Brent Merkley's Whizzer

[Brent Merkley]

Here are pictures of the whizzer I built I have made changes to the motor since these shots were made. It rides very smooth and stops on a dime, I think the old 5 inch whizzer brakes are the best, not cheap but if used on the fron and back they are very effective.

 

[bill green]

Hi Brent Very Very well done .Thats what I would call A 100% .I like the way your warped mind works..Bill Green

 

[Brent Merkley]

Thanks Bill

Thanks for the kind words, this is a great hobby isn't it! It can be frustrating once and a while but when these things are running well I cant get enough riding time in.
Brent

 

[stude13]

terrific pics and a wonderful build. mitch

 

[RdKryton]

Wow
Well done! Very nice job. I wish it was mine.

Jim

 

[Quenton Guenther]

Hi Brent,
Lookin' good!
Is that a vintage Pacemaker 5" rear brake assembly? Looks like the one on my 1950 Pacemaker.

Have fun,
Quenton

 

[ren]

Those forks look like expensive art work!! They are amazing, did you make them?

 

[KilroyCD]

I have only two words to say..."WOW" and "WOW"!
Seriously, that is beautiful. Great job!

 

[uncle_punk13]

Whoa; That is one gone girl...! Please, give the details of that girder fork?!?

 

[Brent Merkley]

Hi All

Hi Thanks for the feed back!
The rear brake is an original Whizzer 5 inch coaster drum brake.The front brake is also a 5 inch Whizzer brake. As I understand it the kick-back brakes were used on the pace maker and the brake I used on the front was standard on the rear of the sportsman and Ambasator.
As for the fork I always loved the look of the girder forks used on many of the old bikes. I designed this one based on one I saw on a pre 20's BSA. I started out looking by for a doubble tapered tube to use as the trailing tube on my fork. I looked at the tubing Shwinn made up for the Knee springer and thought that I might be able to remove the band and mounting boss that they welded to the tube and sure enough I was able to get rid of them by grinding them off. I then had to extend the bottom and rebend the top. All that just for the trailing tube. The rest was just fabricating parts from standard tubeing, that is after figuring out the rake and trail geometry and a design for the damper. I have to say it was a challange but it was rewarding as the bike has no sign of wooble at 55 mph and rides sooo... smooth over the bumps.
Quenton, I remember you mentioning that you had a whizzer with a 5 inch rear brake that was only so so , I can say for sure that the front brake I have is the primary stoping force and the rear is a great help. I had an 8 inch HAZE mechanical disk brake on the front of my Whizzer for a long time , it was basicly my only brake the rear coster brake was worthless to say the least. Although the disk brake I had worked fairly well It was less then perfect. The brake pads were about 1 inch square each , that's two square inches of frictional material. I was always having to make adjustments to keep them in proper adjustment. The 5 inch whizzer brakes have two shoes ea. that are about 1 inch wide by aproximatly 4-5 inches long each thats lots of frictional material so they dont need to be adjusted every other day and there is lots of stoping power in that much surface area. I feel that the best brakes for a whizzer are the 5 inch Whizzer drum brakes or if someone were able to set up hydraulic disk brakes with resonably large brake pads they would be very good but as you might see that is hard to do if you want to use the controll grips that are available from Whizzer.
Enjoy Brent