Originally Posted by
arty dave
You really do have some beautiful bikes Sir Mike, and I enjoy seeing the ones you post.
I'll have to post my early 50's TCW hub before it goes back into its shell. It looks clean and functional & I'm hoping it works. I harvested it from a 24" girls bike with a very bent frame. I'm also hoping the front drum brake will help the TCW to slow down the roadster they'll be on. The only coaster brake I've used was a Sachs 3 speed that had less braking power in third gear and more in 1st, and I think the TCW is similar.
I got excited for a moment there, but no World Tours in 27x1 1/4"
. They are a good tyre. I've been pleased with buying from Bike24 (Germany to Australia), and bought a pair of Alloy Westwood rims from them, that I still haven't laced up. My excuse is that I'm still building the space to build bikes in
I appreciate it. The Manton got donated to a local bike co-op and the Tiger I sold to a fellow who wanted to do his own, additional customizations. They were good bikes but I didn't ride them enough. They sure were attractive. I love old American and British bikes. People sometimes forget that from about 1938 through 1950 or so, several American bike manufacturers tried to revive the adult cycling market in the US. There was a bike boom in the US during the 1890s, but it went bust shortly after the turn of the 20th century. Gradually, the automobile took over by the 1920s. The English stuck with their bikes. Then starting in the late 1930s, American manufacturers like Schwinn, Columbia/Westfield, and a couple other builders tried to revive the adult sporting market for cycling. This included both touring and racing. The Manton & Smith shown (though a bit modified) appears to have been Manton's attempt at an adult utility cycle in the 1940s. The companies made a good run at it and produced some excellent utility-type 3 speeds in that era, but ultimately the automobile was too dominant in the US for the 1930s-40s revival to really take hold.
If you have the coaster hub already and it seems to be in good shape, it's worth giving a try. The cost is time only to try it. The TCW indeed has variable braking with 3 being kind of weaker than the other gears. The brake shoe is undersized relative to what one would want, and the transmission bloc is held in place using an E-clip, which if it moves, will throw the transmission off. Make sure that E-clip is firmly in the groove on the axle. You'll still want a front handbrake on the bike if you use the TCW. It's good to be able to re-use the old hub if everything is good on it.