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Old 05-05-15, 03:16 PM
  #85  
tdsherman325
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Join Date: Sep 2012
Location: Abilene, TX
Posts: 186

Bikes: Many

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We've got 6 - in rough order of age:

1962 Western Flyer Bicycle-Built-For-Two


Just bought this one about a month ago from an antique dealer. The wife and I took it on a road trip to Austin and had great time on Austin's many bike paths and lanes - It's like driving a semi truck amongst regular bike traffic. Rides nice and smooth and never fails to turn heads.

It was made by Huffy, as far as I can tell, and has a tandem-specific version of the Bendix "red stripe" rear hub.

Needs a new chain, and it's missing the front brake and the chain guard. It's been repainted once and those aren't original saddles - they're much too wide so the front saddle's suspension doesn't work. I'd like to rectify those issues and get a child seat for it so all three of us can ride the same bike.

1960's Skyway


My wife bought this bike when we were first married. It was her main ride until she bought the Royal Prince, and served as a backup ride until last year until a stick went up in the spokes and it was subsequently ridden into a fence. It's always been a very simple and dependable bike - always gets you where you're going.

Skyway was a Japanese brand that disappeared somewhere in/after the bike boom. Research has not turned up much information on these bikes but the frame construction, and a few comments I've seen here and there, suggest that they were made by Bridgestone. I've not seen another single-speed but there are Skyway three-speeds out there from the mid-to-late 60's with the same frame, handlebars, etc. It has a weird rear hub with a tiny clutch inside it instead of a regular coaster brake, so backpedaling takes a half-second for the brake to start working.

I've mended most of the damage but I haven't gotten around to replacing the chain yet. The original fenders were very Raleigh-like, identical to the Royal Prince, but were destroyed when it was wrecked. The wife hasn't decided whether to find original style fenders or get modern ones.

1969 Royal Prince


This was one of those things where when I would have gotten yelled at if I had done it. My wife dragged this bike home, in pitiful condition, from a yard sale where she had paid $10. Cost to repair it: $450. She helped me fix it up and it's now her daily ride. The larger chainring gives it a very lazy feel, and an almost unusable 3rd gear, but she was enamored of that crankset and claims to like it that way.

She has a talent of finding untraceable bicycles from the 60's. It was made in India and the rear hub is a Sturmey-Archer, so we know the year, but that's about it. Apparently there were huge number of makes in India churning out these Raleigh clones. They also apparently used whatever tooling was at hand since it varies from imperial to metric standards.

The only original parts are the frame, forks, chainguard, brakes/levers, and rear hub/shifter. VT Bike Stuff here in Abilene rebuilt the rear hub and mounted it into a new rim. The custom wheels are part of the reason it was so expensive. The headset and crankset took a while to find period parts because no one makes them in that size anymore. Handlebars are a 60's AMF set we had laying around.

1970's AMF Frankentrike



Bought around the same time as the Skyway with a matching, ladies style frame. That didn't hold up long on Abilene's streets and it eventually cracked and folded up. It was originally an AMF Roadmaster and I had a broken down AMF Texas Ranger sitting around so I mushed the good parts of the two together to come up with this. This and the Evox are the ones I ride all the time. The Frankentrike is the current kid hauler so I ride it whenever we're all out together with my son in the back.

It is a single-speed, one wheel drive trike with a coaster brake, but one honestly cannot get going fast enough for that to be an issue. The larger frame on 24" wheels gives it a longer wheelbase than it originally had. All of the parts are 1970s-ish AMF, with the exception of the trike rear end. It seems to have been made by some small, nameless American company at the time.

I'd like to paint it a single color but my wife likes the original paint.

2001 CCM Evox 120



Picked this one up a few months back and it's been my daily ride and commuter ever since. The ride is a bit odd until you get used to it but I love it. The steering's a bit twitchy, though. I wish it were geared a bit higher, too. That being said, it's still a very very quick and comfortable bike.

Turns out that these were made in Quebec by a company named Quetzal, and rebadged under a few different Canadian makes. Shimano date codes put it at 2001. Everything on it, down to the grips is original.

I've toyed with the idea of electrifying it but I just like too much the way it is. I may look into getting some kind of fairing and bumping up the gearing a bit.

2005 Dr. Pepper Frankenbike



This bike is easily the crappiest piece of crap we own, but there's a story behind it: My brother won this bike in a Sonic contest when we were teenagers, and it's been passed around in the family for years. Everyone's ridden it at some point, including me. Eventually it ended up in my parents' garage and my brother took it apart to paint it. The boxes of parts got lost but my dad found the frame when he was cleaning up his garage last year. Staying true to it's heritage, it has been faithfully repaired using only the crappiest Chinese components I would have otherwise thrown away.

It's probably a Pacific Cycle of one form or another, but there are no identifying characteristics other than "Dr. Pepper".

It still needs cables, a chain, a saddle/seatpost and a front dérailleur. It'll get fixed eventually, maybe.

And that's it! No car. My wife has an old Beetle but that thing hasn't run in years. We do it all on bikes.
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Last edited by tdsherman325; 05-05-15 at 07:44 PM. Reason: Fixing images
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