bobcycles
Riding a '38 Autocycle Deluxe
Just to update history a bit. CyclArt is gone. They closed up in 2016. They were bought out by an Arkansas business that had / has carbon fiber bike plans. Basically he sold out and got a job in a cheaper place to live. He is out of the picture now.
I had an Ideor frame painted by Jim in the late 90's. It was agony to deal with him. Susan was much better. That was why she dealt with customers. He would come out from the back after eavesdropping and offer his many opinions. I had a restoration shop and did custom paint. The only reason I got involved was they had the EXACT Ideor decals. Beautiful but not for sale unless he put his color on the frame. Frame has chrome ends and he bitched about wanting todo the plating. I got my way and it was done by Christensen plating. Shut Jim up fast. I asked for him to not apply his CyclArt decal. That was the deal breaker for him. It is there buried under the clear. I did persuade him to put in under the bottom bracket! Who won that one? He got paid and I got a nice job! The good old days!
Their nitch I believe was racing bikes... the customer base was a different sort of client mostly.. and as you stated
he was able to recreate decals etc and do 'over the top' restos on the racing stuff where originality and sticking to
old school methodology wasn't that important.
Balloon bike jobs sucked...I've seen a ton of them...most were comical....yet sadly cost the poor owners more than
any other restorers would charge that I'm aware of in this field.