San Diego Tweed Ride!

Photos from the First Annual San Diego Tweed Ride, in which my wife and I rode (sort of, see link below) with our 1955 Huffy Sportsman and 1977 Schwinn Suburban. It even rained, which is pretty rare here.

I posted a ride report here, and there are many more photos at the Velo Cult Bike Shop Blog. Good times!

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Bike Entrance

A very nice photo of my 1955 Huffy/Raleigh Sportsman by Adrienne of Change Your Life, Ride a Bike! Thanks Adrienne!

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Bicycle Chic(?) San Diego

I've been away on vacation, so haven't been posting for a while. Now I'm back, so I'll try to get a post up every once in a while. Summer is a hard blogging season, 'cause I'm out actually doing stuff and have less time to write about it.

Thought I'd share this photo of my wife and I taken on this month's Mid-City Bike Blast ride, which toured community and private food gardens in the City Heights area of San Diego.  It was a great ride. In the photo, I've gallantly offered my cycling cap to my wife, who was worried about sunburn, flipped up my collar, and soldiered-on. We actually look pretty happy, no?

Original photo (and others from the ride) here.

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Reader Project: John's 1955 Huffy/Raleigh Sportsman

I'm a bit slow in getting this posted, but John and I have been exchanging emails as he has been busy resurrecting this lovely 1955 Huffy/Raleigh Sportsman he found on Craigslist-- just like mine, only red.  Notice the Raleigh-style fork that has been added to replace the original. John finished his work very quickly, especially considering this was his first old bike project. He has lots more photos of his process here.

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So Much Park, So Few Picnics

Balboa Park and its satellite neighborhood parks are so vast, we could have a picnic every weekend for a year and never have it in the same place twice. We just might!

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The Favored Son

As my bicycle stable has, well, stabilized for the time-being, I'm finding that I do not love all my children just the same. I find myself drawn to the Huffeigh even for errands that might better belong to either the Columbia or the Schwinn.

Two nights ago, I ran to the market for beer, a half-gallon of milk, and one of those little watermelons. It ended up being quite a heavy little load of stuff. Instead of taking the Columbia or the Schwinn, which are better-equipped to take this kind of load, I couldn't resist the stately allure of the Huffeigh, with its new Brooks saddle and cork grips and bell and gleaming black paint. I was a little surprised to find that the whole disproportionately heavy load fit quite nicely into the little basket I've mounted on the rear rack, and I had no trouble at all.

The bikes have also fallen into clear roles: the Columbia is the work-horse, the grocery bike, the long-hauler. It sits me forward a bit more, the saddle is higher, and I feel like I pedal it more efficiently -- better for hard work. The Runwell, which has been idle for some time awaiting new tires, is always going to be the older gentleman who doesn't get out much, I'm afraid. And the Schwinn, well, the Schwinn is quite comfortable, but ungainly and heavy.

But the Huffeigh is just the right combination of all three: it can carry a load, it's sufficiently old, and it's very comfortable. I just like it, is all. So now we're about to go on a picnic, and although I probably should take one of the other bikes, I think it's going to be the Huffeigh again.

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Bikes in the House

Remember when you were a kid, and you were so enamored of your bicycle that you wanted to ride it everywhere? And your mother said, "No bikes in the house!" Well, maybe it's the little kid in me who was denied the joy of bringing his bike into the house, but there's something about having a bicycle inside that makes me very happy. I'm lucky enough to have a safe, sheltered place to keep my bikes outside of the house, but I brought the Huffeigh up for a bit of cleaning and adjustment tonight, and I've been enjoying having it in the living room as an objet d'art.

I also take inordinate satisfaction in cleaning, checking, and adjusting all the little bits. Especially with old bikes, which can sometimes be temperamental, it's important to do monthly or weekly safety checks. Because I rebuilt both of these wheels myself, I'm a little paranoid about the wheels, so I check spoke tension and rim trueness, and I'm perennially making adjustments to the brakes. There's something about checking in with the bike, doing all the little maintenance things, that gives me a great deal of satisfaction. It stems, I think, from what motivated me to get into old bikes in the first place: getting to truly know and understand and maintain your own form of transportation. There's something very simple and yet very liberating about that.

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Updates to the Huffeigh

Or, the trouble with buying leather saddles of largely unknown age and condition on eBay.

Be fairly warned. Towards the end of Sunday's Down Townies ride, my used Brooks B72 broke; tore apart right at the nose rivets. It wasn't dramatic or painful, and I knew exactly what happened right away. At least I was able to put a few dozen miles on it before it broke. And, fortunately enough, I had hinted strongly to my wife of my desire for a new Brooks B66 as a graduation present, and it happened to be ready on the afternoon this one broke. While picking up my new saddle at the shop, I also finally picked up a kickstand.

It's feeling good to get the Huffeigh outfitted as a daily rider. I had hoped, while I was investing many hours of work on it, that this bike would be a good ride, and I haven't been disappointed. Now that it's shaping up to be my main ride, I'm getting exciting about doing all of the finishing touches. I've also put on a salvaged rear rack and basket, figured out how to attach the chainguard without it rubbing, and together with the new saddle and kickstand, it becomes that much more useful and complete as a mode of transportation. Next, I'd really like to find a new retro-ish-looking headlamp and dynamo, and also get a pump for the frame.

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Just a Photo to Keep You Interested

While my substantive blogging slows down. BTW, the rust on the Huffeigh's rims (seen above), which I could not remove (trust me, it's not going anywhere) has proven to be a fantastic benefit in the rain. Anyone with steel rims can tell you they don't brake worth a hoot when wet, but the extra texture of the rust seems to help. In fact, I didn't notice much difference from my normal brake performance.

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I Like My Bike

That's all. Just sayin'.

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1955 Huffy/Raleigh Sportsman FINISHED!

Sweet Fancy Moses, this has been a long project! I started this back at the end of November, which makes it just shy of a full five months. Here's what I did:

-CLEAN, CLEAN, CLEAN

-replaced crappy saddle with less-crappy used Brooks B72

-replaced stuck stem/bars after sawing off original

-replaced badly pitted and gouged crank axle

-replaced crank cotters

-replaced missing hub hardware and shifter cable

-replaced tires/tubes/rim tape

-replaced brake shoes

-replaced grips

-cleaned and repacked headset, bottom bracket, hubs

-sanded, primed, painted fenders, top tube, chain stays

-touch up and clear coat entire bike

The photos above are actually a bit disingenuous, since the chain guard isn't attached due to the chain rubbing on it terribly ("grinding" is really more the word). I was a bit worried about that from the beginning because of the wear patterns on the inside of the guard when I bought the bike, but I thought they might just be from years of neglect. I can't quite figure out why it's rubbing, actually, since the attachment points on the frame don't leave a lot of room for interpretation or adjustment. It must be on correctly, but it still rubs. Still working on that one.

Otherwise, it runs very well. It's very comfortable and smooth and surprisingly light. I had some trouble with the rear sprocket, the teeth of which had been misshaped due either to a too-tight or poorly maintained chain. When under way, the chain sounded like it was grinding through a poorly-adjusted derailer, which clearly wouldn't do. I swapped out the sprocket from the Columbia, and in the process, discovered that the sprocket on the Huffy had been put on backwards. I put it on the Columbia the right way to see if it would run any better, and it did! So, the Huffeigh sprocket is now working just fine on the Columbia, and the Columbia sprocket is working just fine on the Huffeigh. Thank you, Sturmey-Archer, for making such brilliantly-interchangeable parts.

I had planned on this being a cargo/grocery bike, but it turned out to be entirely too gentlemanly to be a beast of burden, so the Wald wire pannier rack I bought is now on the Columbia, which has been re-dubbed the grocery bike, while the Huffeigh will fill the Columbia's previous function as general run-around bike.

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Huffy/Raleigh Rebuild Series #6

Grips, shifter, and brakes on.

But nothing is attached yet. The cork grips still need to be varnished (not shellacked, 'cause I don't have any shellac, but I do have spar varnish, which is even more water-resistant), which will darken them significantly, and I still need to order a new shifter cable, cable wheel, indicator spindle, and some missing axle hardware for the rear hub. I'll be out of town next weekend, so I'm probably still looking at about two weeks before it's finished. It's really starting to look good, though, if I do say so.

BTW, the tires are Michelin World Tours, which are a great match for old British three-speeds. They look great, but they were a real bugger to get on. I don't think I've ever had such a hard time coaxing tires onto wheels.

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Huffy/Raleigh Decals

Okay, these photos are brutally honest. In fact, I will say that they make the final result look a good deal worse than it appears in person. On the first photo (down tube), you can see that in some places the original finish didn't take the clear coat so well. It looks like pitting, but it's just in the surface of the clear coat, not the paint itself. I'm still not very good at applying the clear coat sometimes, so this is probably user-error.

Other places, like this bit at the top of the seat tube (below), turned out very well. In fact, the whole seat tube came out looking quite good (see second photo below). However, I noticed the other day when I had the bike in the sun that I very thoroughly clear coated some of my dirty fingerprints onto the seat tube.  I thought I had the whole frame clean, but I guess I missed a spot. Fortunately, it's only apparent in the right light, from the right angle. I guess it'll help me positively identify the bike if it ever gets stolen!

The chain guard is a bit rougher, as I just did a bit of touch-up on the paint, then applied the clearcoat. It was also in worse shape to start with. I'll post some photos of it later, I forgot to get any of it when I took these. 

I picked up some cork grips from my LBS yesterday, and I've got the brakes on now. It's raining today, but I'll try to get another photo in the reassembly series posted in a few days.

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Reassembly Photo Series Interruption

I'm afraid my work on the Huffeigh today has confirmed that I will need a couple of extra little bits to move forward with the reassembly, so the photo series is on hold temporarily, likely to resume week after next, but possibly sooner.

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Huffy/Raleigh Rebuild Series #5

All the round things are on. Now I'm sure of it: this is definitely a bicycle.

I was planning to take this photo with just the wheels and fenders on, and have the cranks be in the next one, but I needed to make sure the new old crank axle from eBay was going to fit, and I got a little carried away before I remembered to take a photo. Still to come: brakes, shifter, chain, pedals, grips, baskets.

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Huffy/Raleigh Rebuild Series #4

Saddle up!

Used Brooks B72, vintage unknown, also found cheap on eBay. A huge improvement over the thing that was on there. Brace yourself, the next in the series in going to skip a couple of steps all at once, given the nature of needing to attach fenders and wheels in the same go. It is a bicycle!

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Huffy/Raleigh Rebuild Series #3

Hmm, this might actually be a bicycle! Eventually.

One-piece handlebar/stem from a J.C. Higgins found on eBay to replace the stem I had to saw through to get to the stuck stem bolt. Not a perfect match to the original two-piece set, but not bad, either, and dirt cheap.

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Huffy/Raleigh Rebuild Series #2

And then there was a fork.

I am aware that the lamp bracket is upside down--I'll be putting a front basket on eventually, that's why. Look for a post soon about repacking headset bearings. Easy!

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Huffy/Raleigh Rebuild Series #1

In the beginning there was a frame...

I tried to get some good photos of how the decals and original paint took the clear coat, as per reader request, but they didn't turn out. I will try again in better light. Once again, the only areas of the frame that got new paint were the top tube and chain stays, the rest just got a bit of touch-up paint and the clear coat. I'm really impressed with how uniform the final result is.

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Huffy/Raleigh Paint Finished

Well, I got my wish, and the humidity came down a bit today so I could do the clear coat. It's dry to the touch now, so I gathered up all (or most, anyway) of the parts and arranged them for the first of a series of reassembly photos that I'll put together into a slide show at the end of the process. I've included a couple of other shots to show the dramatic results of the painting. Hopefully, I'll get started on the reassembly tomorrow, although I've still got some last parts on order, so I won't be fully finished for a little while.

Here are the fenders, before photo here.

And the head badge/head tube, before photo here.

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