My mini bike problem/obession

[SteveSS]

When I was a grade school kid I wanted a mini bike so bad! At $100 they might have well been $1 million. I drew pictures, kept up on all the literature etc. Now I have some of things I wanted as a kid. Problem is now I have 8. 2 old Kawasaki 100's I mentioned in the old motocross thread and 6 of the Doodle Bug style. We take the 2.8 hp engines off and replace them with the 6.5 hp $100 Harbor Freight Honda clones. There is a whole culture around these Doodles.

http://www.oldminibikes.com/forum/omb-build-off-2015-a/If I see one at a good price I have to buy it. They are fun in the drag racing pits. I ride them around my neighborhood like a goof. My son found out he could ride one from the parking lot to his college campus buildings and not get hassled by campus cops.

It's just funny how that unfulfilled desire hangs with me at 58 years old.

 

[Cranky]

When I was in high school, they offered a new class dealing with sheet metal, welding and the like. The instructor didn't know how to weld except for how to strike up an arc and kinda knew how to get a bead started but that was all I needed and took it from there. Anyways, when it came time to do our own project towards the end of the year, everyone went to building BBQ pits out of 55 gallon drums. Back then, no one in my immediate family was doing any outdoor cooking but I liked the idea of having a mini bike so I sent off for a set of plans from the back of some magazine. Hot Rod or something....don't remember. Well, the plans were for some small 2 stroke engine and I had a 4 stroke from an edger so I modified the plans to fit that engine and used a 20" bicycle front end with butter fly hand bars. Took the wheels and tires off my old wrecked go cart (don't ask lol), got some 1/2" water pipe and went to bending and welding. Was able to complete the frame and make it a roller before the year was over and got a B+ on it...since it really wasn't complete. The instructor liked it since it was the only project that didn't include a 55 gallon drum lol. After getting all I could out of the old edger motor, I found one with more hp and milled the head, added a straight pipe and a bigger carb and ended up going 55 with a suicide clutch and belt drive! That was my one and only mini bike and got back into go carts years later but wouldn't mind having another bike. I'm 64....and you got my mind going. Wife will sheet if I bring something home again with 2 wheels lol

 

[ZR9B]

I have been on that site for 3 or 4 years now...GREAT site...as good as this one is to Mopars!! I have a hand full of mini bikes now....they are a lot of fun and Its funny reading a bunch of grown men playing with mini bikes.

 

[dieseldazzle]

Man I remember my benelli 65 and my tecumseh 5 horse side shaft mini bike with a jack shaft.

And at 100 bux they might as well have been a million is oh so true.

 

[coloradodave]

Secret: Get the wife involved...

 

[Lets Roll]

I was lucky kid I had those horizontal shaft clutch mini bikes one was a chopper I'll post a pic if I can find it also had honda 50 and kawasaki 75. But I wanted a 125 or a 250 cc dirt bike more than anything back then.

 

[Richard Cranium]

I ride them around my neighborhood like a goof.
It's just funny how that unfulfilled desire hangs with me at 58 years old.

I always wanted one as a kid and every once in a while, I still have desires to get one, but I also thought of the "goof issue". Thanks for the link. Looks like there's plenty of goofs out there!

 

[patrick66]

We take the 2.8 hp engines off and replace them with the 6.5 hp $100 Harbor Freight Honda clones.

I'd think the 2.8 horse American engines would be far better. I've had two HF Honda clones that were pure junk.

My first mini-bike was one I bought at age 13. No motor, but otherwise complete - even had front and rear springs! I found a 2-1/2-horse Clinton one-lunger with a rope start you had to rewind manually with each start! That was the first small motor I pulled apart out of pure curiosity. Reassembled it and it ran great! Put that on that little Rupp frame and rode the piss out of it. The bike had a separate tank, so I plumbed all that to the little tank on the Clinton engine. Ran beautifully with no leaks. It might have done 25 - 30 mph, but at that height with iffy brakes, it felt like 90 to me as a 13-year-old! No helmet, ever. With all the crap I did on that little bike, I'm truly surprised I lived to see fourteen. Jumping the irrigation ditch across the street was always fun, as well as hitting the jump that went off my street into a clearing. I'd hit that at full speed and go flying through the air in true Evel Knievel fashion! Minus the dramatic crash and broken bones, of course!

 

[theman440]

I had a YZ 60 when I was a kid and my brother had a mini with a big 2-stroke chain saw motor in it. It was faster than my YZ1! Currently I've got a Doodle bug, stock engine, jackshaft kit, re-jetted carb, Chrome fenders, aluminum front wheel. I use it as a pit bike at the dragstrip.

 

[67Satty]

My grandpa bought me and my brother one of the lawnmower engine ones when we were in grade school. He bought it for us without checking with my parents first. They weren't amused and made him take it back again. At 50 years old, I'm still a little bitter about that. My dad made up for it a little by teaching me to ride his Yamaha 175 Enduro when I was twelve. This same grandpa used to give me and my brother bricks of Blackcat firecrackers when we just little kids. Kids today don't know what they are missing, growing up in the 1970s was a blast.

 

[mosquito13]

Some friends did the flames and pinstriping for me. great fun at the music fests

great fun . I actual got a thumbs up from a cop . back seat removes to hold a 12 pack or small cooler. purpose built.

 

[Budnicks]

I {& my useless brother Tim} had a couple Taco 22's & Taco 44's

started on them about 6-7 y/o so about 1965-66-67ish,
I graduated to go-carts & dirt-bikes/motorcycles soon after

Briggs & Straton 4 stroke powered, 3.5hp on the Taco 22 & 5hp IIRC on the Taco 44

it was a long time ago, but we drove them literally tell the wheels fell off...

photos below from Google, I don't really have many photos at all from my ill spent youth...

the one photo with "goofs"
Dumb & Dumber is the dweeb/dork mentality...LOL

 

[SteveSS]

Again, those were for rich kids. I can't imagine what a help they would have been herding cattle. You would get the whole herd pointed one way and then one maverick decides to turn and do and end run. I yearned for something to make that easier. I had to walk with a stick in my hand. Our horses were way too wild. My fault, I didn't ride them enough but it was always exciting when we did. I remember dad had a new 1965 Impala. We left it in a pasture to herd cattle and the horses ate the paint off the hood. I did make sure my son had a Honda Mini-Trail.

 

[Budnicks]

Not sure whom your referring to ?
I'm sure the hell wasn't a rich kid by any means or sense of the word/definitions,
my step father was hourly wage Union Pipefitter, he surely wasn't rich...
& I worked my arse off for everything I had,
I helped my step dad with his paid projects/side jobs, to earn extra $$$,
I also mowed lawns & had multiple paper routes, even as a youngster,
to afford getting most my toys or they were hand-me-downs, that I rebuilt,
from my Uncles or my favorite older cousin Joe, that ultimately
"I had to do some kind of work for"...

I collected bottles from a field off Clayton rd. or
around the neighborhood, just to get money for gas...

IIRC the last Taco 44 I had I paid $50 for it, second hand &
it took me a year or more to save that, getting up 4:30 am to do my routes...

I didn't like sharing the Taco 22 with my useless step brother,
at his house in Lafayette miles away, from my house in Concord...

Tim that never paid for gas or anything else, he was a spoiled/coddled brat,
his sponge of a mother was married to my real father &
he was a working class stiff too...

Latter had them both at my dads ranch/property in Garden Valley,
they were well used, I learned allot working on them...

No entitlements here, I earned most all my toys...

just a clarification...LOL, no big deal thou

 

[bigaadams]

G u i l t y...still ride mine around...fun at the swap meets..neighborhood kids are envious....lol

 

[SteveSS]

I worked too. I had a paper route but I never brought in much money. All my free time was working on the ranch which didn't pay. My dad was a professional man. We had money but not for things like mini bikes. The rich kids had the Honda D-50 Mini Trial. the really rich kids had the 70CC Mini Trail

 

[64BEL]

I had a Honda D-50, but I don't remember being rich, Steve. :tongue5:

 

[mosquito13]

WTF with the rich kid sheet

 

[73ply]

i get it...have a sears mlni bike..i bought 4 yrs ago,, had one when i was a kid...im 54.......

 

[barnfind]

I don't know what you're talking about.
Wasn't rich growing up by any means, lots of lawn mowing. First one was a Ruttman Spyder, lots of good times on that mini. Heres my Lil Indian, bored main jet and it shoots fire out the header, quite a handful to slowdown.