..and story.
HI there, I’m new here and my name is Greg.
I’ve decided to dig out my old Cat mini-bike I got when I was 11 years old and put it back together, as it has been stored in pieces since around 1995, after I rescued it from my dad's rotting shed.
I don’t know anything about it other than it is a Cat. So, I’ve registered here to learn what I’ve got, where to get stuff for it, and so forth.
I’ve already learned a great deal since I registered a week ago, just by perusing the great pictures people have posted. Based on the pictures others have posted, the best I can tell is that I have some version of a metallic gold colored model 400
I’ll start with some background on the bike and the state it was in when it was given to me, along with an old riding tale:
In 1970, while living on Dover AFB base housing in Dover DE, my older sister’s new boyfriend gave the mini-bike to me with a blown-up Tecumseh 4H.P. engine. Aside from having a blown-up engine, there were a few parts missing such as ALL brake components, engine cut-off switch, and a chain guard. Other than the bad engine, no brakes whatsoever, and no convinient means to kill the engine, I believe the only other thing wrong was a broken throttle cable.
I had a 3 H.P. Briggs from my primitive Go-Kart that I would swap back and forth between mini-bike to go-kart. I remember trying to repair the ball-end on the throttle cable just so I could ride it and it was quite a while before I actually got a new throttle cable.
One time I was desperate to ride the mini-bike and the throttle cable repairs weren’t going so well, so I had the brilliant idea to put a spring on the carb so that the spring pulled the throttle wide open. I attached the strongest string/cord I had available (which as I recall, was some cotton kite string), and attached it to the throttle so that when I pulled the string it would bring the engine down to an idle, and when I wanted to accelerate I would just loosen my grip on the string and let the spring pull the throttle towards wide open.
This worked for a day or two until the day I was sitting on my brake-less mini-bike with the engine running while holding my “throttle-string” showing off my “stringenuity” to a neighbor kid. Well, as you’ve probably been speculating, the string broke and having no brakes, I had no choice but to hang on and ride to a solution. I went from sitting at an idle to full-throttle and rode two 15ft diameter circles before I aimed it at our neighbors chicken-wire fence, which worked really well as a mini-bike catch-net, as it stopped the bike handily without damaging the mini bike, but I did have to pay for some chicken wire though.
I’ll have some pictures coming in the next day or so to help identify, but for now I thought I’d ask you guys the following questions:
1. Are there any number stampings on the frame that can identify the exact model of the mini-bike? I found some numbers stamped into the engine plate that read 9037763
2. Are all Cat mini-bikes “Muskins?”
3. What does the H.P.E. abbreviate?
Anyways, thanks in advance, and I hope I didn’t bore you too much with my long-winded post.
~greg~
HI there, I’m new here and my name is Greg.
I’ve decided to dig out my old Cat mini-bike I got when I was 11 years old and put it back together, as it has been stored in pieces since around 1995, after I rescued it from my dad's rotting shed.
I don’t know anything about it other than it is a Cat. So, I’ve registered here to learn what I’ve got, where to get stuff for it, and so forth.
I’ve already learned a great deal since I registered a week ago, just by perusing the great pictures people have posted. Based on the pictures others have posted, the best I can tell is that I have some version of a metallic gold colored model 400
I’ll start with some background on the bike and the state it was in when it was given to me, along with an old riding tale:
In 1970, while living on Dover AFB base housing in Dover DE, my older sister’s new boyfriend gave the mini-bike to me with a blown-up Tecumseh 4H.P. engine. Aside from having a blown-up engine, there were a few parts missing such as ALL brake components, engine cut-off switch, and a chain guard. Other than the bad engine, no brakes whatsoever, and no convinient means to kill the engine, I believe the only other thing wrong was a broken throttle cable.
I had a 3 H.P. Briggs from my primitive Go-Kart that I would swap back and forth between mini-bike to go-kart. I remember trying to repair the ball-end on the throttle cable just so I could ride it and it was quite a while before I actually got a new throttle cable.
One time I was desperate to ride the mini-bike and the throttle cable repairs weren’t going so well, so I had the brilliant idea to put a spring on the carb so that the spring pulled the throttle wide open. I attached the strongest string/cord I had available (which as I recall, was some cotton kite string), and attached it to the throttle so that when I pulled the string it would bring the engine down to an idle, and when I wanted to accelerate I would just loosen my grip on the string and let the spring pull the throttle towards wide open.
This worked for a day or two until the day I was sitting on my brake-less mini-bike with the engine running while holding my “throttle-string” showing off my “stringenuity” to a neighbor kid. Well, as you’ve probably been speculating, the string broke and having no brakes, I had no choice but to hang on and ride to a solution. I went from sitting at an idle to full-throttle and rode two 15ft diameter circles before I aimed it at our neighbors chicken-wire fence, which worked really well as a mini-bike catch-net, as it stopped the bike handily without damaging the mini bike, but I did have to pay for some chicken wire though.
I’ll have some pictures coming in the next day or so to help identify, but for now I thought I’d ask you guys the following questions:
1. Are there any number stampings on the frame that can identify the exact model of the mini-bike? I found some numbers stamped into the engine plate that read 9037763
2. Are all Cat mini-bikes “Muskins?”
3. What does the H.P.E. abbreviate?
Anyways, thanks in advance, and I hope I didn’t bore you too much with my long-winded post.
~greg~
Last edited:
hmy: A 12 bolt would have worked.