Hey, who's to say you're not Sam?

It has happened before...

Nope, I'm not Sam. Bummer, looked like it could have been a nice bike. I'll be watching the local CL and Ebay to see if it shows up.

Off work in 7 minutes, snowing like a blizzard outside, I think I'll do my western thrift shop loop one county over on the way home and see if any new stuff showed up. Then I'll go home and build a snowman with a flat innertube for a belt.

Well, how about that! I got bold and with a copy of her email saying I could have it if it was still there, and since she hadn't replied to my emails earlier this morning, I drove by her house. And there is was sitting outside just waiting for me, so I parked the car and walked up and got it and threw it in the car and off I went. Felt like a kid on Christmas morning all the way home. :D:D:D:D

And it turns out it is a Lotus. Needs some major overhaul and probably some new components but I'll know more once I get into working on it. I'll also hang it on the fish scale to get a quick rough weight before I take any parts off since it really felt light when I picked it up.

So, the details:

Brand: Lotus
Model: 3000R (on the seat tube) and Pro Series (on the top tube)
Tubes: Tange triple butted, forks have a CroMoly sticker on them
Wheels are Weinmann 700c, presta valve clinchers
Rear cluster is a 7-speed, and appears to be froze up fairly solid and rusty
Chain is solid rust frozen solid
Group is Sun Tour Blaze
Size measures out to about 56-57 ctc on the seat tube, not sure about the top tube length yet

I'll post a few pics shortly once I get some lunch and let the dogs out and get the attack cat ready to take to the vet in a bit.

I don't know why I'm so excited about this catch. We need a wheelie emoticon :):):):)

edit:
She is sometimes quick with her updates:
Heh, heh, I guess you can call me Sam now. ;)

And it looks like Norskagent was the first correct guesser on the bike brand. :thumb:
I'll rummage around in the basement for something.

That is taking the bull by the horns, Sam.

Lotus - knew it!

-Kurt

what happened to work?:innocent:

The main take away from this thread is that I was first with the lotus call!

What happened to work? Uh, well, I work a 9x4+4 work week, so 9 hour days plus 4 on Fridays.
But I have been known to find the sudden "need to run an errand" every once in awhile at other times of the week, fill out a slip for temporary change of hours, run the "errand", make up the hours on another day. Nice to have the flexibility when I don't abuse it too much. :thumb:

Uploading pics now to photobucket, will post links shortly....
= = = = =
edit to add a quick pic while waiting on photobucket

Photobucket is running slow so I ran my xat.com software to shrink these down.

Bike frame itself doesn't look too bad, a few spots here and there that I've noticed so far where the paint is scraped or rubbed off that has some rust but I haven't noticed any telltale signs of any paint bubbling up. The pedals look like there were decent at one point in time, but turn very stiff and need a good clean and relube and rubdown/polish, but they should come back into service okay when done. Hubs only have a number on them and a little tree or crown type of image, not sure what make they are. The rims are Weinmanns but are Made in the USA.

Shifters are plastic, not sure how well they work yet. Rear derailer may or may not be functional, won't know until I get the chain off and the cable loose. Front derailer did move a little. Chainrings may or may not be salvagable, comments or guesses on how well they'll clean up? I've never used that Oxalic acid stuff before but may give it a go with some of this stuff.

And wonder of all wonders, a small sticker on the seat tube has the name of "Huffy" on it, so yes it's a Lotus, but it's apparently a Huffy Lotus. I don't know the Lotus brand at all and don't know a lot of about the "better" years of Huffy, I'm open to comments or education on this one.

The bike weighed in at 27 pounds on the fish scale as it sits.

Top tube measured out to 56, perfect.

The stem came free, but there is some rust as seen in the pics.

The seat post might be stuck however, or it might be just frozen from sitting outside for many years. Sad that fairly decent bikes spend their time outside in the weather, but it's mine now and is sitting on the dog porch thawing out and dripping dry before heading down into the bike dungeon/basement for some past due attention.

I strongly suspect that the Dan guy looked at the bike and passed on it due to the condition. Works for me.

more pics of dirty and rusty stuff

interesting little nylon or plastic inserts in the rear dropouts on both sides

Missing one brake hood, but the bare one doesn't look too bad to me to run bare.

final pics

That chain may need a little work...

I read recently of someone who bead blasts their rusty chains and makes them look new again, might have to look into that. But in reality I might just hang in on the back fence next to another one I've got back there in case I need to fend off any rabid wolves or other such wild critters. ;) Then again I could collect all my rusty chains and make a picture frame out of them for the perimeter of my white garage door. :D

As to the bike, even though the tire sidewalls are pretty much just threads the innertubes still hold air. I pumped 20psi into them just for grins and they're still holding.

I've got no idea why this thing weighs so much, almost as much as the World Sport with steel wheels and this Lotus has alloys. Does anyone have a comparable bike to compare weights with?

I'm also curious how old this bike is. I'm going to guess late 80's to mid 90's maybe. I'll have to see if I can find any s/n or date codes on it anyplace.

I was just reading that the flower petal logo was used from 1983-1986

Dan must be smoking crack... that bike was FREE!

Wisconsin is like that.

cb400bill,

Is the stuff you were reading about the flower on the web someplace, or in print?


and as to being "free", free is a relative term. ;)
If someone carried this bike into the shop during the summer season while I was working I would probably have looked it over, then walked with them out to the new bikes after asking if they had an emotional attachment to the bike. Buying parts at full retail and paying someone else to do the work would put this bike at a negative value. But doing it as a hobby, having a few spare parts in baggies and bins, having a source or willingness to seek out discounts on parts, all can make this a worthwhile project.

Speaking of which I've got to go squirt a few drops of penetrant/lube onto the seatpost now that it is up to room temperature and has stopped dripping snow and ice off of it. Going to be interesting to see what the insides of the bottom end look like once I get that far into it.

I don't really know much about Lotus bikes. After your bike was ID'd I just started surfing around trying to learn about them. I found this thread on a different forum.

http://resolutecycling.blogspot.com/2008/04/lotus.html

Thanks for the link, interesting reading.


I managed to get the seatpost out today. Let some LiquidWrench and then some of the PB Blaster stuff work on it for awhile, then finally took it out to the alley and clamped the top of the seatpost into a big plumber's vise I have bolted into a log section. Took some firm tugging and twisting with the frame to finally get it to pop loose, but it's out - yippee. Left a few vice teeth marks on the seatpost head, but it's still usable and the bite marks will just add to the story.

Had to take the chain off in a couple of sections and try a few different pins to find one free enough to break the chain apart without busting my smaller chain tool. The chain is so stiff I could use it for a broomstick.

Wasn't too sure how friendly the skewers were going to be for getting them off, took a crescent wrench on the levers but off they came.

So far so good, there is hope for the bike. I'm going to have to chuck and swap a few parts but it's looking like it should fair an overhaul okay.

Just for fun try cleaning the quick release in some Oxalic Acid. You might be surprised.

Hey, I am Sam and you stole my bike. Congrat on your free lotus. That was funny.

I think I'm going to get one of those bicycle license plates and have it stamped with "SAM".

Stopped in at the local Home Depot and tried to find some of that oxalic acid stuff, nobody there ever heard of it. I'll do a little forum searching on the subject and see what I can learn, then will try to find some at a different store later today. I might have to find some consumer brand names that it is marketed under.

Do you have to neutralize the acid on the parts after use, or is it just a hang to dry type of process?

It's probably not something I want to use in the basement near the gas furnace. I wonder how it will work out in an unheated garage with the temps projected to be below 0degF this week.