# '69 Columbia muscle bike



## Stinky_Sullivan (Jun 4, 2014)

I'm just thinking out loud. Fell free to add your thoughts.

I've got a '69 Columbia muscle bike. It's badged a Columbia 500. I've searched Mr Columbia's site and even discussed it with him and we can't figure out EXACTLY what model this bike is supposed to be. Little is known about the Columbia 500's. That badge was used on all kinds of frames and there's no catalog info on them. Either Columbia or a previous owner put together a bike with features not combined in one bike as listed in the catalogs.

It's a Sky Blue boys frame with 40" wheel base, 20" rear wheel and 16" front wheel. There is a hand brake lever on the right side and the frame has marks suggesting there was a rear caliper mounted on the top stay. The rear wheel has a coaster brake. There is no brake of any kind on front. It has the Big Dipper seat in gold sparkle/glitter and the grips match. The Big Dipper seat is only shown in the '69 catalog per Mr Columbia's site. It has a 36" sissy bar but no backrest.

Assuming all these parts are original but expecting some parts to be missing, this is still a conundrum. The catalog doesn't offer this frame in Sky Blue and none of the Big Dipper seats were gold. None of the bikes had a coaster brake AND a rear hand brake. Any bike that had a rear hand brake also had a front brake of some kind whether caliper or drum. All of the 20/16 bikes had a front drum brake. The chain guard is missing so there's nothing with the model name on it. Only the Mach 1 had this style frame, 20/16 wheels, a single speed coaster hub, and the Big Supper seat but nothing else about the Mach is a match.

Here's where the thinking comes in.

What do I do with this bike? I see 3 options; assume nothing is missing and the bike has the parts it's supposed to have, build it as a Mach since that was the only bike with this frame and fork, or build a Frankenstein bike.

I'm inclined to build the Frankenstein. I wouldn't make any changes that couldn't be undone. A front drum brake is a must IMO. They're just cool. I could turn this into a 5, 6, 10, or, 12 speed. I've already measured the rear dropouts and a hub with a 5 or 6 speed cassette will fit without having to spread the frame. A double chain ring will fit on the original crank with no problem. Another option would be to use a Tolkheim 5 speed transmission. It came off a '72 or '73 Huffy.

There's one big drawback. No matter what I do, I'm too tall and too fat to ride the bike regardless of which way I go with it. I sure wish I was 10 years old right now.


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## RailRider (Jul 22, 2014)

Have a photo?


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