harbor freight, the best place for cheap tools and welding supplies. some things, you don’t wanna buy there, like a welder for example, but for little things, it’s the best. welding gloves, cut off wheels, drill bits, ear muffs, safety glasses, digital calipers. . . . .

i have shared the box with another for the entire time i’ve been here. a few years now, maybe 4 or 5 years i think. now i have the whole place to myself. this will be my new hq in retirement. much more space. and i need some more organizing and furniture.

first some power. it would be nice to have a real power source rather than throwing out the extension cord every time i go there. this is the power box i need to hook up. and i needed a power line to run to the source. i found an old extension cord and cut off one end. spliced the extension cord into the box and ran it from the back of the box to the power source.

it works! now i have 4 plugs right by the table.

next i raid the scrap bins for scrap metal to build a couple things. and i use some stock puch pipes as well

first the hanging shelf. in this shipping container, it’s a nice idea to make hanging things. like shelves and other things i’ve made like the wheel rack for hanging wheels and the frame rack for hanging moped and bike frames. and this, the hanging shelf. it’s got a couple advantages.  first i dont have to bolt or weld anything to the container. + i can move them around. there are hooks up by the top of the container. so i can move this shelf and all the other hanging things a number of different places around the container. that makes sense, right? and if i leave? i simply unhook them and the container is same as it was. + as always, made from scrap metal. that’s like recycling. it hold a lot of weight and it costs nothing.

the scrap metal and stock puch pipes start to take form into the puch pipe table!

and here it is. a sturdy table to hold my tool cabinet. the box is starting to take shape. it’s hard to make anything without a bit of organization.

i started lacing up the wheel. using the only method i know how, taken from the puch manual

so that seemed to work. it all went together fine. i gather this is called “cross 3″ i probably should have used some info like this wheel building page but i like the puch manual

the wheel is finished and i go to true it. to begin with, i dread truing wheels. i have had a few bad experiences with truing wheels and i hate doing it. this wheel was probably the worst one yet. what it comes down to is that i should never have bought a cheap steel rim. i should have got a better aluminum one. the rim i got was untrueable. i did my best with it, then took it to a freind who makes wheels for a living. he couldn’t do it. because the rim is messed up! he got it as close as it could get. i figured a little bump in the wheel wouldn’t be so bad. i just wanted to ride the bike. this whole thing had been taking too long. then i put the tire on. looked good. put the bike back together. then the next day i come back and the wheel is completely  warped! i was able to mess with it some more and make it rideable. and i’ve ridden it for a couple days now. i hate truing and lacing wheels. i think i will get some aluminum rims and make the wheels nice. i need to have a good experience with wheels. i wonder if it’s worth telling the place it got the rim. they should probably know, if they don’t know already. that rim they got sucks!  i wasted money, and i wasted time. it’s not such a big deal. but i think i’ll let them know so they don’t run into this problem in the future with other customers. this is the bad rim i got from niagara cycle works. i’m sure it’s not they’re fault. they just got some bad rims coming from the supplier.

the jc higgins now. no fenders, no rack. not now. i like the way it looks with out em. i’ll keep it like this for a while. no riding in the rain, no carrying things. that’s fine

it’s too bad it was the back wheel and not the front. the front could be replaced easy and cheap. the back is an original 3 speed jc higgins wheel. and now i need to get a new 26 1 3/8 rim and re-spoke it

now i can touch up the paint a bit and get everything back to near to perfect condition. i ordered some new all white tires. should be a nice touch. a touch of class that is

jch fenders. if you didn’t know, jc higgins was a brand sold at sears and some of the bikes, like this one, was made by puch. kind a like a freespirit.

this is an amazing bike rack. it actually transforms into a kid seat. and i used to ride my kid, aftan  on there, but now she’s too big and she can ride her own bike. so i took a few parts off the rack and painted it black.

scratched paint and cracked pipes. luckily my friends in portland have a welder. and i can take off the tape and fix the pipe for real.

but more problems happen shortly after this. and for the first time, the derbi magnum breaks down. well sort of. .