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Dumpster Diamond, My Entry for the 15th Annual RRBBO

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I like the bare metal look too. My 1939 Road Master.
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I like the bare metal look too. My 1939 Road Master.View attachment 1294616
That's a good-looking Road Master you got there!

I like how my Hawthorne looks in bare metal, but I really intended to have this bike primed and painted to look reminiscent of a 1920s Harley Davidson. Plus, I've got another bike, a 1950/1951 Schwinn DX, that I want to leave bare metal with a satin clear, like what's on the Hawthorne. I really don't want to have two similar-looking (in my opinion) bikes with the same bare metal/satin clear finish. My bike collection's too small to have duplicates. I want each of my bikes to look different from one another. For now though, I'm just going to keep Dumpster Diamond like it is, and ride it until I have some money saved up to build it the way I really wanted.
 
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Here were some of my original plans for how Dumpster Diamond was supposed to look. Originally, I planned to paint the bike a light grey with black details and orange pinstripes, topped off with a gloss clear coat. I was going to try to add each modification to the bike in stages, with stage 1 just keeping the bike fairly stock.
screen-shot-2020-07-08-at-3-35-48-pm-png.png

The tank would've probably been shaped like a diamond when viewed from above. It would also have been painted grey with black and orange details, which I still have yet to figure out.
screen-shot-2020-07-08-at-3-36-03-pm-png.png

The number plates would've been about the same as they are now, just painted light grey with black and orange numbers. Obviously, I skipped a couple stages and went ahead and had the number plates made.
screen-shot-2020-07-08-at-3-36-26-pm-png.png

Here's where I would've really taken this bike over the top: a pair of stealth cup holders disguised as a small V-twin engine, cradled by an equally phony extended down tube. I wanted to add an optical illusion with this fake engine to couple with the classic auditorial illusion of sticking some playing cards against the spokes to make it sound like a motorcycle. Why? Because I thought it'd be funny to watch people try and figure out why anyone would be pedaling a motorized bicycle while the "engine's" running. I still haven't figured out how to make the cup holders fully functional while looking like a believable engine, but I'm still working on it.
screen-shot-2020-07-08-at-3-36-45-pm-png.png

screen-shot-2020-07-08-at-3-37-09-pm-png.png

After an unfortunate accident involved with a brass wire wheel and a power drill, I had to take a critical amount of time off from working on my bike, which meant I had to scale back some of my original plans for my bike. I figured I could still add some black details on top of a bare metal frame, but it didn't take long for me to realize that would still be too much work with the little time I had left before the deadline for the RRBBO. Still, I like the placement of the diamond scallops on this design better than the first design, so I'll definitely want to keep this design in mind when I redo this bike.
screen-shot-2020-08-14-at-6-00-45-pm-png.png

screen-shot-2020-08-14-at-6-00-24-pm-png.png

When I found that the only way to finish this bike was to leave the whole bike bare metal with just a satin clear, I drew up this design. I knew I could spice up the chain guard with a vinyl decal, but sadly, I ran out of time to make a decal for the tank. Still, I at least made the tank trail past the seat pole like I originally wanted, so I'm pretty proud of that.
screen-shot-2020-08-21-at-9-04-08-pm-png.png

One last idea I had to save for a later date: a custom "reversible" triple tree fork with truss rods. I briefly played around with the idea using some scrap conduit and one steer tube off another fork I had in my "sell/trade" pile. The idea is to use the open tops of the fork tubes to hold a pair of steer tubes, cut to line up with the top of the main steer tube, and shaped at the bottom to match the diameter of the fork tubes on either side. The three steer tubes (one real, 2 dummies) would then have a matching set of nuts and washers on the threaded portions, and 3 identical handlebar stems to mimic the triple tree forks of some 1920s board track motorcycles. Tying it all together would be some custom truss rods based off said board track motorcycles, but mounted via nuts, bolts and a little tension. I wasn't sure if I wanted the truss rods to be straight like what I usually see on those earlier motorcycles, or curved to match the slope of the bottom of the fork.
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Here were some of my original plans for how Dumpster Diamond was supposed to look. Originally, I planned to paint the bike a light grey with black details and orange pinstripes, topped off with a gloss clear coat. I was going to try to add each modification to the bike in stages, with stage 1 just keeping the bike fairly stock.
View attachment 1295158
The tank would've probably been shaped like a diamond when viewed from above. It would also have been painted grey with black and orange details, which I still have yet to figure out.
View attachment 1295159
The number plates would've been about the same as they are now, just painted light grey with black and orange numbers. Obviously, I skipped a couple stages and went ahead and had the number plates made.
View attachment 1295160
Here's where I would've really taken this bike over the top: a pair of stealth cup holders disguised as a small V-twin engine, cradled by an equally phony extended down tube. I wanted to add an optical illusion with this fake engine to couple with the classic auditorial illusion of sticking some playing cards against the spokes to make it sound like a motorcycle. Why? Because I thought it'd be funny to watch people try and figure out why anyone would be pedaling a motorized bicycle while the "engine's" running. I still haven't figured out how to make the cup holders fully functional while looking like a believable engine, but I'm still working on it.
View attachment 1295161
View attachment 1295162
After an unfortunate accident involved with a brass wire wheel and a power drill, I had to take a critical amount of time off from working on my bike, which meant I had to scale back some of my original plans for my bike. I figured I could still add some black details on top of a bare metal frame, but it didn't take long for me to realize that would still be too much work with the little time I had left before the deadline for the RRBBO. Still, I like the placement of the diamond scallops on this design better than the first design, so I'll definitely want to keep this design in mind when I redo this bike.
View attachment 1295163
View attachment 1295164
When I found that the only way to finish this bike was to leave the whole bike bare metal with just a satin clear, I drew up this design. I knew I could spice up the chain guard with a vinyl decal, but sadly, I ran out of time to make a decal for the tank. Still, I at least made the tank trail past the seat pole like I originally wanted, so I'm pretty proud of that.
View attachment 1295165
One last idea I had to save for a later date: a custom "reversible" triple tree fork with truss rods. I briefly played around with the idea using some scrap conduit and one steer tube off another fork I had in my "sell/trade" pile. The idea is to use the open tops of the fork tubes to hold a pair of steer tubes, cut to line up with the top of the main steer tube, and shaped at the bottom to match the diameter of the fork tubes on either side. The three steer tubes (one real, 2 dummies) would then have a matching set of nuts and washers on the threaded portions, and 3 identical handlebar stems to mimic the triple tree forks of some 1920s board track motorcycles. Tying it all together would be some custom truss rods based off said board track motorcycles, but mounted via nuts, bolts and a little tension. I wasn't sure if I wanted the truss rods to be straight like what I usually see on those earlier motorcycles, or curved to match the slope of the bottom of the fork.View attachment 1295127

View attachment 1295128

View attachment 1295130

View attachment 1295132

View attachment 1295133

View attachment 1295134

View attachment 1295135
You must have quite a pile of trade/sell parts!
 
You certainly have an inventive mind. Like the many variations of paint, up to you to decide which you like better, after all, it's your creation. Can't say I've ever seen a triple tree fork, but it sure would be interesting!

Rock on my friend!!
 
You must have quite a pile of trade/sell parts!
I do, but admittedly most of what's in that pile is fairly common stuff. Funny enough, Dumpster Diamond was built almost entirely out of parts from that sell/trade pile, including the frame!
 
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You certainly have an inventive mind. Like the many variations of paint, up to you to decide which you like better, after all, it's your creation. Can't say I've ever seen a triple tree fork, but it sure would be interesting!

Rock on my friend!!
Thank you Mickeyc! Yeah, I still need to go back and work on my designs again. I've had some more ideas for this bike since the Build Off ended back in September. Here are some pictures of where I got the triple tree fork idea from:
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