Eric
Finally riding a big boys bike
When I was a kid, life was all about BMX. I grew up in Orange county CA and it was the epicenter of the emerging new sport of BMX. My BMX bike was everything to me... it represented freedom, exercise, transportation, racing, social status and much more that I may never fully understand.
I started with a Schwinn stingray converted to a BMX bike. I still have the bike today (See picture). And yeah, I know its not a real stingray based on the serial number and the double straight bars. It is actually a 1961 skipper made to look like a stingray. But when you are 5, you don't care.
That bike was in various configurations over the next 5 years. I ditched the banana seat, different various parts to make it a better BMX Bike. I even swapped to a webco frame and then to a mongoose and after a while, all the parts to my old schwinn bike made it to attic where it stayed for 30 or 40 years.
As a 12 year old kid, I always had my eye on a getting a new top of the line BMX bike like a Cook Bros, Redline or a GT. These bikes were all from the So Cal area and if you had one it would make every kid in town drool with envy. I could not afford a bike like that so I continued to trade and barter for parts and just cobble together a bike that was good enough. See pic below (cobbled bmx bike lol)
However, my day finally came. I think I was 15 when I learned there was a kid at school that had a 1983 GT Pro that he did not want anymore. I think he got a car, and in those days when you got a car, bikes were tossed to the side. So I traded everything I had of value like football cards, video games and some cash and I finally got a GT. Unfortunately, I dont have any pictures of the original GT. I rode the heck out of that bike and raced it at the BMX track in Irvine. But then I got a car and I did not care about the GT anymore either and it sat in garage. I even lent the bike to a friend who wanted to race it at the BMX track. Little did I know, I would never see my GT ever again. The guy I lent the bike to went to the Irvine BMX and on his first lap, broke his femur in a crash and was taken to the hospital by ambulance. I was very bummed about my bike but I could not really give the guy any grief because he was in the hospital and my bike was just gone.
Over the years, I have collected, rode, built and cherished hundreds of bikes since then. Here are a few pics of my collections.
So that brings me to today. Normally, I don't buy, collect, ride or even care about 20 inch bikes. I just think of them as children's bikes and I dont have any interest in them because adults can't really ride them. So, against my better judgement, I decide that I am going to build up a replica of my old dream bike, the 1983 GT Pro BMX bike. I am going to build it with as many original parts as I can and where I can't or where it is cost prohibitive, I will use reproduction parts but period correct. I started searching around on the forums, FB and ebay and I found a guy with exactly what I was looking for. He had a frame set that was perfect for this project. I am starting with the frame and fork and building up from there.
I have started collecting the parts and will post my progress as I go. Please comment with your stories about how BMX affected your life or if you had a GT and loved it like I did mine. Thanks for listening if you made it this far. Eric
I started with a Schwinn stingray converted to a BMX bike. I still have the bike today (See picture). And yeah, I know its not a real stingray based on the serial number and the double straight bars. It is actually a 1961 skipper made to look like a stingray. But when you are 5, you don't care.
That bike was in various configurations over the next 5 years. I ditched the banana seat, different various parts to make it a better BMX Bike. I even swapped to a webco frame and then to a mongoose and after a while, all the parts to my old schwinn bike made it to attic where it stayed for 30 or 40 years.
As a 12 year old kid, I always had my eye on a getting a new top of the line BMX bike like a Cook Bros, Redline or a GT. These bikes were all from the So Cal area and if you had one it would make every kid in town drool with envy. I could not afford a bike like that so I continued to trade and barter for parts and just cobble together a bike that was good enough. See pic below (cobbled bmx bike lol)
However, my day finally came. I think I was 15 when I learned there was a kid at school that had a 1983 GT Pro that he did not want anymore. I think he got a car, and in those days when you got a car, bikes were tossed to the side. So I traded everything I had of value like football cards, video games and some cash and I finally got a GT. Unfortunately, I dont have any pictures of the original GT. I rode the heck out of that bike and raced it at the BMX track in Irvine. But then I got a car and I did not care about the GT anymore either and it sat in garage. I even lent the bike to a friend who wanted to race it at the BMX track. Little did I know, I would never see my GT ever again. The guy I lent the bike to went to the Irvine BMX and on his first lap, broke his femur in a crash and was taken to the hospital by ambulance. I was very bummed about my bike but I could not really give the guy any grief because he was in the hospital and my bike was just gone.
Over the years, I have collected, rode, built and cherished hundreds of bikes since then. Here are a few pics of my collections.
So that brings me to today. Normally, I don't buy, collect, ride or even care about 20 inch bikes. I just think of them as children's bikes and I dont have any interest in them because adults can't really ride them. So, against my better judgement, I decide that I am going to build up a replica of my old dream bike, the 1983 GT Pro BMX bike. I am going to build it with as many original parts as I can and where I can't or where it is cost prohibitive, I will use reproduction parts but period correct. I started searching around on the forums, FB and ebay and I found a guy with exactly what I was looking for. He had a frame set that was perfect for this project. I am starting with the frame and fork and building up from there.
I have started collecting the parts and will post my progress as I go. Please comment with your stories about how BMX affected your life or if you had a GT and loved it like I did mine. Thanks for listening if you made it this far. Eric
Last edited:
(see avatar)
The headset is Boss!!
Legendary Tange....
