Chiangkong Roadster Special No. 2

[anon]

I've already posted this picture in the How To forum.

Anyway, a little story about it then...

Chiangkong is a area in Bangkok where stuff like engines, car parts, bikes and trikes that have been discarded or died in Japan come to Thailand to be resurrected...breathed a new life...

Anyhoo, I'd been riding a fat tire bike and decided it wasn't quick and nimble enough anymore...so I went to Chiangkong and dug this out from a junk mountain rusty bikes and parts...

It came from Japan and had a thirst for knowledge, I disgress :wink: , with Japanese stickers and lugs, that's when it caught my eye. But the frame was stamp Taiwan. Diamond frames are now hard to come by because of the fixie craze. Out of lines of used folders, cruisers, mountain bikes and what they term here 'the housewife' bikes (not my term), this was the only one lugged frame I could find. And it was the right size. I didn't grab it right away and surveyed the whole few square blocks before coming back to get it. It was pretty costly for an old-no-collectors-value bike, say more than a brand new Huffy Cranbrook at Target.

The next day after it was stripped and roughsanded and painted flat black. At first I was gonna go with this flat black. I had someone remove the brazed-ons on the fork and ripped out the cable stays on the top tube.

The chainwheel had to rings so I stripped one off and kept it. It's SR custom 49T with 165 arms that'll do.

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[anon]

Then I decided, no, not flat black. Luckily I have an uncle with a paint shop. So gloss black it is with his best paint, the parrot brand he said.

The rims are new Bontrager Camino 700c.

I had two forks painted. An extra cruiser fork for if when I want to put fat tires on.

Meanwhile the parts started rolling in...

The Schwalbe Delta Cruiser came from derekscycles in England. That makes'm tyres :mrgreen: . The Sturmey Archer X-FD front hub came from Xtreme Bike and Sports from the mid-west USA. Both through eBay. Good deals. I got this I'm-not-too-sure-if-they're-antique stem and bar set from a local restorer. I haven't seen one like it before; one bolt holds both the bar to the stem and the stem to the tube. :?

The paint dried and dried before the S2C from junkyrustybikes.net finally cleard customs.

"Yeah, another Guv'nor clone." 8)

Of course it is. It's also a clone of all that came before.

I got this book when I was working on my cruiser late last year. I'm sure several of us here have it.
Bicycle by David V Herlihy

Great book!

Great pictures inside.

How come bicycles around that time all had cream tires? Why are they black now?

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[Tailwinds]

Wow! That thing looks great!

 

[anon]

While the rims were laced, I tried to wrap the bar with leather strips and cork. The leather comes from an old braided belt.

Here it is assembled...The leather grips came unwound though. I may try it later with glue and lacquer.

Now it's on a Soma bar found in another pile on another day.

A fixie killer that has already infected quite a few in the neighborhood.

 

[anon]

Wow! That thing looks great!

Thanks.

The irony in all this is that though most of the parts are made in the region - the tires I believe in Indonesian and the hubs in Taiwan - they are not stocked here and have to be sourced from the US and the UK.

A new handlebar is being flown in from Michigan. :?

8)

 

[herr_rudolf]

Chiangkong is a area in Bangkok where stuff like engines, car parts, bikes and trikes that have been discarded or died in Japan come to Thailand to be resurrected...breathed a new life...

After all the negative publicity on Asia, and it's parts this^ is good to hear!
Pretty ironic you have to order the parts from overseas when you know they are made just around the corner. I guess the UK and the USA ARE making money of of asians that are too bitten by the custom bicycle bug...

Oh, and that bike is beautiful! Glad you didn't paint it matte black.

 

[anon]

Chiangkong is a area in Bangkok where stuff like engines, car parts, bikes and trikes that have been discarded or died in Japan come to Thailand to be resurrected...breathed a new life...

After all the negative publicity on Asia, and it's parts this^ is good to hear!
Pretty ironic you have to order the parts from overseas when you know they are made just around the corner. I guess the UK and the USA ARE making money of of asians that are too bitten by the custom bicycle bug...

Oh, and that bike is beautiful! Glad you didn't paint it matte black.

Thanks.

One thing is the fact is e-commerce in English-speaking countries is just more developed and easily accessible to most. Funny I can get stuff from Australia tax-free because it's in Asia zone, but few things seem to be made there.

Take Electra. Great Californian company. Reponsible for stimulating a whole segment. Made in Taiwan. Can't get one here. :?

 

[Galtbacken]

Very nice looking bike! I like that classic style.

 

[anon]

Very nice looking bike! I like that classic style.

Thank you, Galtbacken.


Come to think of it, it's not just ironic I have to order parts that are made in Asia from the US, but it also is not quite environmentally friendly, is it? That the parts have to take a slow boat from Asia to America and Europe and then be flown back to Asia again?

I now wish Sunrace Sturmey Archer HQ had answered my mail inquiring about regional dealers. I'm so taking up this issue with them. Maybe their guys in the US and the Netherlands will be more responsive.

I will still get my Worksman Cycle shipped to me though, because THAT is MADE in the USA. :mrgreen:

 

[siberian]

great bike! next year i hope i'll make roadster on 28" wheels base, today my thoughts come to my new cruiser project)

 

[Gdcast]

Great bike!!!
A similar bike is on my wish list! Hope to build it soon.

At least you get to buy all those magnificent parts, around here we don't build a thing and we don't get to buy anything from ebay without being charged double it´s price from the local customs. That if you get the chance to pay, cause if they like what you bought, they say is a prohibited item and they keep it for themselves :x :x :x
All sniffy parts from China, if you look hard on them, they break. :!:

 

[anon]

thanks siberian. i can't get my hands on a cruiser so i'll have to make do with diamond frames. good luck and hope to see yours.

Great bike!!!
A similar bike is on my wish list! Hope to build it soon.

At least you get to buy all those magnificent parts, around here we don't build a thing and we don't get to buy anything from ebay without being charged double it´s price from the local customs. That if you get the chance to pay, cause if they like what you bought, they say is a prohibited item and they keep it for themselves :x :x :x
All sniffy parts from China, if you look hard on them, they break. :!:

Hi and thanks, Gdcast. I totally sympathise. It used to be like that here too, until fairly recently. Now I think our customs and mail systems are pretty much modern now - thanks to cc cameras all around.

 

[xddorox]

Awesome looking bike. It is simple yet very beautiful, congrats.

 

[SSG]

Great looking rebuild!

How come bicycles around that time all had cream tires? Why are they black now?

Early bicycle tires were typically a shade of white or gray, and sometimes red "natural rubber". They started adding carbon to many tires around 1910, which makes the rubber more wear resistant and also colors them black. In a way bicycle tire design basically emulated automobile tire design. A popular design at the time was to put a black tread area on a white tire which is what we now call whitewall tires.

 

[anon]

Great looking rebuild!

How come bicycles around that time all had cream tires? Why are they black now?

Early bicycle tires were typically a shade of white or gray, and sometimes red "natural rubber". They started adding carbon to many tires around 1910, which makes the rubber more wear resistant and also colors them black. In a way bicycle tire design basically emulated automobile tire design. A popular design at the time was to put a black tread area on a white tire which is what we now call whitewall tires.

Thanks for the info. I sometimes see freshly harvested (or collected) rubber sap and it's almost creamy like these tires, except shiney sort of like latex and used to think maybe it was just easier to make them offwhite that way. Carbon must be for vulcanization. So these modern cream tires must be different from the earlier ones.

Anyhoo, I put this new bar on it. It's a Civia Loring. (I decided to depart from the North Road or the Moustache, just for...) It's a very good handlebar. You're not totally upright. You're still dropping some weight on the front part of the bike. You pedal off on the parallel ends. Then as you pick up speed, you're naturally drawn to shove your hands into the curves (two positions, either outside curves or inside curves on both sides). You can also grab the straight part crouching down or up. That's just with the normal rise position with bar ends facing back. It's great! Civia Loring. Light aluminium.

I relocated the bell to the stem already.

 

[anon]

Renamed Urban Speedster No.2

 

[anon]

One thing leads to another. Finally finished! A buddy's bike. Another rebuilt from a 70s Miyata Gentleman. Yeah!

 

[heyslugger]

Beautiful Bikes! I happen to see your comment and location (Non) on another thread about Wal Mart (Tesco) Bikes and clicked through to this thread. Very nice work on these. Took me back. I grew up on Ekamai. We used to go to warajak rd. and sometimes to a spot in Phra Khanong for our parts! Thanks for the memories. Ha remembering that just reminded me of how scared I was of Mae Nak Phra Khanong!

 

[OUTLAW]

nice lookin bikes. :mrgreen:

Outlaw 8)

 

[FatBoy]

Very Cool 8) :mrgreen: