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Elgin Oriole

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fat tire trader

Riding a '38 Autocycle Deluxe
Hello,
This morning, I made a web page to show my Elgin Oriole project.

http://fattiretrading.com/oriole.html

I would appreciate it if you guys would look at it and comment. Do I need to make any corrections? I'd like to add photos of nice original Orioles to the page. Does anyone have a photo of one of their bikes that they would let me use?
Thanks!
Chris
 
I have a 37 Oriole that also has a Morrow hub with the raised center and grease fitting. Hub is marked G3, from 3rd quarter of 1937. The serial number on the frame also points to the last part of 1937. Fenders are aluminum, and also had the Wald stem and steerhorn bars when found.
 
Thanks for the info. I will add it to my page. Can you provide a picture of your bike? I have heard about the aluminum fenders. Do you know if they were available in other years? Is the chain guard still steel?
Thanks,
Chris
 
Might be a while til I get a photo of the bike, it's stored for winter and there are many bikes in front of it. Wouldn't you know it's the first one closest to wall. Chainguard is steel. Not sure what years aluminum fenders were offered. Stainless were also offered and possibly regular chrome. Crescent fenders until 38, when gothic fenders appeared. The only gothic ones I've seen were aluminum, don't know if other gothic fenders were used.
 
Here's some shots of my Murray built. Year unknown; serial is not indicative of anything. Picked up at the Memory Lane swap last spring as shown; cleaned and serviced everything. Rack was offered in the catalogs in black or chrome, so I gather that's even been on the bike since new. Fenders are stainless. I feel like every advertisement I've seen calls for chromium fenders, when all the actual bikes I've seen have been aluminum or SS.

PS: Looking for a nicer saddle if anybody has one!

DUWRjSL-1.jpg


pdiVhiL-1.jpg
 
So what about

the initials they are talking about?

JPROMO's bike seems to be murray with wishbone stay and forged fork crown- illustrations in catalogs posted seem to show different (westfield?) stays and stacked plates for fork crown....any connection to type of fenders used?

Chris's bike has alemite on the frame- would it not then have alemite on the wheels when new??
 
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The Sears catalog reprint book describes mudguards:

1936 F/W: stainless steel plate to resist rust on the Oriole, enamel on the Fully Equipped bike with the same frame.
1937 S/S: chrome plate (and steer horn handlebars)
1937-1938 F/W: lustrous, polished (the fenders were stainless steel on the '37/'38 I had)
1937 Christmas: chrome plate, ad shown below
1938 S/S: gothic, brightly polished (peaked aluminum, locking channel side stand, 2-speed offered)

The cat's show pedals for 1936-1937 that have what looks like diamond-tread blocks and Persons-type end plates; the 1938 look like Torrington 10.

1937_Sears_Page031-1.jpg
 
JPROMO,
Do you mind taking some more pictures of your bike with a plain background for me to put on my Oriole page? I'd like to show both the Westfield Oriole and the Murray Oriole.

My Oriole does have the alemite ports on the bottom bracket, but not on the head tube. I will look closer at the head tube to see if the hole for the port is there.

It appears that some of the Westfield Orioles had a special crown for the truss rods and some did not. I'm assuming that the earlier ones had the fork crown like the one on my bike. I think that this same fork came on some Mead bikes.

I really need the truss rods, by bike looks dismembered without them.

Thanks,
Chris
 
the initials they are talking about?...JPROMO's bike seems to be murray with wishbone stay and forged fork crown- illustrations in catalogs posted seem to show different (westfield?) stays and stacked plates for fork crown....any connection to type of fenders used?

Chris's bike has alemite on the frame- would it not then have alemite on the wheels when new??

Can't find the mention of initials, but think I remember seeing it?
Yeah, never seen an ad showing the Flowline (Murray) frame Oriole...any out there?
From what I've seen fenders seem: Westfield flat braces, Murray pressed steel.
Have seen 4 kinds of forks:
Westfield with and without trussrod "ears", tubular legs. Rounded forged-crown with blade legs shown below, might have been changed?
Murray with forged gothic crown and tubular legs.
Hubs: the original I had was Westfield-built, Alemite head and BB, Air-Cooled Alemite rear, front was the type typically found on Westfield bikes, no Alemite.

oriole-1.jpg


oriole002-1.jpg
 
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JPROMO,
Do you mind taking some more pictures of your bike with a plain background for me to put on my Oriole page? I'd like to show both the Westfield Oriole and the Murray Oriole.

I'd be glad to get some better pictures. I usually take them with a quiet background and hated these pictures right away for it. Unfortunately, the snowy midwest is making me wait for a thaw to do any digging through the bicycle jungle.
 
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