs to be done at reasonable temperatures. Can't work on the lowrider either for the same reasons.

See you guys around summer time!

 

[SuperNiac]

In an unexpected turn of events I got around to start shaping the tank

The foam blew away all my expectations and turned out great.

I laid most of the fiberglass before realizing that it needs 24 hours to fully cures, meaning I'll only be able to finish it after Christmas. I made some calculations : I'm 18 and I made around 50 project that required paint or stuff to dry. On average it needs about 12 hours to cure, that make 600hours. 18 years in hours is approx 150000 hours. It means I've spent 0.4% of my life waiting for sh*t to dry.

On that note, merry christmas everyone.

 

[SuperNiac]

Hope you all had a great Christmas.

I came back home and I had a friend over who built fiberglass pools; he showed me some techniques and general tips.

I trimmed the excess, and closed off the tank. I'll still have to do a last resin batch to finish around the headtube and the cantitubes ends, then it'll be bondo and paint hopefully!

 

[SuperNiac]

Hey hey it's ya boy Mr Ineverfinishsh*t

This morning I laid the last pieces of fibreglass to close everything in after a good hour of sanding

Pretty pleased with the looks of it. While that was drying I cut the original seatpost to make my laidback post; I also added an old sprocket as a support

And finally even more resin to top it off.

 

[rcsnipe2000]

dig it! like the shifter solution as well as the uses of spray foam.

rc

 

[SuperNiac]

Wooooo the sun is back! As stated previously my garage isn't heated so it's basically the same temperature as outside and any sort of body filler/resin needs at least 15° to harden. Well today I got around to sanding all the excess resin and I bought a sander off amazon cause f sanding. I laid the first gross bodyfiller coat, wich is probably gonna be the only one before laying finishing filler/primer. Forgot to take pictures so that's gonna have to do :

As soon as my sander arrives I'm gonna finish the tank, sand away all the rust and leftover clear coat and hopefully begin the decals.

 

[toro1978]

I chopped the top of the seat tube and mounted the collar under!

I guess You got that collar open and then squished it again around the tube or did You have another trick up Your sleeve? Did You make a cut on the back of the seat tube further down so the collar would indeed compress the tube and hold the seat post or is it (the collar) there just for looks?
Greetings.

 

[SuperNiac]

I guess You got that collar open and then squished it again around the tube or did You have another trick up Your sleeve? Did You make a cut on the back of the seat tube further down so the collar would indeed compress the tube and hold the seat post or is it (the collar) there just for looks?
Greetings.

I used an old steel collar to force it open on the tube as an aluminum one would've probably broke while doing that. I'm planning on making a cut in the seat tube cause I still want the saddle adjustment.

 

[SuperNiac]

Little update. Much sanding going on, nothing really interesting. Routed the shifter cable.

 

[SuperNiac]

After 2 dead months of the frame laying on the shelf in my shed I decided I needed to get to finish it. Managed to get some time today to work on it, and gathered the courage to get sanding.

Started by finishing the whole shape, sanded all the xecess, patched up some holes.

Going over with a final coat of body filler, just missing the finishing filler to be packed on the blue marks.

I cut the slit for the seatpost before realising my seatpost wont fit in such a thin cut, so I wasted at least 3 dremel discs grinding it wider cause I couldn't get the angle grinder in there.

Seatpost fitted

At that point I've been working on the bike for about 6 hours straight and I decided it was time for a test build. Being an ..... it didn't occur to me I should have done this long ago.
And it looks like absolute ..... I had high hopes for that bike and it looks like a toddler that just shat himself.

I've never been so dissapointed in something I made. Cue "in the end - Linkin Park"

To try and not look like I wasted so much time on this ugly piece of crap I got rid of the sprig and although it halps with the pose of the bike, it stills looks awful.

Join me as I stand in front of the abomination I have created. The thing I didn't consider is that bike was built with a very steep head angle for that specific fork and that boardtracker stance I hoped for now goes down the drain. I'm going to sleep on it and decide tomorrow if I still want to finish it or if it's going in the trash.

On that note, cheers

 

[Starnger]

Chill out, you just need to change the forks for something else Maybe radically raked out classic looking single-crown forks would fit? Something like this:

 

[SuperNiac]

Little update :
I slapped some random seat on and swapped the stem to make the new forks. The plan is to build forks similar to gocruisergo forks.

Scrap steel I had around

Layout and planning

Bends for the lower arms

Made some small mods to my kinker to get decent bends, works allright