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Military rims and tyres

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Hi Brett.

If you've located a Coffin ring, I'd use that until you locate a Sweetheart (they seem rarer).

The question as to when they changed from Coffin to Sweetheart is why I started collecting frame numbers in the first place. At the moment, the last known Coffin is about MG120000 (Feb/March 43), and the first Sweetheart MG134000 (March/April 43). Columbia didn't build all G519's in a block of numbers, they are mixed with other bikes, so in this gap there is less than 14000 G519 bikes. I suspect the change is at the end of one contract, and the start of another, and I am trying to figure out the contracts at the moment to see how this and other ideas work. Your bike is later than this change, so I think probably a sweetheart ring.

In Early 1944, MC (Marine) bikes were produced with the Coffin ring, and it seems some very late MG (Army) may have been too (one example known).

Your bike is a straight bar, and these certainly used the Coffin rings earlier (and later), so it won't look out of place, and someone would have to be a true rivet counter to know the difference. Moreover, if a bike was repaired, it's probably more likely that a replacement sprocket would be a Coffin type, no matter what it was originally.

I look forward to the finished bike.

Adrian
 
Hi Brett.

If you've located a Coffin ring, I'd use that until you locate a Sweetheart (they seem rarer).

The question as to when they changed from Coffin to Sweetheart is why I started collecting frame numbers in the first place. At the moment, the last known Coffin is about MG120000 (Feb/March 43), and the first Sweetheart MG134000 (March/April 43). Columbia didn't build all G519's in a block of numbers, they are mixed with other bikes, so in this gap there is less than 14000 G519 bikes. I suspect the change is at the end of one contract, and the start of another, and I am trying to figure out the contracts at the moment to see how this and other ideas work. Your bike is later than this change, so I think probably a sweetheart ring.

In Early 1944, MC (Marine) bikes were produced with the Coffin ring, and it seems some very late MG (Army) may have been too (one example known).

Your bike is a straight bar, and these certainly used the Coffin rings earlier (and later), so it won't look out of place, and someone would have to be a true rivet counter to know the difference. Moreover, if a bike was repaired, it's probably more likely that a replacement sprocket would be a Coffin type, no matter what it was originally.

I look forward to the finished bike.

Adrian

Adrian you are a wealth of knowledge! I had suspected they would have been supplied in contract batches but didn't know that there were mixed with other bikes. You would think they would have concentrated on one batch at a time. Do the original manuals shed any light on the contract /serial number relationship?. I know the Jeep manuals have contract information on the front cover so just a thought the Bicycle ones would.
I will now keep an eye out for the correct sprocket but it's considerably harder with being so far away.
Many thanks again,
Brett.
 
Hi Brett,

as the saying goes 'Standing on the shoulders of Giants'. I gained a lot of my knowledge from people on these boards.

Part of my background is also WW2 jeeps (I have a 1941ish Willys MB, and I have no idea how many sets of original data plates) and I did a lot of work on the numbering of jeeps in the US, British and Australian Armies back in the early days of the internet. Incidentally, the first proper WW2 jeep website (and the reason I originally connected to the internet!) was The World War Two Jeep, run from a server called Phaedra by Steve Malikoff in Australia.

1941.JPG


Anyway, to your questions. I am working on trying to figure out the contracts. There is a list of contract numbers and the quantities of bikes ordered on them (not from the manuals, but government purchasing figures), but it is not known if this is a complete list (the lists only include contracts over $50,000), or if all of the contracts were fullfilled. Unlike the jeep contract numbers, bicycles don't have 'Hood numbers' and the allocation of frame numbers is more random (Well, Ford GPW numbers can be pretty random too).. The current list of known Columbia G519's is around 70, Huffmans, somewhat less. This is about 0.1% of the bikes contracted to be built, so is making analysis a little difficult, but I do have some conclusions that I hope to publish here shortly.

As an example of what I was saying about the bikes not being built in big blocks, your bike is MG149013, K7. The closest bike I have noted to yours in frame number is W149035, K7, which is a Compax folding bike owned by CABE member 37Schwinn

https://thecabe.com/forum/threads/1944-columbia-compax-military-model-folding-bicycle.99850/

Living in France, I have similar problems for obtaining parts. Often, because of the time difference, parts I would have liked are posted and sold on CABE whilst I'm still in bed! There is also the problem of not everyone being prepared to ship overseas from the US. It's their decision at the end of the day, and I won't argue it. Luckily (as last weekend) I have some friends from the CABE who are prepared to accept and post on parcels as necessary.

Best Regards,

Adrian
 
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