Tweaker's Rehab

[tjwilson]

Poor Tweaker. Bad choices and the strong pull of his older brother Crunchy's influence have won out. Despite best efforts Tweaker's never really been able to live up to his full potential. Time for some introspection and re-evaluation. Back to square one... a return trip to the drawing board.

 

[tjwilson]

A Little History

The origins for this build have their roots way way back in BC (Before Covid), at the dawn of 2018 in the Winter Build Off as Nautilus. As always with these build offs, had a lot of fun, learned a lot, and ended up with a new bike. Unfortunately I never really cared for the final result. I kinda had two competing ideas for the design, a stretch cruiser and a short wheelbase bobber. I didn't think that conflict was ever resolved and to me it just did not work. Plus it was heavy and, I seldom took it for a ride.

Fast forward to spring of 2019 were Tweaker makes his first appearance. In an attempt to fix things I removed some useless weight, shortened the wheel base, and got rid of the fauxtina that turned out looking more like wood to me than patina. But... even after letting it site for a while, I still don't like it, still don't ride it.

That brings us to the present were I've stumbled upon the only viable solution. Time to find a sale on cut-off wheels and put them to work.

 

[tjwilson]

Change Can be Painful

First a round up of details of what I'm starting with.

 

[tjwilson]

Under the Wheel

Now to figure out a way to put it back together.

 

[Fv2]

Well... This should be interesting.

 

[Captain Awesome]

Subscribed!!

 

[kingfish254]

Glad to see you jump om again!!!
It's always fun to see the killer work you roll out.

You better stock up on some of this....

 

[Funkme]

This is interesting has me grilled...

 

[MattiThundrrr]

I'm in!

 

[OddJob]

TJ is in the house! Slice and dice and turn it out nice.

RaT oN~!

 

[tjwilson]

Glad to see you jump om again!!!
It's always fun to see the killer work you roll out.

You better stock up on some of this....

View attachment 162106

Thanks.
Tweaker energy... late start and a summer full of plans ahead. I'll take all the help I can get!

 

[tjwilson]

Picking up the Pieces

This shot is one of a bunch of attempts I started off with. All very similar but way too close to what I had just cut apart.

In searching on "kustom motorcycles" for inspiration I ran across examples of 70's choppers with king/queen seats. Got me thinking. Imagine this seat without the tall back and only the "queen" section integrated into a fender.

Did a few really rough sketches (not worth showing) that convinced me to go in that direction with the seat. I'm thinking kind of a banana seat fender combination that gives the flexibility to really shorten the wheelbase. The dimensions work out in theory anyway. Here's the beginnings of rearranging the frame.

 

[tjwilson]

Backbone

Thought it was worth showing a few close-ups of the main center section of the frame. Initially I had dreams of highly polished and painted surfaces for this build. A little general roughness might be more appropriate. This piece has developed a bit of "character".

Cutting and tacking up the head tube.

 

[MattiThundrrr]

That's just awesome. One tube defeats my entire build! I love this place

 

[kingfish254]

I like the seat idea and putting a little 70s chopper vibe in there. That backbone tube has so much character to it!!

 

[Fv2]

That seat without the sissy bar pad is what we call a B!£(h pad.

 

[OddJob]

'Character'...that def is a term used when it comes to describing rat rod bikes. As usual, or should I say as 'unusual', it's looking good already TJ!

 

[tjwilson]

Building on Character - Revised Down-tube

I didn't care for the shape of the existing down-tube and wanted to re-bend it. A while ago I built a few stands to hold wheels and a dummy crank. Built a head tube stand too but didn't use it this time around. Anyway, the idea was to change my design/fabrication process up a bit. Found myself getting frustrated at times trying to bend metal exactly to pre-drawn two dimensional designs. Thought I might be missing options that the metal might "suggest" in the bending process too. This is the first time I used this approach. Started with a small diameter solid rod I could bend by hand. Found a shape I liked and then re-bent/bent tubing to come close to the solid rod "template".

Re-bending the original down-tube.

Bending a new piece to extend the top of the down-tube.

 

[tjwilson]

Building on Character - Revised Down-tube (2)

Sleeving the down-tube pieces.

Fixtured, welded and smoothed-ish.

Ended up close to the solid rod template.

 

[tjwilson]

Trimming and Notching the Backbone and Down-tube