not_jason

Hello forum!

Riding my bike is one of my oldest interests, but it's one that I unfortunately don't do nearly often enough. There's a wide variety of reasons why I neglect my bikes, but chief amongst them is that I don't have very many friends who share the hobby. My goal in joining this forum is to subject myself to more bike culture, to get myself excited about riding more often. Also, I've enjoyed lurking in the vintage bike thread, and I'm excited to take part in those discussions.

A bit about myself as a bicyclist: My first bike was an 16" BMX that I rode around in the kitchen of our house. While I've owned a couple mountain bikes in my life, my passion during junior high and high school was 20" bikes. I used to ride flatland BMX on a highly modified bike that I spent way too much money on. In addition to that, I've built lowriders and make-shift choppers. During my first few years of college, I lost a lot of my fire for riding (mostly because it was very inconvenient on our campus), and by the time I finally got back into it, I found myself a lot less excited about BMX and gimmick bikes. However, years of riding single speed bikes left me with a lingering appreciation for simplicity, which drew me into the realm of old 3 speeds. I've fixed up a couple, and fallen in love with them. Since then I have branched out and gotten a ten speed and a 5 speed, with the normal derailur set up, but I love the simplicity and reliability of old Strumey-Archer hubs. Also, the aesthetic sensibility is great.

Outside of biking, I'm a musician. I play bass and sing in my band. I like obnoxious grating experimental pop music.

This is much longer than I intended. Here's my most recent yard-sale find:

RonH

Welcome.
Stop by the Classic & Vintage forum and you'll get a warm welcome. Those folks love old bikes ... and pictures.

East Hill

SA fans, Schwinn fans, photo fans!

See you over there .



Me with my 1977 Richard Sachs .

Welcome back to BF, and feel free to PM me with any questions !

East Hill

East Hill

Oh, and what part of Maine? At least one C & Ver lives in Maine...

not_jason

Thanks for the warm welcome!

I'm in the Bangor area. There are a lot of cyclists around here, but I haven't seen very many on old bikes. That's not to say they aren't out there, but they're probably not riding back and fourth across the same 3 mile stretch of road that I am.

And if anybody's wondering, that thing in the picture is an old Sears and Roebuck. It doesn't appear to have a model name. I just bought it yesterday and haven't even gotten the chance to ride it yet. It needs a new shifter cable and possibly a new shifter. It feels solid though. It was made in Austria, and I think the guy I bought it from said it was a 73.

East Hill

If it was made in Austria, it's probably actually a re-badged Puch.

I can't remember if any of the C & Vers are in Bangor, but I bet there's a few.

East Hill

not_jason

Yes, I believe I read that somewhere on this forum, about the rebadging.

not_jason

And for that matter, I've got a Sears bike I bought a few weeks back that I believe was probably made in the late 70s. It's a very nice bike in it's own right. After a few adjustments, it rides like a dream, but it feels none the less like a department store bike. It's heavy, it's clunky, etc. My new one feels a lot more solid, and a lot more "bike shop quality", comparable to my Raleigh Sprite.

Here's my Sears Free Spirit 3-speed:

East Hill

You have a Raleigh Sprite as well? We have a thread going in C & V about Raleigh Sprites .

East Hill

not_jason

give me a link and I'll go post mine. I looked for it on my own, but not very hard. I promise I'll start posting in the general forums soon enough, but I'm waiting for the time to be right, and for a good topic to pop up where I won't look like a total newbie idiot by participating. For now, I'm going to exploit my little thread here for what little life it might have left.

Here is my aforementioned Sprite:


$5 dollars well spent!

And since I've posted everything else in my fleet, here's my primary ride. You might see this and think, "why?" and you'd be correct. It is by a wide margin the worst bike I own. However, I have a certain attachment to it, as I had to do quite a bit of work to bring this back from the grave. It's about an even split between a bike I found in a barn and a bike my dad picked from the dump.



What kind of crazy person dreamed up this lever? The only other one like it I've seen was mounted on the steering wheel of a modified racing lawn-mower. Also, sparkley grips!


This bike wishes it were British so bad. Just look at that logo.

JohnBrooking

Welcome to BF, "not jason"!

I'm in the Portland area (yes, Portland Maine) and have a bicycle commuting club that you can get to by the link in my sig. I know it's a bit far to travel to meet us in person, but you are very welcome to hang out with us online, and if you do make it down around Portland sometime, give me a shout! We have a message area and places for photos and files, as well as lots of information I've posted on a variety of commuting-related topics.

One of my bikes (currently a total of 4) is a 3-speed Huffy that I found at a yard sale for 3 bucks and then paid the bike shop $30 to tune up for me. I used it for commuting the winter before last, but now it's just the occasional family ride and backup to the backup. For last winter, I purchased a new Giant Cypress EX with an internal 7-speed hub, for worry-free riding through snow and slush. But it's still not quite as simple as the old 3-speeds!

Yes, I bike commute all winter in Portland, except for the really bad storms. My ride is about 5 miles each way, from Westbrook to South Portland. I have a computer job which allows me to work from home on occasion, so my rule this winter was I'll ride if my co-workers are driving, but if they email to say that are working from home, then I do too. That's worked out very well. I rode all but about 1/2 dozen of the worst days.

Check out this pic of the Giant. Note the snowplow! (As I recall, that was not a commuting day, but I did bike out to the grocery store to pick up some items!) More pics here.

Have fun, ride safe!

- John

not_jason

Having just survived the most recent winter, I feel cold just thinking about that!

East Hill

Here's the latest Sprite thread:

https://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...ghlight=sprite

East Hill