The Runwell: Day 3

Today's big task was the front wheel: getting the rims, spokes, and hub cleaned and inspected. Everything seems true and tight and sturdy, and it certainly looks better now than it did. I used a combination of light oil and steel wool, and Brasso polish. I also had a go at removing the pedals, but was only able to get one off. The other is stuck fast and is going to need some serious help. The pedals weigh about half a pound each (a slight exaggeration, perhaps), which surprised me. I also got most of the paper or cardboard, or whatever was under the grips, off the handlebars, and realized that probably the worst rust on the bike was hiding under there.

Once I get a rust treatment on, they should look better, and hopefully there's not too much damage. I guess I'd rather have it there than anywhere else, though. Work is probably going to slow down a bit, as I have more pressing obligations to attend to, but I'll keep posting my progress here as I go.

The Runwell: Day 2

First, I took a few swipes at the chainring with fine steel wool and some light oil to see what I was in for, and it looks like it's going to need a more extensive treatment.

I removed the decaying plastic (or very old, thin rubber?) grips, and found a mess of cardboard, or paper, or cork, or something underneath, which is proving difficult to chip off.

Here's a photo of the small spot I started on the handlebars, which also shows the poor shape they're generally in. Still, I got this much done with just a touch of oil and the steel wool, so that's encouraging.

The front hub and rim are shining up beautifully. I only just got started, so I didn't take a photo, but they will fairly gleam when finished. The front hub has apparently been serviced somewhat recently, too, since the bearings are still well-greased. All-in-all, I'm still pretty encouraged.

The Runwell: Day 1

The first order of business was to run a cloth over the whole thing so my hands didn't come away black every time I touched the thing. I squirted Pedro's Bio Cleaner on a damp rag and just wiped the whole thing down. I came away with three buckets of brown/black water. At first, I thought I must be taking off the paint, but no, it was just dirt. I also took a broom to the underside of the saddle, the wheels, etc. to get the cobwebs and leaves and such off. Even this minimal cleaning made a big difference.

With everything clean, I set about tackling what I expected to be the worst part: trying to wrestle the seat post out. Actually, it came out quite easily, and was not rusted at all below the tube line. Phew!

I put the seat back on, and flipped the bike over to work on getting the bent fenders, seized-up chain, and floppy front tire off. They were all getting in the way of moving the bike around, and I figured it would just be that much easier and lighter without them. The result is pictured above: a nice clean-looking bike, if I do say so! This is the last time for a while that it will look like this (i.e., all put together), so get an eyeful!

The next step is going to be cleaning up the front wheel, since it's in the best shape to begin with, and making some forays into working on the handlebars. I figure that will give me a nice boost to get started on the rear wheel, which is really a mess. I'm starting to think that it may not take as much work to get this beast rideable as I thought (knock on wood). Famous last words, right?

Everything is Dirty

As in filthy. Grimy. Gross. Accumulated road guck.

I took a little break from work at noon today (I work at home) while my lunch was warming up, and removed the front brake assembly. I'm doing everything incrementally, one step at a time, because I'm not at all confident in my ability to remember where everything goes. I'm taking pictures of everything as I do it for later reference when I try to put it all back together, then bagging everything in labeled plastic zipper bags. I know, it sounded anal to me too when I read this bit of advice online, but so-help-me, it has SO helped me. I'd never remember where all the little washers and nuts and doo-dads go if I didn't label everything.

The main point of all this is that every piece that I take off is really dirty. I clean up the surface of everything fairly regularly, but I've never delved into the guts of the bike, and as I'm doing that, I'm realizing how filthy everything is. I'm also realizing that whoever had this bike before me did a lot of "improvising" when it comes to little parts. There are a lot of washers that don't seem to fit quite right, some nuts that are cross-threaded on bolts, etc. Anyway, I haven't cleaned the parts I took off yet, maybe tonight. Then I'll really know how dirty they were. The photo above gives some idea of the grime.

Day 1 & 2: Huffy/Raleigh Sportsman

The first shiny bits made their appearance today. I've got the wheels, fenders, chain guard, kickstand, etc. off the bike, but have left the handlebars/stem/fork assembled and the saddle and post on so that I can upend the bike to clean from all angles. I always clean everything first before I get too serious about the technical bits like bearings, crank, hubs, etc. Part of the reason is so that I can handle the bike without getting too dirty, and I also like the psychological boost I get from sprucing everything up. I washed the whole frame with Pedro's Bio-Clean squirted on a wet cloth, then went over it with rubbing compound to get a deeper clean and to coax what luster is left out of the paint. The fork and its chromed cap came out beautifully, but the head tube reveals the overall poor condition of the paint. The head badge turns out to be chromed copper, which explains the greenish hue it had. I made a go at the handlebars, and confirmed that much of the chrome is flaking off, but what remains shined up better than I expected; same with the stem. I didn't take a photo of that yet.

The Runwell Preview

Just a couple of teaser photos after a busy Saturday of work. Had a successful trip to the bike shop this morning and picked up most of the remaining essentials. Still have to place an order with Harris for the remaining, and to finish up a good deal of the "cosmetic" work. Unfortunately, along those lines, these photos show the limitations of my cleanup effort, especially due to deteriorated nickel and/or chrome plating and a bit of rust still showing on the frame. Oh well, still better than when I found it, for sure.

The Buzz About Old Bikes

Okay, so my blog post title puns aren't as good as some, but I try. This post isn't much on content, but I thought it was interesting and wanted to pass along that I found this little buzzy fellow in the seat tube of the Huffeigh, looking a bit cleaner but otherwise very much like this guy, who was found in the bottom bracket of the Columbia. Has anyone else found yellow jackets, hornets, or wasps in the frames of their old bikes? Is that a thing? Or is it just the bikes that I end up with?

Sturmey-Archer Shifter Before/After

I thought I'd have a go at resurrecting the original trigger shifter on the Huffy/Raleigh instead of putting on a new one. I really like the name plate on this one, so I wanted to try to keep it. These were not made to be dissembled, so I had to use a cotton swab soaked with cleaner (actually, just rubbing alcohol) to get to the inside parts. I also used a small screwdriver and a toothpick to get way in there and chip the dirt and grit away. I'll put a couple drops of oil in there when I'm ready to put it back on, and it should be fine.

To clean up the outside, I used my usual combination of fine steel wool and light oil, followed by Brasso. I would have used RidingPretty's wonderful green cleaning techniques, but I had that part done several weeks ago before she guest-posted here. Finally, I used a bit of red and black craft paint on a paper towel to refresh the color on the lettering. I just applied the paint across the letters with a corner of the towel, then wiped away the excess from the surface. It's not perfect, but certainly looks better than it did.

Huffy/Raleigh Chrome Before

While I procrastinate putting the wheels back together and starting the sanding and painting, I'm going back through all the parts I have already cleaned and doing a second, more thorough cleaning and inspection. The brake calipers and levers are the pieces in the worst shape. These photos are after two cleanings with steel wool and oil, followed by rubbing compound and then polishing with a clean cloth. Trust me, this is as good as they're going to get:

The only chrome bits on the bike that aren't bad are the crank arms and chainring. The stem and handlebars were quite terrible, and after my adventure with the stuck stem bolt, they've been replaced anyway. I'm going to try the silver paint trick for these and a few other once-shiny bits like the frame clips for the cables.

I found this in William Love's How to Restore Your Collector Bicycle (which is now out of print, darn it). Love is talking about cadmium or nickel-plated bits like fender braces, kickstands, etc., but I'm going to try it with chromed pieces. I figure they can't look any worse than they do now.

Good old "chrome" silver (shinier) or aluminum (duller) spray paint works wonders to touchup these...plated parts, but not necessarily by spraying them. First, wash and thoroughly dry all of the parts.... Spray the paint liberally on a paper towel, and rub the paint on the affected part.... The deteriorated portions are a bit rough compared to the rest of the surface, and the paint sticks to these areas while blending with the original surface nicely (Love p.64).

We shall see. This is probably going to be this weekend's project. I'll let you know how it works.

Schwinn Cleanup

I'm working pretty quickly on the Schwinn Project. Yesterday afternoon I took the whole thing apart, cleaned and polished the frame, cleaned and repacked the bottom bracket and headset, and polished up the crank and handlebar chrome.

I'll get some more photos this afternoon, but here's the top part of the headset after cleaning. I didn't get a before photo, unfortunately, but I had to show y'all how well this came out.

The bottom bracket was the same. Once I got the grime and old grease cleaned up, the internal works are in nearly pristine condition. I'm thinking that this old fella didn't see much use in its day, because there is virtually no wear on any of the bearings or cones. Still working on the wheels, but they're also cleaning up nicely.

Reader Project: Lissa's Blue Bombshell

Lissa from New York posted a comment about my wife's Schwinn Suburban a few weeks ago, saying that she has one of her own that she has recently invested in as a supplemental and possibly alternative form of transportation to her car. Her beautiful "Blue Bombshell" as I dubbed it (a name that's stuck, apparently), needs a bit of work to get it going again. As she reports (with a few helpful tips on cleaning):

Up until now, all I've done is clean her up a bit -- steel wool and a combination of vinegar and water have cleaned up the rust on the wheels, the handlebars, and all of the little metal bits that surely have specific purposes, but which I don't have particular names for. My friend has all of the tools necessary for restoring her to functional use, so with his help I'll be removing (and possibly replacing) the gears and the chain, the brakes and brake housings, and the inner-tubes....While he has the bike in pieces, I'll do some other cosmetic stuff with the kickstand, rear rack, wheel hubs, and underside of the seat beneath the fabulous leather saddle, making a CLR-based paste to work on some of that rust.

Lissa also wanted to know what would be a good surface treatment to protect the paint. I suggest a few coats of a quality automobile polish which will go a long way to protect against scrapes and scuffs. However, a slightly scruffy-looking bike is a surprisingly good theft-deterrent, so don't make it look too nice!

Lissa is planning a move to New York City and is looking forward to using her bike to haul herself and her accoutrements around the city. She promises pictures of herself tooling about the city with stuffed panniers and baskets full of produce. We'll look forward to it, Lissa, and happy riding!

Sunday Work Log

I managed to put in a good amount of bike work today for the first time in a while. Here's what I did:

• first three coats of paint on Huffeigh front fender
• finished dismantling the fixie project bike
• a bit of frame cleaning on the fixie project
• clear coated silver chrome touch-up on miscellaneous Huffeigh bits

Other things I've been doing whenever I've had the chance include sanding the parts of the Huffeigh frame and rear fender that will be painted, and trying to figure out how to get the stuck crank cotter and stuck seat post out of the fixie project. Tonight I'm hoping to rebuild the rear wheel on the Huffeigh, except for one spoke, which needs to be replaced and hasn't been obtained yet. Sorry about the lack of photos, I was more intent on getting the work done than taking photos of it. I'll try to get some up this week.

The Runwell: Days 11 & 12

After one day spent badly bungling trying to re-lace my rear wheel, an evening carefully studying Sheldon Brown's guide, and another afternoon finally getting the stupid thing right, I can now say that I've built a wheel, or rather rebuilt a wheel. Once I actually pulled my head out of my...well...and thought about it for a minute, it all went pretty well, with the exception that I stripped a nipple (cue childish snickering) that's going to have to be replaced and the wheel trued.

I also greased and reassembled the rear hub, and now have a functional rear wheel that's in much better shape than when I found it. Here's the before picture for a comparison.

I've even tested the coaster brake by spinning the wheel in my hands, and it seems to work just fine. Like I said before, it's not quite as shiny as I would have liked, but there's only so much one can do after years of weather.

On a side note, after exchanging emails with a very nice gent and former mechanic in England (who remembered when Runwell was still around in the 1960s as a smallish parts distributor), I believe I'm dealing with what's left of the original nickel plating, rather than chrome, which does a little more to explain why it was so badly deteriorated. Chrome was apparently introduced in 1928, but nickel plating was still applied after that date, so it remains hard to pin down exactly when my bike was manufactured.

Green Clean in Action

Inspired by Yours Truly to restore an old bike, fellow San Diego bike blogger Beany has tried the environmentally-friendly cleaning techniques featured once upon a time in Shelly's guest post, and I wanted to share the dramatic results. BTW, I really hope Shelly and I can get another set of guest posts up sometime soon on each others' blogs. Life has a way of getting busy, and before you know it, it's five months later. Urgh. Sorry about that. In the meantime...

The Runwell: Days 9 & 10

Despite my recent disappointment at the utter failure of Menotomy's "Vintage Bicycle Cleaning Kit" (grrrr), I've been plowing ahead with the rear wheel cleanup. Unfortunately, although it is certainly better than it was, I have had to settle for an "antique patina" finish rather than shiny chrome and steel. The chrome is simply wasted after years of rusting outside. As a testament to the heartiness of the old construction, everything is still structurally sound, just cosmetically ruined. I'm still pressing on with my plan to get the bike back up and running before thinking about repainting and re-chroming (after all, I've not even ridden the thing yet), but someday down the road, I'll do both. Until then, no riding in the rain (not hard in SoCal). Here's the after picture of the outside of the rear hub, with the Perry mark relatively clear. The shiny strip is the result of being covered by the dust clip for so many years. Below is the before picture, so you can see that I did accomplish something. Right now, I still have the wheel completely taken apart, and everything is clean (if not shiny). I've never taken apart or reassembled a wheel before, so I'm advancing with trepidation, but I have faith that I'll be able to figure it out. I only attempted it here because the single-speed wheel on the Westwood rim is built without a dish because there is no derailer and gear cluster to compensate for, making it a much more straightforward build. For those who are interested, the rear rim is a 40-spoke design, typical of old English bikes, but not otherwise very common. I'm going to hold off posting a "how to" about reassembling the wheel until I see if I actually "can do," but check out Sheldon Brown on wheel building in the meantime. Once the wheel is back together, both wheels and the frame are off to the bike shop for truing and to have the cottered cranks and stubborn stuck pedal removed. Once that's done, I'll just need to assemble all the replacement parts, and put 'er back together. I'm sure it won't be that easy, however.

Last of the Cleaning

Today, I finished cleaning everything, including wiping down and de-greasing the frame in preparation for sanding. I cleaned up the external hardware on the rear hub and started to try to get at the bearings, but quickly got in a little bit over my head. I had hoped that the bearings would come out without the whole hub assembly coming out, but when I started to take off the bearing race, the whole hub started to come apart, so I veeerrry carefully pushed it all back together and tightened everything back down. The thing about the rear hub is that it's pretty complicated and seems to be working fine, so why fix it if it ain't broke? The brief glimpse I caught of the bearings, however, they seemed to still be pretty well greased, so I'm not going to worry about it. It all still seems to work after my little misadventure, but I won't know for sure until I put the whole bike back together.

If you really want to know how to take apart a Sturmey-Archer 3-speed hub, check out Sheldon Brown's guide on the subject. Maybe someday I'll give it a try.

All in all, I'm really glad to have everything cleaned now. I think the sanding will go pretty fast, so I need to go finally buy the primer, paint, and clearcoat. I also need to place my order for the new shifter and cable and such with Harris Cyclery. Exciting. I hope I can have everything put back together by early September.

No interesting pictures today, sorry.

Replacing the Peugeot's Rear Axle

A while back, I discovered that the rear axle on the Peugeot was bent. I ordered a new axle from Harris Cyclery, and have just now gotten everything put back together. It wasn't that hard, but life has a way of intruding on our best-laid plans. There aren't many pictures because I prefer not to leave greasy fingerprints all over the camera. Until I can hire a full-time camera operator, you'll just have to deal with it. Here's the rundown:

DISCLAIMER: I am not a professional mechanic, and this post should be read only for entertainment purposes (if you find this kind of thing entertaining). If you want to do your own work on your bicycle, you should most definitely consult other sources, and if you are not comfortable performing your own work, consult a qualified professional mechanic.

Remove the rear wheel from the frame: Without a bike stand, I just up-ended the bike and went to work. First, and most obviously, remove the quick-release skewer and make sure the little springs don't fly away. When removing the rear wheel, keep in mind that you'll have to handle the chain, as you will need to disengage it from the rear sprockets. It will be messy. I find it easiest to just remove the chain to begin with, using the chain-breaker tool, which isn't as destructive as it sounds. That way, I can give the chain a thorough cleaning, too. You don't have to do this every time you take off the rear wheel, and you probably shouldn't, but it's been a while since I did.

Once I removed the chain, the derailer "relaxed," since it's spring-loaded, and came to rest on the gear cluster. To keep the derailer out of the way, you can take a piece of wire coat hanger and rig a simple device to hold the derailer arm away from the rear sprockets. Hook one end around the derailer arm, and the other end to the frame. Wrap the wire in tape to prevent scratching the frame. With the derailer out of the way, just lift out the wheel.

Remove the old axle: For the mechanically disinclined (like me), this can be intimidating. There seem to be a lot of little parts in there, but don't sweat it too much, it's not really that bad. You should have a locknut and a bearing cone on each side of the hub (if you don't, you shouldn't be riding the bike). The bearing cone keeps the bearings contained within the hub and allows the hub to turn on the axle; the locknut keeps the bearing cone in place.

You can remove the locknut with a regular wrench, although if it's been on there a long time, you might want to put a drop or two of oil on it to make it easier to turn. There is a special wrench that makes it easy to remove and re-install the bearing cone (called a cone wrench), but I've never used one. Most sites and mechanics recommend you get one, and they're fairly cheap, so I have no excuse. Since the bearing cone shouldn't be screwed down too tight (to allow the bearings to turn freely), you can probably wiggle it loose with your fingers and a small wrench.

With the bearing cone off, the bearings will be exposed, and if they aren't contained within a ring, they will be loose within the bearing cup (the picture at left shows the bearing cup after the bearings were removed). Be very careful that you don't accidentally dump the bearings out, because if they're old and the grease is dry, they'll just fall right out, and you really don't want to lose your bearings (ba-dum-bum). On the Peugeot, each side of the hub has nine bearings (I don't know if it's different with other bikes). Once you've removed the locknut and bearing cone on one side (the side without the freewheel), you can slide the axle out of the hub. I was sitting, holding the wheel horizontally across my knees to do this, and fortunately caught the down-side bearings in my hand as I slid the axle out of the hub. The photo at left shows the hub with axle and bearings removed.

You will now be holding the old axle in one hand and the wheel in the other. Put the wheel aside for a minute. The old axle will still have the bearing cone and locknut on one side, and to get these off, you may have to grip the old axle with a pair of pliers or a vice in order to get enough leverage to turn the nut and cone off. If your axle is still good and you want to keep it, you should grip it at the center and cover whatever gripping tool you use with tape or cloth to prevent it from damaging the threads of the axle. With the final hardware removed from the old axle, set it aside or put it in the odd bits section of your toolbox.

Clean and re-grease the bearings: These literally keep your wheel turning, so if the bearings are dried up or mucky, you should clean them, as well as the bearing cup and the cone. I use Pedro's BioClean, which works quite well. Once everything is sparkly-clean, get your tube of grease and squeeze a healthy quantity around the inside of the bearing cup and spread it around with your little finger. Place each bearing back in the cup (the grease will hold them in there, but be careful handling the little buggers with greasy fingers), and when they're all in, cover them all with another dose of grease and pack in down a bit with the tip of your finger. Don't worry about putting too much in there, everything should have a nice thick coat. Do the same with the other side. You can put a piece of tape over the side you've already done just to make sure the bearings don't fall out when you turn the wheel over.

Install the new axle: I basically just did everything in reverse, threaded the bearing cone and locknut on one side of the axle, slid the axle through the hub, and threaded the cone and nut on to the other side, making adjustments to each side until the axle was centered in the hub. Again, don't over-tighten the bearing cone, the bearings need to roll within the cup. Since the freewheel is on one side of the hub, while the other is bare, you'll have to guess a little to make sure the axle is properly centered, and to do this, set the wheel back in the frame dropouts. The axle should protrude just a couple of millimeters from the frame on each side and the wheel should be centered in the frame. The new axle is a bit longer than the old one, so I added a couple of spacer washers between the bearing cone and the locknut on each side so that the quick-release could be tightened enough to firmly hold the wheel in the frame.

So, that's what I did and it seems to work just fine. For reference, the replacement axle was ordered from Harris Cyclery and has the following specs: Diameter: 10 mm; Thread: 1 mm; Length: 137 mm; Spacing: 126 mm.

Product Review: Menotomy's "Vintage Bicycle Cleaning Kit"

Everyone with an old bike and an internet connection knows about Menotomy Vintage Bicycles at OldRoads.com. Their discussion forums, serial number charts, photo database, and price guide (among many other terrific resources) are invaluable to people who are researching and restoring old bikes. They also sell a "Vintage Bicycle Cleaning Kit" for $21.95 (plus shipping) that is supposed to be the product of years of hands-on experience working on old bikes. The kit is composed of two "spoke sticks," a single pad of copper wool, and a bottle of "Menotomy Mixture," a special formula for cleaning rust, grime, etc. off your vintage bicycle. I've had my eye on the kit for a while now, but didn't figure I needed it until working on the Runwell's rear wheel, which is badly rusted, although I don't think it's structurally compromised.

I ordered the kit a little over a week ago, and it came today. I immediately went out and started working on the rear wheel, following the enclosed instructions, but it was shortly apparent that I had been had. The flimsy "spoke sticks" (so-called because they are supposedly specially designed to get between spokes) are oddly reminiscent of tongue depressors or popsicle sticks, and are actually quite inferior. The copper wool, which you can buy at any hardware store, was shredded and useless after about 30 minutes of work, and the special "Menotomy Mixture" appears to just be a light oil (I don't doubt that it's got other stuff in the "mix," but the results were the same as if I had used only light oil).

The kit did remove some of the surface rust from the rim, but did not give me the deep clean or shine I had been led to expect. What's more, my earlier foray into cleaning a small spot of the rear rim with rubbing compound and fine steel wool was actually more successful than anything I was able to accomplish with this kit. In some areas of the inner rim, the mixture and the copper wool did produce results, but again nothing different than I was able to accomplish with rubbing compound and steel wool.

Let me be clear: I am not criticizing the Menotomy kit for failing to shine-up my rim (which was, admittedly, a tall order), but rather taking Menotomy to task for representing their product as unique and specially designed for this kind of work, when in fact, ordinary products that are inexpensive and readily available produced better results for an equivalent amount of money.

If you're working on an old bike, you don't need this kit. Go to the hardware store and buy some fine steel wool, a bottle of light oil, some rubbing compound, and maybe a can of Brasso or Barkeeper's Friend. Oh, and some popsicles, at least you'll get to eat them before using the sticks. I'm sorry, Menotomy, I love you, but you done me wrong this time.

The Runwell: Day 8 1/2

File this under "echoes of former glory." While I (still) wait for my cleaning solution for the rear wheel to arrive, I cleaned up the fenders, which had gone untouched since I took them off on Day 1. In terms of dents and dings, they actually look better than I thought, but the paint is in sorry shape. What's worse, actually, on both front and rear fenders, there are small protected areas where the paint retains its original shine and even remnants of the gold pin-striping that used to be there. I'd almost rather not see how it used to look, actually, it makes me sad.

I had been thinking about just leaving the fenders off when I reassembled the bike, but now I'm thinking that sanding them, priming them, and spray-painting them gloss black can't be any worse than keeping them in their present state. I can already hear the howls of dismay from the purists out there, but I refer you to my earlier post on painting. Someday I'll have the bike professionally repainted and re-chromed, but I've got to get it up and running again first, and why not have some nice-looking fenders until then, right?

Salvaging a Hub, Part II

The final cleanup on the salvaged Sturmey-Archer TCW III was accomplished by scraping the remaining rust off with a razor blade, then several rounds of polishing with rubbing compound and Brasso. Some areas of the chrome have been cosmetically damaged by the rust, but not the scraping. There has been no structural damage to any of the exterior pieces of this hub. In fact, all cleaned up, many of the bits are in better shape than those on the Huffeigh. I don't post this to gloat (okay, maybe a little), but to demonstrate that even a hub that looks as bad as this one did may be worth a try to salvage and make useable again. Don't give up on bike or on salvage parts just because they look a little rough!