After getting some valuable info on these over in the main forum, I'll bring this here now since both of these bikes fit best in this forum.
I'm looking at putting two bikes together that I bought a part of a lot some time ago, one is mid to late 30's Cleveland Welding built Western Flyer, the other a Westfield, (possibly an Elgin), from either '39 or '40. ( I found several Elgin Headbadges but none match the 2 7/8" vertical screw holes in my frame).
As I did through the boxes of parts, I'm slowly sorting out the parts for each, plus a few boxes of likely unrelated parts.
For the WF, I seem to have everything but the handlebars and pedals, but do have a newer pair of cruiser type bars and a newer set of Union pedals. I have a new old stock set of both Davis and Western Flyer branded tires for this bike.
For the Elgin, I have a frame and fork, crankset, a pair of wheels which have box style rims and an Elgin air cooled rear hub and unknown smooth front hub. This bike came with what appears to be generic painted fenders with individual braces.
The only parts that appear to have been chrome on the Westfield are the hubs. All else looks to have been painted black. The original bars and pedals are also missing for this bike. The tires on the rims are shot, rotted away to not much more than threads and bits of rubber.
My question is, how were parts like cranks, stems, handlebars, and seat posts usually finished on these non-tank model bikes?
Both stems I have appear to be completely unplated, both were painted, the WF stem was painted gray/silver, the Elgin's stem was black.
Both were pretty well rusted and I've soaked off the rust with Evaporust, leaving basically bare steel stems. There's no sign of chrome or nickel plating anywhere on these.
I also have a few other chrome plated stems but I suspect those are much newer, possibly from Schwinn bikes.
Considering the year, I have my doubts as to whether or not the rims that are with the Elgin belong with it, but after 80 years anything is possible.
The WF came from the original owner, and he swore all the parts with it are original except for the front hub and bars. His kid tore it down and gave it a rattle can paint job in the 1970's, he tore it back down to restore it 20 years after that and never went any further. I bought it along with all the other parts over 10 years ago.
The cranks have been painted silver, but after removing the silver, they appear to be bare steel, with no sign of plating, even in between the bearings.
The chrome bits in this pic look out of place. The sprocket on the bike is thinner than the chrome replacement it came with.
None of the seat posts in this pic fit either bike, both likely had bent style 5/8" posts, with the WF using one of the adapters shown.
I have truss rods, both are dull or galvanized looking, and several upper truss brackets that I believe are likely for the Westfield.
I'm looking at putting two bikes together that I bought a part of a lot some time ago, one is mid to late 30's Cleveland Welding built Western Flyer, the other a Westfield, (possibly an Elgin), from either '39 or '40. ( I found several Elgin Headbadges but none match the 2 7/8" vertical screw holes in my frame).
As I did through the boxes of parts, I'm slowly sorting out the parts for each, plus a few boxes of likely unrelated parts.
For the WF, I seem to have everything but the handlebars and pedals, but do have a newer pair of cruiser type bars and a newer set of Union pedals. I have a new old stock set of both Davis and Western Flyer branded tires for this bike.
For the Elgin, I have a frame and fork, crankset, a pair of wheels which have box style rims and an Elgin air cooled rear hub and unknown smooth front hub. This bike came with what appears to be generic painted fenders with individual braces.
The only parts that appear to have been chrome on the Westfield are the hubs. All else looks to have been painted black. The original bars and pedals are also missing for this bike. The tires on the rims are shot, rotted away to not much more than threads and bits of rubber.
My question is, how were parts like cranks, stems, handlebars, and seat posts usually finished on these non-tank model bikes?
Both stems I have appear to be completely unplated, both were painted, the WF stem was painted gray/silver, the Elgin's stem was black.
Both were pretty well rusted and I've soaked off the rust with Evaporust, leaving basically bare steel stems. There's no sign of chrome or nickel plating anywhere on these.
I also have a few other chrome plated stems but I suspect those are much newer, possibly from Schwinn bikes.
Considering the year, I have my doubts as to whether or not the rims that are with the Elgin belong with it, but after 80 years anything is possible.
The WF came from the original owner, and he swore all the parts with it are original except for the front hub and bars. His kid tore it down and gave it a rattle can paint job in the 1970's, he tore it back down to restore it 20 years after that and never went any further. I bought it along with all the other parts over 10 years ago.
The cranks have been painted silver, but after removing the silver, they appear to be bare steel, with no sign of plating, even in between the bearings.
The chrome bits in this pic look out of place. The sprocket on the bike is thinner than the chrome replacement it came with.
None of the seat posts in this pic fit either bike, both likely had bent style 5/8" posts, with the WF using one of the adapters shown.
I have truss rods, both are dull or galvanized looking, and several upper truss brackets that I believe are likely for the Westfield.