I read through this.... all 9 pages
I gotta be honest, I have seen a lot of negative and ignorantly biased opinions that would have been best never aired out.
As the saying goes opinions are like....... everyone has one, But I gotta be honest and complete that old phrase and in doing so say,
Some are completely full of crap and suffer from profuse and perpetual diarrhea
I have also seen Many (more) that are well placed.
As for the 56 Tiger Ratrotter I am project manager/mechanic of on behalf of a friend.... He initially did think about doing a custom semi restoration.
The thing is, he picked the bike up for $15 from a Craigslist ad......there was no pictures, just a temping one liner "1950s Schwinn Cruiser"
Upon viewing the parted out bike with him, we established that it was in fact a 50's but it was during the stripping I was able to uncover the burried truth. With so many layers of paint, years of neglect and abuse it just didn't feel right to do a full resto to Me.
The bike in total was mostly complete, Ashtabula forks with some out of center bending to both (placed the front rim about 1 1/2 off center and rubbing)
the rear fender missing, front fender rusted chrome and layered paints just generally shot to hell, the rims by all sourced info are not likely even Schwinn (could be idk), a Schwinn racing type saddle that my best guess is from a 70' collegiate or suburban based on the rubber formed cover and riveted in Schwinn Approved rear plate and also having Saddle bag eyelts under it, and the bars were OE type Tiger replica/repops.
I sent him WIP pics of the stripped frame and asked what color he was doing since the original color was definitely and early version of translucent red over silver, commenting that it looked kinda baddass the way it sat. Keeping in mind for the strip down I had knocked out all four of the frame bearing cups.
(the steertube ones actually fell out with the fork, I had to gently re hammer and roll the head tube in to hold them properly during rough fit mockup)
To my surprise, he loved it " Oh F**K yeah dude! Do it! You're the boss.....make her mean!"
So in short to my surprise it really does fit the bike in the nature it was found. It is on its way to looking tough as nails, and war torn as if it was a Vietnam napalm survivor.
The rear rim was salvageable after torching the nipples red hot and giving them a careful tweak and a quick oil quench after freeing up.... there was no truing the rim between the paint and rust not allowing them to budge prior. For the record no part of this bike has been forcibly modified in any way....just a few things swapped out such as 70' Shcwinn trike handlebars, the 50's Shcwinn DX truss assembly and solid cast steel steer stem from that
John Deere themed POS that no one seems to be able to definitely identify or support there claims with info I can look at and validate.
(Yeah BTW that ugly cat came back, it sits in my basement while I cook up a dose of crazy to toss at it)
However following suit with alot of the negative nellies around here being jerks about rat bikes or rat rods in general...... I am to a degree on your side. However it is specificaly to you whom are being jerks about it that I say this: " function over form"
A bike is worthless if it ends in a scrap pile to be crushed or melted down, so have the sensability to enjoy the fact it is at least still being loved!
Always worry about function before giving on rusted rats arse towards what it looks like! I won't deny having seen alot of disgusting half baked BS given the label rat, custom, or chopper that I would sooner laugh hysterically and mock the builder as I wonder how drunk they were while building it> JS!
I am a traditional semi-purist if it cost to much to restore outright but is at least worth the vision to save a little history, then take the desire and save its function.
Chopper is in no way indicative of excess rake and forks longer than the frame.... I blame trendy dipsticks for raping classic terms.
It is postwar in origin from when the troops came back from war and kept their Harleys and Indians, seeing how them bikes were pushed hard where roads may not have existed and rattled themselves stupid on pavement.... most military add-ons were welded on. Seeing all was welded on and the idea of "WON'T USE IT-- LOSE IT" everything had to be CHOPPED OFF, and as a civilian these things No longer served any purpose other than dead weight to slow the bike down The true American Chopper was born.
Same said for a ratter, a rat build is a No budget build, or any money put towards it is minimal and mandatory mostly for function. The term is based on scavenging like a rat, or digging through scrap piles or a packrat parts bin to pillage usable stuffs....doesnt matter what or where from only that it will work modifications needed or not.
TBH I am highly offended by the lame builds with nonsensical crap pinned onto them for no reason and misuse of the terms chopper and rat.
A fine example of a typical rat repair would be a piece of coffee can tin to patch a horribly rotted out section of tank, fender, or chaingaurd not solder filled as it would cost you time using a torch flux and solder.....this is an ultra low/no budget build we are talking about here!