joeyduck

That's awesome. To both of the two previous posts.

Johnny Mullet

Those knobby Kenda tires did slow the bike down some, but half of my commute is new paved, smooth road and the other half is rough pavement with potholes.

Shiloh253

I really hate to necro this thread, but I love these sorts of projects, tinkering around and overhauling a bike like that. A few questions though, if you wouldn't mind me asking:

-How did you do the 26in to 700c wheel conversion, and was it very difficult?

-Are those gumwall tires holding up pretty well?

-What parts do you think "absolutely" need to be replaced on a bike such as this one immediately, and which ones can wait?

Thanks very much, I really enjoyed this thread!

Johnny Mullet

The 700c wheel conversion was not hard at all. The front wheel went right on with no issues and the Diacompe brake caliper mounted right into the factory hole in the fork, The rear wheel had a clearance issue with the kickstand mount. I had to grind it down with a dremel tool. The rear brake mounted on the reflector tab no problem. I had to adjust the rear deraileur to hit the gears properly since there was 5mm difference. The old brake mounts on the front are still there, but the ones on the rear are used to mount my home made rear rack.

I don't like the newer China made Huffy bikes. They are crap, but the older USA made bikes are pretty decent although heavy as expected. Some guys do not like the one piece Ashtabula crank, but I prefer them since I am a big guy and have stripped a few 3 piece cranksets and wasted a couple bottom bracket bearings where these old school cranks are indestructable!

You can take an older Huffy bike and do some major mods to drop the weight to under 30 lbs by using a bottom bracket adaptor and changing cranks, replacing wheels, handlebars, pedals, stems, etc.

For some reason, I prefer the feel of these older steel bikes.

Shiloh253

Awesome! And we're in agreement on the china bikes. Some are decent (heard good things about Vilano) but for the most part I've not been impressed. The reason I'm interested is because a local guy has an early 90's Raleigh he's willing to part with for dirt cheap and if I can put in the time/energy, I'd love to give it some new life.

BicycleNutsy701

I've got a newly-assembled Huffy frankenbike commuter (frame from 1 Huffy, components from another/the parts bin). Have you replaced or somehow modified the brakes on this bike? Even picking the better 2 out of the 4 brake assemblies I started with, the brakes on the Frankenbike are, at best, about as effective as the ones on my road bike. The rear slows me down and the front will stop in 3-10 ft. depending on my speed. (Admittedly, my hands aren't that strong, but even when my friend floored them he barely get a skid out of it.)

Johnny Mullet

When I swapped to 700c wheels, I had no choice but to upgrade the brakes. It has road bike wheels and brakes on in.

Mopar440ci

haha this has been quite good read, really makes me want to see what i can do to make an old bike fast just for the fun of it.
just as you do i love tinkering and tooling on things to see what can be made of them and i spend alot of time keeping my various bikes in tune.
if i was the owner of this super huffy i certainly would take it to bike events and bike club rides just to see reactions to a huffy keeping up with the pack.

Johnny Mullet

I have another Huffy for group rides and events now. You can follow my build on this thread for that bike...........
https://www.bikeforums.net/classic-vi...road-bike.html



This Huffy went through a few changes as my commuter. I lost the drop bars which will be transferred to the Techtra Lite...........

Mopar440ci

i like it better with the mtb bars as it less obvious that its a "sleeper " so to speak.

Bandrada

Looks like it has great geometry.

Johnny Mullet

It's been awhile since I updated this thread. I am still commuting daily with this bike and have put well over 500 miles on this bike this year on top of the 400+ miles I put on it last year. I switched back to the Araya 700c wheels and 700x35c tires. I also upgraded the brake levers to Sram and replaced the brake calipers with some old school alloy Polygon calipers and new pads.. The stem came from a 90's Huffy MTB and the bars from a 95 Raleigh M20 along with the thumb shifters. The bar ends were wrapped with black bar tape. I got a new saddle and better lighting for the bike also..............







This bike has been totally trouble free!

joeyduck

It makes my mouth water and my legs twitch. That is a great looking commuter.

Johnny Mullet

I really miss riding with drop bars while commuting, but I switched to flat bars so when riding through town, my hands were on the brakes and I could sit more upright. Well, I got bored over the weekend and seen the old drop bars and stem I removed from the road bike to upgrade it. These old bars have the suicide levers on them, so I can't leave well enough alone and swapped my commuter back to drop bars since I always keep cables in stock and had some black bar tape...........

mctrek

Wow, I've never seen anybody do this much work to an old Huffy! Great job! I would convert the cranks also with an older, solid Sakae crank set. Those types of cranks can take a beating also, and if you go with a decent bottom bracket they should last you a long time before you have to do anything to it... But that is my opinion. And nice pictures at Presque Isle, I love biking in that park! Really nice place to ride!

amaramartin

I have an old bike too and am still not able to sell it away. It's really close to my heart.

crankholio

These pics look awesome. I really like taking an old bike and seeing what kind of potential it has. I've got a K2 Zed Sport that I've just about replaced every part on it, and it's my around-town beater.

grubetown

Wow thread! If Johnny Mullet is still riding this bike, I will be amazed