Lets Swing

It was on the plus side of 50 deg today, so I brought the swinger out to play. The clutch springs need a little tweaking, and the idle jet feels too fat, but it runs and looks good, at least to me! Photos should let you decide.

Pack Attack

I received the Bullet exhaust for my Red Maxi in the mail today, and I went to the shop and bolted it up. I've always had a little trouble with Bullet exhausts being a pain to fit on the studs, and this one was no exception, but I was able to get both nuts started and pull it tight. I had to bend my left crank, it was a little tweaked, but now it clears the exhaust no problem. So, with that said, I assembled the 14 bing and put it on the 14 intake, slapped it all together, and put the bike on the stand. I set the choke, primed it, and on the first kick, she roared to life. What a great feeling! No screwing around to get it to run, I'm excited. I took it for a spin, and it accelerates a little sluggy, but it has a nice top speed, I would say about 33. I'm running 16x45 on it, I think I might kick it down to 15x45, but we will leave it as is for now, I can tell I'm running a bit lean with a 66 jet. I will put in a 70 and see what happens. This is on the open port Aluminum stock cylinder, too. The high torque cylinders are much more awesome for acceleration, that is for sure. I was happy to ride it around, and quickly went back inside and took off the wheels, and repacked the bearings. They had not been done, and it is a night and day difference. The nasty old junk in there hardly counts as grease. They spin effortlessly now. Between the repack of bearings and the sanding of the drums and pads, as well as light cross hatching on the pads, this bike rolls and stops like a new chassis. I'm constantly amazed at how different a bike feels when you put 45 minutes of work into the wheels. It rolls smooth and stops hard! The new seals and bearings did the trick for the engine, it fires up easily and with no problem. I think I might mill the head to give it a little more torque, but I do have a factory high torque head, so I suppose I'll give that one a try first, and see if it helps. The seat height is perfect, it feels low enough to be comfy, but not too low. I kind of like rolling the rigid front suspension, its a unique ride, like nothing I've ridden before. Hopefully the suspension forks will be finished with powder soon so I can have the bike together on final assembly and call it done. It does need some killer pedals and grips though. No bike shops around here are open on Saturdays though. Lame.

It looks like I'll be attacking the Swinger 1 soon.

Oh, plus I found the perfect ferring for my Motobecane 40. It's pretty cool, and large, and awesome and the right color (eventually the MBK will be black). I'll try to get some pictures up of it later, but it is one of the old TRAC moped ferrings. The cool kind, not the lame kind.

Barricade

I'm back from the in-laws after Christmas celebration, I was able to sneak into the garage and use some tools and accomplish something. I have had a set of 6 spoke Motobecane mags sitting around (actually, hanging from the rafters) and I have decided to go ahead and just get started on my Motobecane project. I had been waiting until I had all the parts I wanted, but who knows when that will be. Due to the insufficient funds coming in, I might have to wait until next winter to get all the cosmetics in place, but if I can ride it around this spring, that might motivate me some. At any rate, I dissassembled the mags, pulling the hubs all the way out, which was a bit of a process.
The mags were Gold, like in this picture, and the coating was corroded and flaking badly, plus they were super dirty and full of cob webs. At first glance, I though the hubs were held in with Allen screws, but I soon realized that the hubs were riveted in. So I had to drill out the rivets and then use a punch and hammer to drive the rivet out of its hole. It worked pretty well once I had a system down for it. The hubs have come out, and I doubt I will use rivets like the stock ones to re-attach them. Most likely I'll use nice new hardware with nuts and plenty of locktite. With the hubs out, I inspected the brakes. The pads are in decent shape, and the inside surface of the drums have a little rust, but nothing I can't fix with some light sanding. I'm going to replace the sealed bearings as well, both in the front and rear. I guess I'll have to find some kind of drift punch to push them out. Everett might have one that I can use, he does have all the other Motobecane tools.

The mags being hub free, I tossed them into the sand blaster, and with a methodic and systematic sweeping of the skat, I cleaned all the corrosion and coating off the rims. They look much better now, having been blasted down to a smooth finish. I blasted the rear sprocket too, I plan to take them all to the powder coater and have them shot in a nice black. Not flat, but not too glossy. We will see how the look. I am on the fence of coating the hubs. The black color is pretty good, and I'm not sure if the drums could avoid being coated which would mess up my braking, so I'll consult on that. These mags will grace my 40, mounted onto Peugeot forks up front. Not sold on what tire I'm going to use. I like Gazelles on my Magnum, but they seem almost too "off-road" for the look I'm going for on the 40. I suppose I might get some more Savas, I liked those tires on my Swinger and Maxi. Any recommendations on tire choices?

Swinger2 : Glam Edition

A JCPenny Swinger1 was manufactured by Kromag and sold through JCPenny. It was the low dollar model, with a rigid front and rear suspension and no speedometer. Very basic, it only came in blue, with color matched blue fenders and skinny wire wheels. The JCPenny Swinger2 was the next model up, and featured speedometer, and full suspension, in addition to a rear rack with spring loaded book keeper. It also had color matched fenders and the skinny spoke wheels, and came in 3 two colors, orange (some might call a carousel red) and yellow. The JCPenny Pinto had a half crome tank and crome fenders with front fork brace bar, came in orange and yellow with the wider set of spoke wheels. The JCPenny Pinto2 came in both silver and black, with a half chrome tank, chrome fenders, snowflake mag wheels and long seat instead of the traditional saddle. All Pinto and Swinger models had the swiss cheese tube frame.

All that being said, I've started to assemble this rediculous Swinger2 that I got on an impulse this winter. It has a Magnum length swingarm and Murray front forks, making the rear shocks sit low and the front end sit high. Add a chopped seat post and a low saddle, throw in some stupidly blingy metal flake powdercoat, and maybe a touch of gold spokes, and you've got a lowrider moped.
Oh, and here is a tip on the best way I've figured out to put a kickstand spring back on. Watch and learn! Get a large size phillips screwdriver (because they are round completely which works best) and slip it into the lose end of the spring, then put the other end of the screwdriver on the knob and pull the screw driver toward you, using the knob as a fulcrum. The spring slides down the screw driver and pulls itself on nice and tight, then you just wiggle your driver out.

Oh, P.S. I know my shocks are upside down, but they have clearance issues right side up, so don't think I'm an idiot. Well, I'm kind of an idiot for building such a stupid bike, so rather, don't think I'm incompetent.