Eddie Miller
Look Ma, No Hands!
This is my 1985 Coast King Ventura 10-speed bike. It's been in my family for almost 33 years. Dad bought it brand-new at the Coast-To-Coast hardware store here in Coldwater back in the summer of 1985. This was between his Junior and Senior years of high school. It originally had a water bottle and a tire pump, but those are long gone. At one point he had a generator, a speedometer, a headlight, and a headlight on it, but again those are long gone. Except I still have the speedometer somewhere, but I don't think it works. He rode that all over town, including to and from work. It went with him to college in Florida in 1987. It went with him to Ohio for about a year after he and Mom got married in 1991, it came with him when he and Mom moved back to Coldwater in 1992, and it came with him when we had to move back in with my paternal grandparents in 1995 when I was a baby. It stayed in my grandparents' basement after we moved into our house in 1998, and sat there until about 2008, when we cleaned the basement out. We brought it out with the hope I would ride it, but eventually it broke, so it sat in our shed until this past year. It received new tires a few years ago, but my paternal grandfather, out of frustration, cut the rear shift cable because it was getting in the way while we were putting the tires on. Back in April, I replaced the cable with one I salvaged of my maternal grandfather's old 1984 Free Spirit FS-12. I also had to use a gear from the Free Spirit's Eagle derailleur to fix my Shimano Eagle II derailleur, because one gear had all the teeth stripped off. I also put the wheel reflectors from the FS-12 on the Coast King, and had to replace both nuts on the back wheel. In the past, I'd used vice grips on them because I couldn't find the wrench. That was a mistake. I replaced the nuts yesterday, with a little help from Grandpa and his wrench set (the nuts I got turned out to be metric). He also put two new zip-ties on the frame to hold the rear derailleur cable in place, and lubed it for me. I still haven't gotten the derailleurs to work, but I don't think I put the rear cable in properly. Maybe they both just need some oil, I don't know. All in all, a nice old bike that's been in the family since 1985. What do you think? 
