Good to know for the future. My current old cruiser has a traditional hub, and caged bearing set. I'll just check for play regularly on the front.
After the build - Keeping the bike sound and safe
- Thread starter junglepig
- Start date
LewieBike
Well-Known Member
Note the best bike frames for motorizing are ones where the seat and downtube have a near perfect or very close match to the 'saddle' of the engine casting's mount areas. Also any older bike made of 1020 high-carbon steel or 4130 Chrome-moly alloy steel tubing with straight tubes.
This flies in the face of most people putting these engines on cruisers. But you want the tightest, most secure way to mount these engines and very few modern bikes are set up with the right seat/down tube angles, in the correct "1 to "1/18" diameter size frame tubing without having to do an adapter or some other compromise mount. Also good quality hubs, spokes and rims. and a decent sprung saddle for the bumps you will encounter while going faster than your legs normally push you along.
My bike is a 1958 J-C Higgins 3 speed that I've reworked into a 5 speed citybike with 26" mtb wheels and a better front fork with cantilever studs.
These engines were originally made for Raleigh Roadsters clone called the Flying Pigeon, made in China bicycles. Most of any 1980's vintage MTB with straight tubes would be a good bike frame for a bike engine conversion, sort of getting rare to find though. I dare not recommend that someone convert an older English (or Austrian in my bike's case..) 3 speed roadster to a motorized bike unless you got some bike mechanical chops. This conversion, although somewhat easier than building a bike from scratch still involved a complete tear down, painting, and fussing in a 5 speed derailleur+shifter and cable, chain and finding an old cottered crank from our community bike shop, I also had to MAPP torch heat the steel arms of the cranks to bend them clear of the engine cases.
This flies in the face of most people putting these engines on cruisers. But you want the tightest, most secure way to mount these engines and very few modern bikes are set up with the right seat/down tube angles, in the correct "1 to "1/18" diameter size frame tubing without having to do an adapter or some other compromise mount. Also good quality hubs, spokes and rims. and a decent sprung saddle for the bumps you will encounter while going faster than your legs normally push you along.
My bike is a 1958 J-C Higgins 3 speed that I've reworked into a 5 speed citybike with 26" mtb wheels and a better front fork with cantilever studs.
These engines were originally made for Raleigh Roadsters clone called the Flying Pigeon, made in China bicycles. Most of any 1980's vintage MTB with straight tubes would be a good bike frame for a bike engine conversion, sort of getting rare to find though. I dare not recommend that someone convert an older English (or Austrian in my bike's case..) 3 speed roadster to a motorized bike unless you got some bike mechanical chops. This conversion, although somewhat easier than building a bike from scratch still involved a complete tear down, painting, and fussing in a 5 speed derailleur+shifter and cable, chain and finding an old cottered crank from our community bike shop, I also had to MAPP torch heat the steel arms of the cranks to bend them clear of the engine cases.
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