rare little canadian oddity revised pic's fri 19th

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icyuod2

icyuod2

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well i have to tell you, i was very excited when i came home and found this odd little bike in my back yard. i had no idea where it came from and figured either my friend at the dump salvaged it for me, or one of my other friends had happened across it.

turns out this isn't the case. its my neighbours old bike and he wanted me to clean it up for him. alittle disapointed it wasn't left for me, but he did say he has another. :)

waterloo (the place it was built) is just an hour away from both my home town and the city i currently live in. theres not much info on the sunshine bike company. it wasn't around for long.

based on company info, i think the bike dates to the 1930"s but i'm not 100% positive.
figured you guys would enjoy it anyhoo.

heres alittle info i dug up.
"Incorporated in 1929 by H.V. McKay of Sunshine Harvester Works(Australia) and Massey-Harris(Canada). Sunshine-Waterloo Company Ltd. was formed. They built a 285,000 square foot plant in Waterloo, Ontario in 1930. The company was involved in manufacturing mainly farm equipment before the war. The company diversified during the 1930s adding the production of baby carriages, bicycles, tricycles and roller skates. In 1939 the manufacturing converted to war-related production army trucks, smoke bombs, shells, mines, grenades and gun mounts. Following the war, market changes led to the company adding office products, stoves, shelving and lockers. Massey-Ferguson Industries Limited(formed in 1953 from Massey-Harris-Ferguson) purchased H.V.MacKay's share in 1955, acquiring the Sunshine-Waterloo Company in the process.

This association allowed the company to expand in the office equipment market leading to a switch in focus in 1956 almost entirely to the manufacture of steel office furniture. The name was changed to Sunshine Office Equipment Limited in 1961"

I hope this helps somewhat. If it's a 40s model, it would be from the later part of the decade. Either way, it's a cool bit of Canadiana. I hope you buy it. It's good to preserve some small bit of Canadian heritage. You never know. They might be super rare. By my calculations, they only built bikes for 11-12 years. And I'm pretty sure there wasn't high numbers of them built and sold."
the only thing not rusted. :)
IMG_0514-1.jpg


IMG_0511-1.jpg

not quite solid tires, but they might as well be. (16" wheels, its a small bike)
IMG_0516.jpg

belt driven
IMG_0512.jpg

IMG_0513-1.jpg

IMG_0517-1.jpg

heres the belt tensioner
IMG_0521.jpg

IMG_0522.jpg

tiny little pan seat welded to a lean back post
IMG_0519.jpg

IMG_0520-1.jpg

ratty enough for ya?
i'm sure if it were mine, i'd leave it just the way it is, however my neighbour has other plans
guess i got my work cut out for me. :)
 
Re: rare little canadian oddity

Ohhh, Dude! How sick Is that...?! And from your adopted homeland!! Cool! 8)
 
Re: rare little canadian oddity

2WheelFlyer said:
Oh my God, that thing is rusted solid! that's a tough build!
Click to expand...

actually not quite solid. :)

all the nuts/bolts are coming out very easily. i figured i'd have to drill most of em out, but that hasn't been the case.
seat was easily removed, bars also.

must be all that quality canadian steel. :)
IMG_0524.jpg
 
Re: rare little canadian oddity

WOW what an amazing find.......That drive system is the best........So ahead of its time.....Makes me think why more bikes dont have belt drive wheels.......Really is the coolest bike I've seen in awhile........Also Canada is a beautiful country......
 
Re: rare little canadian oddity

well you can tell this thing was built by a company that built farm implements.
the crank has no bearings (imagen that) its just a brass bushing(with a recessed area inside for grease) and a steel rod with a pulley mounted to it.
IMG_0529.jpg

it wouldn't surprize me if alot of the parts were created from parts they use for farm implements.

i still can't get over how easy all the bolts were to remove. after i cracked most of em, i turned em loose with my fingers.
pretty impressive considering how rusty they are.
 
Re: rare little canadian oddity

what a crazy little bike! jeez, i can't remember the last time i replaced some semi-pneumatic tires....... :)
 
Re: rare little canadian oddity

Bendix said:
what a crazy little bike! jeez, i can't remember the last time i replaced some semi-pneumatic tires....... :)
Click to expand...

which brings up a good question, how does one go about fusing a semi-pneumatic tire back together?
 
Re: rare little canadian oddity

That is probably the most rust I've seen on anything in my life. Good luck with the build. I remember my first bike as a kid was a little blue bicycle that had solid wheels. I got in trouble one day when, after church, I went out to ride it without changing into my play clothes. When I was younger, we had two sets of clothes, church/school, and play. You'd better not mix them up either.
 
Re: rare little canadian oddity revised pic's fri 20th

well i striped most of the bike down. if it where mine, i'd leave it raw metal. :)
now you can see the workings , it really is an odd little bike. it will peddle forward or backwards. it also has no brakes.
IMG_0532.jpg

IMG_0533.jpg

alot of the bike is brazed. and that brass bushing turn out to be a couple brass washers on a steel tube.
IMG_0535.jpg

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with alittle grease the crank turned out to be very smooth for not having bearings.
IMG_0540.jpg


still have to find out what color he want's it painted.

i still have to clean up the rims, but to do so i'll have to remove/replace the spokes. i need to figure out if i can fuse these old tires back together before i go pulling them apart.
 
Man I've never seen anything like that. there's a few frame builders like Matt Chester and Grant from Rivendel bikes who build similar frames with giant head tubes. nothing like this (road or cyclo cross) but definitely inspired by this old type design. cool. what diameter tires?
 
Great job so far Leigh. I have seen a couple of these on kijiji and thought they were pretty cool. You know you build nice bikes when the neighbours start dropping off build bikes without asking how much. I hope you had your tetnus shot before this build.

Rob
 
thx rob, i'm going to drag it with me next week to brantford.

the owner told me he has a second bike he wants to use for parts. he's gonna drag it down here today. he hasn't seen the bike since i cleaned it, and the only parts it really needs is an original pedal and the front tire if i cant stretch this one.

so with any luck, i'm hoping i can talk him into giving me the second bike as payment. :)
we'll see what happens.

if i soak this tire in mineral oil, will it soften up so i can stretch it out?

i've revived alot of old dried up rubber pellet gun seals/pump cups by soaking them in mineral oil. just wondered if the same would work with a rubber tire.
 

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