My patina'd rat project

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M

Monster 550

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Apr 14, 2012
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Hanford, CA
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I think this is a Malibu hopper so I'm not gonna give it a nice resto. I aquired it doing a side job for my wifes friend. I was paid for the job and saw this leaning on a fence with the front rim burried in dirt and asked about it. Sure enough my wife's friend said to just take it. My plans are to repaint and age the frame, chain guard and chain ring. Rims are gonna stay rusty along with the rear fender, crank, bars and any other bare metal parts. I'm gonna ditch the front fender and rotate the rear one down almost like a tail dragger and try using OCC chopper tripple trees with a 26er. Bars will be flipped and paint scheme is still up in the air. Thinking of an old aged army green with a white star on the chain ring, but not sure. An aged wooden tank is still in debate also. Here's what I'm starting with...
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Did some quick grinding yesterday and started some mock up today. Just need to figure out excactly how I'm gonna do the final mount on the OCC triple trees, but I'll figure it out.
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Thanks, but it's not a sprocket, it's an old saw blade. I got it stripped back down and started on the frame, head cups, chain guard and chain ring. I first layed a couple thick coats of grey primer followed by a single thin blochy layer of flat black, then a few thin uneven layers of metalic anodized red to cover it all. Tomorrow I'll do a couple of thick rust colored layers of primer and finally my last color (still thinking army green). After it all dries and cures I'll rough sand it to age it. I'm not happy with the cleaniness of the chrome on the tripple trees so I might scuff them up and let them sit in wet dirt for a few days.
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Keeping with the ratiness I wanted to make an added piece to make the trees work. I was searching for days around the house, through my jetski parts, tool shed, garage, even my gardening shed and finally found something that'll work. I just so happened to spot a molded end cap on my wifes old day bed in the garage that's the same rough diameter of the steering tube. I stuck it in the vice and cut off what I needed with a hacksaw. This will take up the space leftover from the stem. I can't weld it since it's aluminum so I cut slits on one end to press into the tube and the bearing cup fits perfect. Also I finished with the red primer, but couldn't find any olive drab so I'll continue the search tomorrow...
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I actually found an army green in gloss which will work out great once I sand it down. I pulled out my old navy gas mask bag and it will be strapped to my bars. I also have a sea bag that I'm thinking about cutting up for a seat cover which matches the gas mask bag perfect. I wish I could find my old wool blanket for this, it was green and has a black "U.S." faded right in the middle. While out searching for the paint I saw some green gardening twine for a couple bucks and have to have it. What I used it on so far are my grips. I left the old rubber grips on, but cut both ends off and wrapped over them. I don't want this to look like a replica military bike, but more of a rat rod as if someone took an old military bike and customized it if that makes sense. Here's a few update pics...
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Got the frame, chain ring and chain guard all sanded and aged and got started on assembly. I'm not sure I'm liking the forks so tall so I may end up cutting the tubes down. I still feel like it's missing something, I know the fork tubes are too shiny, but I don't wanna paint them yet and the fender will hopefully tie them in. I "V" cut my seat post to lay it back and welded it, just waiting on paint to dry on it then I'll put it on with the fender. I need a seat still so I'll steal one of my sons' seat for mock up...
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Here's how it looks with the fender. I hamered out the dent in the fender for the chain guard and bent up the mounting tab to mount it where the brakes would mount lowering it in the rear. I didn't like how the crank looked so I painted it with bed liner from a spray can just like the seat post so I'll get that together tomorrow. I also mounted my gas mask bag along side of the top tube so I'll get pics of that once the crank and chain guard are on. The seat in the pics is just for mock up so I could set the bars.
If you try to steal it... ...Nothing will happen because my kids dog's a scaredy cat.
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I really like how you aged the paint! :mrgreen: one day I shall learn how to do that.(looking off into the distance with the wind blowing through my hair all infront of an orange sunset) :lol:
 
Thanks, this was the first time I've ever done it. I'm sure there's plenty of ways to do it, but all I did was painted it with the colors mentioned above and went to town sanding with the finest sand paper I had. Since my final coat was a gloss I think it made it a little harder than if I would've used a flat. More pics tomorrow, i ended up putting the front fender on swept as far back as I could get it and with both on and the gas mask bag I think it makes the long forks not so bad, but I'm sure in the future I'll paint the fenders and fork tubes the same aged green and lower the front end.
 
This is really cool 8) ....I like the taildragger look and the color is a nice choice :!:

Did you make that seatpost?
 
Here's an almost rideable bike, Still unsure of the chrome fenders and fork tubes and the length of the tubes, but I'll ride it as is for awhile before cutting the forks down. Maybe before painting the fenders and tubes I'll sand them down a little and throw some red primer overspray on them and sand a little more. I guess it would hurt, if they come out ugly I'll just fully prime them in red then the green top coat and age them. Remember thoufg, I don't want a military replica, but more of like someone took a military frame and built a rod out of it...
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Re: My patina'd rat project (done for now)

Here's the rideable "General" finished for now. I had bought a white seat for it just for comfort, but I bought my wife a used Schwinn with a beat up black seat so I swapped with her and covered her old one with a sea bag. There's still little things I'll add as I go like for sure the first medal I ever recieved in the Navy which is the Gobal War on Terrorism medal and all branches recieved it in boot camp so it'll still go with the Army theme. I also took the rear rack from my wifes bike because she didn't like it and I cut notches out of it to fit between my seats springs without having to raise my seat, but it's pink so needs to be painted first.
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Great. it would be fun to frustrate the MPs while doing some hot dogging on that bike.
 
Haha, I don't know about the Army, but most of the security in the Navy were just other rates TAD with MP's. I did add a rear rack from a Windwood and think I'll be adding the BMX style forks that I already have painted and aged so I can use these forks on a Navy build.
 
Pic with the rear rack stolen from the wifes Windwood. She hated it on hers, but likes it on mine. Next up is to replace the BMX style forks I already painted and an MTB stem.
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Great job on the patina!!! Looks like a bicycle from the old TV show MASH 8) :mrgreen:
 

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