Alexander Reynolds Custom Build - ARCO

DaddyJohn

Well-Known Member
#1
We’ll I’ve finally gotten around to making some progress on a mini I bought last year, as seen in my ”WTH is this?” thread.

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Anyway, it was hacked on, glob welded, badly painted, parts poorly selected, and just generally trashed, so restoring it wasn’t really in the cards. I decided to embark on a “get it working well as cheaply as possible without it looking stupid” type project, and this is where I am so far. Still needs more love, but progress is evident!

Though the (believe it or not, running) Honda GX200 engine fit, it would never look quite right on this bike. So off it went to find a better home on another machine someday.

I removed the rear wheel, replaced the old wheel-barrow style bearings with sealed units, and made internal and external spacers so I could tighten it down properly. The crappy (riding mower?) tire was replaced with a spare snowblower tire and tube. It's a Cheng Shin, but looks identical to a vintage Schenuit/Carlisle.

It needed a sidestand, so I took an old bent Kawasaki one I'd been saving for 20 years, shortened it, and made a pivot tab to assemble it to. Welded it to the frame, and it works pretty well.

I decided an HS50 would look right, so pressed that into service from the same cheap snowblower the tire came from. It required a new motor plate, as the spacing was off on the old one, it was too thin, and I wanted to add rear jack screws to tension the chain.

The seat is one of those Doodlebug units that GPS had on sale for cheap. I made a mounting plate for it and welded it to the top of the frame. To get the ergonomics right, I had to hang it off the rear quite a bit, so made up some stainless struts with stainless rod-ends to hold it up. Kind of overkill on the componentry, but I had the stuff laying around to do it.

The solid pegs were all jacked-up, plus I didn't like them anyway, so I removed them and welded some tabs on the frame for some EMGO buddy pegs instead. They fold up for storage and can deflect if the mini falls down or hits anything, so I'll consider it an improvement.

Instead of an unsightly handlebar switch and wire, I added a little panel to the top tubes to mount the old snowblower key switch.

Moving forward, I need to add a band brake and cover so that it can stop. Will also need to take the fork off and rework the top plate, as the pivot hole has worn bigger and has a lot of play. The front wheel also needs converted to sealed bearings, so I'll have to make internal and external spacers. Needs painted and a matching tire (think I have a good Schenuit) also... Speaking of paint, I'm thinking Deep Green hammered metal. Also need controls.
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#2
Coming from an Arco nerd, I love this. There's been a few builds lately of people using what they have on hand verses a complete resto and I'm mall for it. It's what we did when we were kids and while there may be a little better engineering involved as adults, I still enjoy seeing it. If you check out the early Arco bikes, they actually came with a top plate and key switch like you added. I love the pegs and seat struts too. Following for more...
 

DaddyJohn

Well-Known Member
#3
Coming from an Arco nerd, I love this. There's been a few builds lately of people using what they have on hand verses a complete resto and I'm mall for it. It's what we did when we were kids and while there may be a little better engineering involved as adults, I still enjoy seeing it. If you check out the early Arco bikes, they actually came with a top plate and key switch like you added. I love the pegs and seat struts too. Following for more...
Thanks for following and appreciating the method, loving the "use whatcha got" threads too!

I enjoy the challenge of seeing how inexpensively something can be built, plus see if it can incorporate any gathered useless junk, lol... Sometimes that leads to some creative solutions, which hopefully adds to the cool-factor. Anyway, at this point I might be $150 into the whole project. With a GX200 engine to spare, that's winning!

Here's a pic of the band brake assembly I want to use. Going to need a cable and lever for it though. Should have a decent lever somewhere, but will need to find a cable.

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DaddyJohn

Well-Known Member
#7
Small update... I painted the frame Rustoleum Hammered Metal Green. Was hoping for a mottled/textured finish that would hide the hickeys and scars in the frame (that I really have no interest in investing the kind of time it would take to deal with). I found the spray type lays out a bit more evenly than the brush-on, so it didn't work as well as I'd hoped. Still, not bad though...

I also installed my Harbor Freight front wheel. The original one has the old-school crappy wheelbarrow bearings, and the central hub is almost flush to the fork, which made installing the spacers required for sealed units problematic. I didn't want to mess with cutting the hub down, and found the HF wheel was just right for the purpose, and at $11.99, the price was right! It did come with a tire (trash), cheap wheelbarrow-style bearings (trash), and a tube (good), but I just took the Cheng Shin turf tire I had on the rear and remounted it to the new front rim. The rear was then treated to an old Carlisle Indian head turf tire, probably from the same snow blower the Cheng came off of. Looks pretty good! Anyway, I did put the flanged sealed bearings in the front wheel and fabbed an internal spacer. Still need to make the external spacers and that'll be sorted.

What's left is swapping the carb, wiring the ignition switch, mounting the chain, adding a throttle assembly, brake assembly, and probably getting a new cover for the seat. It's a 1st gen DB30 seat, so shouldn't be too hard to find one.

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DaddyJohn

Well-Known Member
#10
Finally got some time to mess with the Arco a bit, and got it to the point it's running nice and moves under its own power.

That said, I discovered it's geared way too high with the existing rear sprocket; starts out gutless and eventually builds to Warp 8!o_O

It's got a 40T rear sprocket against a 10T clutch sprocket for a 4:1 ratio. This is against a 12.5" diameter rear tire.

It's looking like the easiest thing for me to do is get a bigger rear sprocket. However, as the frame tapers in, clearance is a problem.
It's currently got a #40 chain, so going to a #35 could narrow it some and help mitigate the issue. Looks like I can get an undrilled 60T rear sprocket for $22 on eBay, which I'd have to pair with a 12T clutch in the #35 size (10T would be better, but not seeing any cheapos that aren't 12T). Would like to do a bigger rear sprocket, like a 70, but as the tooth count goes up, the clearance issue gets worse. Can probably shoehorn the 60T in though with a little grinding...:oops:

So, what do you guys think about a 5:1 ratio driving against a 12.5" tire? Probably going to mostly see street or flat gravel usage...

Once I get this sorted, I'll be putting on the band brake and custom cover, recovering the seat, and calling it done!
 

DaddyJohn

Well-Known Member
#12
u get a 1000 points!! for not!! putting the 100 buck china motor on it!~ well done
I like the Predator engines quite a bit; for about $100 plus tax, they’re an amazing deal. But there’s a time and place for everything, and this particular mini needed a $30 snowblower engine. :D
 

mustangfrank

Well-Known Member
#13
Yeah you're kinda limited in ratio choices if a 60 tooth rear is the largest practical size and without a TAV. Too bad your chain size needs to change, it'd be nice to have the 10T clutch if you decided you need 6:1 later.

Hopefully 5:1 does it for you.
 

DaddyJohn

Well-Known Member
#14
Yeah you're kinda limited in ratio choices if a 60 tooth rear is the largest practical size and without a TAV. Too bad your chain size needs to change, it'd be nice to have the 10T clutch if you decided you need 6:1 later.

Hopefully 5:1 does it for you.
Agreed... Here’s a pic of my clearance issue. There’s only a whisker if clearance with the 40T and #40 chain.
 

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mustangfrank

Well-Known Member
#16
Agreed... Here’s a pic of my clearance issue. There’s only a whisker if clearance with the 40T and #40 chain.
The closeup on the green paint highlights what you were saying about the lack of hammered effect but it looks damn good, mega bonus points for the garage shag!

Don't know if you already ordered parts but the post above is right, the issue is the wheel/sprocket spacing, how hard would it be to modify the sprocket mount closer so you could keep your chain and clutch gearing? Or even "cheat" the rear wheel slightly right and fractionally off-center with spacers to give you clearance? If you're not going to run fenders it'd be hard to detect.
 

DaddyJohn

Well-Known Member
#17
The closeup on the green paint highlights what you were saying about the lack of hammered effect but it looks damn good, mega bonus points for the garage shag!

Don't know if you already ordered parts but the post above is right, the issue is the wheel/sprocket spacing, how hard would it be to modify the sprocket mount closer so you could keep your chain and clutch gearing? Or even "cheat" the rear wheel slightly right and fractionally off-center with spacers to give you clearance? If you're not going to run fenders it'd be hard to detect.
It doesn’t surprise me that the rear wheel isn’t original, considering how hacked together it was when I got it. Didn’t think much about it at the time, but it could never have really worked for the PO. That said...

Getting a new wheel with a closer sprocket is a reasonable avenue, but I’d have to buy the wheel, make spacers, and worst of all, relocate the engine more rightward than it already is. That means my carefully constructed motor plate with adjustment slots would have to be ground off and moved over (ugh), or I’d have to grind more slots in it (though they’d likely be so close to the old slots, they’d break through). Ugh...
 
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