# Has any one had success bending vintage pedals back in to shape?



## MarkKBike (Jul 31, 2018)

These pedals came on a 53 traveler I recently picked up. The pedals frames are both bent up and collapsed inwards, but have strait spindles and spin freely. The bikes frame was also repainted, so maybe these were re-painted also. I only picked the bike up because It was 5 minutes from my house and perceived the purchase as a deal. I also knew I would not feel bad about refurbishing / repainting the frame to be pretty once again.

Before I even make a attempt, I was wondering if they are even original and if they are and I manage to straiten the frames, will the rubber be able to be bent back into shape?

I don't want to waste my time trying if it looks like a lost cause, and they are not even original. I may just leave them as is, and toss them on a rat ride.














I made a mistake and had meant to put this in the schwinn lightweight forum, hopefully someone will see this that knows.


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## juvela (Jul 31, 2018)

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One bicycle tool I have found helpful in straightening stamped pedal cages is the La Jeunesse chainwheel straightener from Bicycle Researsch.  You may have something already which could serve this function or you could fabricate something...






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## mongeese (Aug 1, 2018)

They are Schwinn of the era. Most times these pedals are worn the way yours are. Lost cause likely.


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## MarkKBike (Aug 2, 2018)

Thanks for the info. I may try to see what I can do with the pedals this weekend.  I will try and dissemble them and  bend them back into shape, Then give them a cleanup on a wire wheel and if needed maybe clear coat the steel. I may also try heating up the rubber in some water on the stove, and see what I can do. My goal will not be perfection, just better.

I will report back within the next week, and post picks if I'm successful.  The 53 traveler is going to built back up for me as a rider, and I'm going to try and keep the budget really low with just having to replace cables and tires (which I already have laying around from other bikes).

The traveler will eventually get a paint job similar to my first bike I ever refurbished, (a childhood ride of mine). This is a bike I have posted here before and was in just as bad condition if not worse. It should eventually turn out something like this one, but I plan to keep all the original parts. I'd be very surprised if the chrome comes back to life (I think it might be gone), but with these old Schwinn's you never really know until you try,





The Last 50's era traveler I tackled, was also in pretty poor condition and now looks like this. This one bellow still has the original worn paint.

The new one, (Not pictured yet: I tore it down before thinking to take photos) is going to be it's replacement.  It also came with a non orriginal saddle, and that was listed on ebay the same day the bike was purchased. The saddle sold fast and allowed me to re-coup 1/2 my purchase price on the bike immediately.





My new 53 traveller is a few years older than the one pictured here, and since it was already repainted once before,  I know I can re-paint the frame without feeling guilty and make it look nice. My goal is just to transform it back to a decent looking rider, and correct all the over spray the original owner performed when he decided to re-paint it 10 years ago.


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## bricycle (Aug 2, 2018)

I reshape TOC rat traps


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## juvela (Aug 2, 2018)

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Have never restored any rubber pedals.

Occurs to me to ask if anyone offers replica rubber for them, they way replica brake lever hoods are offered?

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## MarkKBike (Aug 4, 2018)

I decided to give it a try this morning and got one of the two done. It took me about 35 minutes.  I used a vice, a tire iron, and a hammer. I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out. Its not perfect, but good enough for me. I will tackle the other one another day.

The rubber inserts were actually still pliable.  I was expecting them to be as stiff as a rock. They easily conformed back to the shape of the re-bent frames. The hardest part was trying to grab those little nuts inside the frame so I could unscrew the bolt that holds on the rubber inserts. There is a small rib on each side that makes them diffulcult to grab.

















It gave me some confidence the rest of the painted metal parts on the bike will also turn out pretty good.


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## Schwinn499 (Aug 4, 2018)

Perseverance....word of the day. Great job, they look great.


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## mongeese (Aug 4, 2018)

Looks suspect to me but, if you did pull that off accolades from me.


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## MarkKBike (Aug 4, 2018)

mongeese said:


> Looks suspect to me but, if you did pull that off accolades from me.



I  understand your suspicion. and to eliminate the doubt, when I do the other one, I'll promise to take picks of the progression. I'm off to best buy to buy a new mouse (See my last Post) Tab keys are hard to navigate.


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## juvela (Aug 4, 2018)

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Beautiful work.

One would not have guessed there to be yet remaining plating beneath the "battle ship grey" paint.

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## MarkKBike (Aug 7, 2018)

I'm still having some trouble removing the bolts on the second pedal, and that is the reason for the delay. I got one of them off, but the other three are still stuck. I have some penetrating oil applied, and am waiting for them to free up. If they do not free up in the next couple days I will drill the heads off the bolts and replace them. If the pedals did not have those little ribs on the inside this process would have been much easier. With the ribs I probably only have about a 1/16" of a area to grab with my needle nose pliers, and my multiple attempts have begun to round off the gripping corners on those tiny nuts. With the way the pedal is bent I do not have much room to work with. I'm thinking the bolt heads will probably need to be drilled off.

Two of the nuts and bolts on the set are not original anyways, so there is really no loss.

Whenever I work on anything, I always try to do the hardest portions first, that way you know what your getting into and the task at hand becomes more enjoyable as it progresses.

The way I cleaned up the rubber on the first pedal, is I whacked off all the crud on a wire wheel with a few very light passes, and then made a few additional passes on a spindle sander as the rubber was slightly deformed and I wanted to bring them back to shape and reduce the size of the missing chunks of rubber. That's why you can not see any of the tiny ribbing present on the rubber of the first pedal that was completed. Those ribs described can be seen in the fist photo of this topic, but for the most part they were already worn off from use.

First picks in:

Its not the same order I did the first pedal in, but I wanted to get just a little bit of the work done. I did some minor paint removal and the start of initial polish. The real work will begin once I get the rubber pads off. (Once i got the first bolt free, I put it back on loosly so it does not get lost). This is just a quick pass on a light thin wired brass wire reel that I atatched to my grinder, and some very fine steel wool to remove the gold tone left over by the brass wheel Once I get the rubber inserts off, I will rebend the frames to shape, and polish them up with a cotton cloth wheel and some polishing compound. I also whipped some of the crud of the exposed rubber surfaces. After just a few minutes of work, the problem pedal already looks much nicer.


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