Hello,
I recently acquired a bike for my girlfriend and have been having one hell of a time identifying it. Any help would be greatly appreciated..
. Thank you
.

Pic Assist - https://www.bikeforums.net/g/picture/23241840

I don't know who would have made it, but the Flying O was OTASCO's house brand. OTASCO, was a regional hardware chain mostly in Oklahoma and Kansas. This bike is probably from early to mid 70s and OTASCO was out of business by the mid to late 80s. As a small boy, my first non-second hand bike came from OTASCO. I have seen a few Flying Os come up in my area and while some are in good condition, they aren't worth much more than nostalgia to me. Tires for this will cost more than the bike is worth by far. Sorry.

Flying-O was the brand of OTASCO, orignally known as the Oklahoma Tire & Supply Company, a retail auto supply chain. Based on the rear dropout this bicycle appears to have been manufactured by Huffman/Huffy. The graphics look 1980s to me.

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a serial commencing with the letters HC would indicate a machine produced at the Huffman plant located in Celina Ohio



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Back in the day, many department stores, tire shops, and more were in the bicycle business. They would get decals applied to bikes made by others and "instantly" they had their own bikes. I bought a new bike at a lawn mower repair shop once. Store didn't even have a franchise to sell new lawn mowers, but they were in the bicycle business with their own brand.

People now researching such "brands" are challenged to find any information on them. Vintage bike information is usually posted on the web, for free, by people that just like one brand or another. Not much love for the old department store stuff.

Nothing unique or special about these bikes, the brand will tell you nothing as to parts and any repairs. Crimped drop outs look very "Huffy"-esque.

Hopefully the tires still have markings on them as to size. In the world of bicycles, there are five DIFFERENT tire sizes for 26 inch tires. The lack of standardization can be a real pain.

And on older bikes, wheels can get swapped out, so what originally was on there may not matter. I had a bike with 26 x 1 3/8 tires. Simple, right? Well, the rear wheel was the standard 590 tire size. The front was the Schwinn S-6 size (597). Needless to say, the pair of 590 tires I had only fit one wheel.

Bike was a Western Auto (not a Schwinn).

+10 new tires will exceed the value of the bike.

https://www.sheldonbrown.com/26.html

I would agree the bike is Huffy built circa late 70's early 80's based on the light metalic gold paint which I have only seen this paint on Huffy's and early 80's Pontiac's.

In St. Louis we had Western Auto stores and I remember their house brand quite well. Long gone but not forgotten.

Yes. The Western Flyer. My parents were loyal to a salesman at OTASCO named Cotton and dad didn't particularly care for the man that owned the Western Auto in my town so the couple of times I got a brand new bike as a boy it was Flying O all the way.

This Flying-O frame has the look of Huffy Aerowind mixte, except without the aero tube set. the Aerowinds were manufactured in 1981 and 1982.

The bicycle model information will be on the non-driveside dropout. The serial number will be on the head tube.

Aerowind mixte for sale

Huffy Aerowind

I think your girlfriend deserves a better bike.

Could still be useful as a grocery getter/town bike if a rack and basket is added, re-tired, cleaned up and serviced.