OLD MINI BIKES . COM

[RichSchmidt]

My Honda fiddy pit bike.

[RichSchmidt]

My father and his friends in about 1964 or 65 on their mini bikes that they built in high school welding shop class. My father is the one on the bike pointing left. Years later my grandfather bought me a similar bike used out of the newspaper with no engine and my father and I put a 3.5 HP Briggs generator on it. It kept tossing the chain but gave me many years of enjoyment.

[TimG]

When I was in about fifth grade I'd mount a B & S motor on a bicycle frame and hook up a pulley to a tire with direct drive, no centrifugal clutch. On a rare occasion, I'd get it going somehow by pushing the darn thing and drive a block or so. Yes, no brakes at all and I'd reach down to the engine to give it gas......

[Steve Shauger]

Originally Posted by TimG

When I was in about fifth grade I'd mount a B & S motor on a bicycle frame and hook up a pulley to a tire with direct drive, no centrifugal clutch. On a rare occasion, I'd get it going somehow by pushing the darn thing and drive a block or so. Yes, no brakes at all and I'd reach down to the engine to give it gas......

Amazing how we all seemed to have the same idea. I took a girls Schwinn bike, heated an aluminum plate (in oven), bent and bolted it in the bike V and mounted a 6hp Tecumseh. I purchased a rear wheel from Cycle City and mounted a sprocket. The rub was the engine shaft was 1 inch and no clutch would fit, so I purchased a sprocket and my father took it to Boeing where he worked and opened the ID to 1 inch.

I had a group of neighborhood friends donate the bike frame, seat and throttle. I rode it two times that I recall. The first the chain immediately fell off due to alignment issue. The next and final time the front wheel immediately lifted as I accelerated. The time front wheel was up an eternity because time sat still. As I was riding my friends were following and cheering me on. I will never forget the pulsing of every powerstroke of the 6hp engine. I knew it was not functional without a clutch..... I ended up getting a Heath Kit mini bike with the variable ratio trans with the huge back wheel.... what a beast !

[JRSully]

We had them here on Long Island Tim, we used to call them "Motobikes". Stingray frames worked the best. What it took to build one

1. Good Stingray frame
2. 1.5' piece of 2x2' Angle iron drilled and bolted to the frame uprights
3. 3hp B+S, or Tecumseh that you would mount on the angle iron via 2 of the 4 mounting holes, minibike throttle
4. Mount a large pulley (usually pulled the out of old Dryers) on the rear wheel, with small pieces of wood/metal to hold the bolts going through the spokes (yikes)
5. Fan belt pulley on the engine

When I tell you these death traps hauled ass, big understatement. But a ton of fun

[x Baldwin Motion]

JR we used to make similar motobikes with cutoff baseball bats as direct friction drive.

came across this old photo yesterday

[PeteLeathersac]

'

Good fun also cool how many of us here had these crazy bikes as kids.
My best pal and I split on one in '72, used roller Mini like BM's above w/ no brakes but good tires for $10.
We scored a 60's McCulloch 2-Stroke Chainsaw engine for free and got it bolted in but had to pay $20 for a centrifugal clutch which seemed like a thousand then.
The 2-Stroker was way too much power but "luckily" chain and rear sprocket a slightly different pitch than clutch drive gear so chain would come off about 30 mph although gearing felt like it would've done twice that or more.
Yikes it was 50 years ago!

~ Pete

[markinnaples]

I had a mini bike BITD that needed a centrifugal clutch but it took my dad forever to buy one. I guess I didn't realize how expensive it was to raise 5 kids on one salary while sending them all to private catholic school.

I'd love to have an early Trail 70 but they're apparently worth their weight in gold these days.

[JRSully]

As I remember them, this were wicked fast (and dangerous)