Klunkeresque

This is the Schwinn cruiser I built for my stepdaughter Brianna. Dan the VW Man swung by again and dropped off some bikes and this was one of them. It had some beach cruiser bars and a coasterbrake on it when I got it. I stole the cranks and clover chainwheel off it for another project. I have plans for the Bendix 76 coasterbrake as well, it's drilled for 12 ga spokes.



When I saw that it had a brake bridge I decided to build it up as a 6-speed because I had a thumbshifter laying around, along with a long cage derailleur, and some cheesey MTB wheels. They had a freehub so I laced in a sealed low flange "Schwinn Approved" hub.



The shifter is from a Magna or something cheap like that, and despite that it indexes well. The levers are road levers that I straightened out in the vise between blocks of wood. I bought the used Schwinn grips for 5 bucks from Community Cycling Center.



I bought new cables for it and one of these derailleur tabs. Everything else is stuff I've collected, dumpstered, or freeboxed.



The only issue was that the rear caliper wouldn't reach so I made this little drop plate. I think that Schwinn used a 1080 reach caliper, I didn't have one of those laying around, but I did have a piece of 1/8" x 1" bar stock.



What I like about it, and what Brianna and her mom Mirand like about it is that it doesn't look like a girl's bike, no step-thru and no pink.