(MBBO 4 Class 1) -- The Raven -- Now With Flames

[ANGRYJOE]

My name is Joe and I am a long time lurker first time poster.

I saw the MBBO pop up in my Facebook thread and decided I would enter our current project.

A little back story on this project -- I wanted to do a muscle bike for my sons birthday in June but money was tight and I could not afford to find a good vintage frame.
I stumbled over this Trek Drifter on craigslist and grabbed it. It had the look we were after and the price was right. It rode great and is an aluminum frame so it is pretty light.

Now, full disclosure. This bike is in a state where we could do a little adjusting and ride it but I have other plans. We are going to blow it apart and rebuild it. Paint it, remove things...add things....As of today I am looking for some parts and plan to build others.

Here is a current picture of the bike in hopes that there are no questions about what we did to it come January.

This bike was put together on a beg, borrow and steal budget and will continue to go that route. My son Jason (11)will be doing as much of on it work as I will. There will be no mod's to the frame because it's aluminum.

If you all feel that it doesn't belong by all means let me know. I felt this might be a little bit of fun for the boy and I but at the same time I want to make sure we don't ruffle any feathers.

I am no photographer but I promise no crappy cell phone pictures of the finished product....

Thanks and whether I am allowed to continue or not I will be following all of these builds closely.

 

[GuitarlCarl]

Just keep posting progress brother, you got a good start... Pics of it blown apart too. Post an intro in the Hello my name is thread...
Raven huh? I'm guessing flat black, definitely rat...

Carl.

 

[Fv2]

Looks pretty cool.
I'm not sure where you sit in the build off though,either way enjoy the father son time.

 

[OddJob]

Looks like you've got a good start and I like the theme. I sold those Drifters back in the mid-2000's, they were light weight and rode great as you say! Also came in some classic 50's colors. Rat on!

 

[CRASH]

Blow it apart and let's see it come back together!

 

[LukeTheJoker]

Welcome to the madness! Looking forward to seeing what you do with it!

Luke.

 

[KJV]

 

[ANGRYJOE]

Being active duty military and working at a local parts store on the weekends and kids doing sports and other crap is a major time suck. Last night I was beat and went to be early. My son said he wanted to stay up for a bit. I told him to start breaking the bike down. I was impressed when I got up for work this morning to see he has it mostly blown apart. I will post a pic of the parts and some of the plans tomorrow. I picked up a new phone at lunch today so my future pictures should be much better....

 

[Chad T]

Looks like a fun project. Like that alum frame.

 

[ANGRYJOE]

this frame is nuts, I've never felt a frame so light before in my life. I plan to cut off the tabs for the coaster brake and chain guard. I have not decided if I want to paint or powder coat...I've got this idea for a two tone black and and blue pearl paint job....Also kicking around using a BMX style front fork....I saw a set of old schwinn stingray forks at the local bike co-op and am thinking I can shim them to fit the head tube...I need to shim the BMX neck I plan to use so I figured what the heck...I've got ideas....gonna doodle some over the next week or two.

 

[OddJob]

this frame is nuts, I've never felt a frame so light before in my life. I plan to cut off the tabs for the coaster brake and chain guard. I have not decided if I want to paint or powder coat...I've got this idea for a two tone black and and blue pearl paint job....Also kicking around using a BMX style front fork....I saw a set of old schwinn stingray forks at the local bike co-op and am thinking I can shim them to fit the head tube...I need to shim the BMX neck I plan to use so I figured what the heck...I've got ideas....gonna doodle some over the next week or two.

Keep us posted on the "doodling"...! You can get headset adapters to reduce the diameter if you want to use one of the vintage forks. Your local shop should be able to help with the sizing. The blue/black sounds cool!

 

[ANGRYJOE]

doing some brain storming with the boy before bed last night and I think we have come up with an idea for the paint. We were going to do a gloss and semi gloss paint job using the semi gloss for contrast. We decided to do something a bit different. Since we named it the Raven and knowing ravens are black and in certain light shine deep blue/purple we cooked up a plan. I think we are going to do gloss black with a deep blue flames...because whats a hot rod without flames? We'll keep the white just for highlights and plan to use the dark blue on the sate-lite rims too....I am no painter so I need to practice to get the look I want...

 

[Fv2]

Can't wait to see this

 

[LukeTheJoker]

Paint plan sounds awesome!

Luke.

 

[OddJob]

Google the Klein mountain bikes from the early 90's and check out their fade paint jobs. Maybe your blue on top of the black, lightly sprayed, and you may want to consider a metallic blue so it catches the sun....for that feathers "iridescent" quality...Black where the dark color is and your blue where the purple is on this example....

 

[ANGRYJOE]

Hmmm, that's pretty slick A deep, deep blue and black done up like that would look cool too.........I'll show it to the boy and see what he thinks....

 

[ANGRYJOE]

I was supposed to get this stupid cast off my arm tomorrow but that got bumped to next week. I cant seem to do anything well with it on so right now we are getting parts and planning...No sure why we bother planing anything....we never seem to stick with a script, we get started and it suddenly becomes OH LOOK SQUIRREL!

We'll be getting dirty next weekend with it.

 

[LukeTheJoker]

 

[ANGRYJOE]

I finally got the stupid cast off my arm...never having one and never having surgery before I assumed it would feel better...I was wrong.
We did do a little work to it this evening. I removed the brackets for the chain guard (channeling my inner BMX guy).

we tossed on some primer and plan to do some wet sanding tomorrow evening.
The original paint was in decent shape so we hit it with some 220 to smooth out some rough edges. I think I'll only need 2 coats of primer on this one to get a nice surface for paint.

I also have some parts on order that will make this thing really cool but we wont be installing them until after Christmas. I figure I will use them as gifts for the boy. He and I have a bit of a tradition going...last year we installed a 212cc engine in his mini-bike, this we will finish up his Hot Rod bicycle.

 

[LukeTheJoker]

After Christmas? GULP! That will only give you a few days to finish it up!

Luke.