The Making of Midnite

Hi, now I’ll go over the building of another really fun bike! This one, I call Midnite is a circa 1955 Hawthorne (sold by Montgomery Wards and company). When I got the bike it was spraycanned red, with a bent Schwinn Ashtabula fork, a feather guard, early Schwinn crank and sprocket, New Departure rear, and a standard matching drop-center wheel in the front. A rear fender chrome, but no front fender.

I like to do a preliminary build on a vintage bike before I paint to get the feel of the whole thing

I put a chrome tank, 55cc Starfire, bookrack, a 68 spoke wheel (temp, was already mounted with sprocket) a little drum brake front, and a chrome fender that was lying around the shop. I like the “teardrop” sprockets common to Monark bicycles, and at this point have changed out the Schwinn assembly

Now we are getting somewhere! Here she is fresh assembled, with new black enamel (by Rocky, elk grove dealer), new Wald fenders (Factory black), a new Kustom Kruiser fork with cantilever brakes, Viscount saddle, new stem, new sweepback bars,

New Alloy wheelset, and a centerstand.

preliminary assembly, cloth sparkplug wire, steel chromed air cleaner, fancy grips, custom 44^th sprocket, next the finish!

Custom expansion chamber, custom billet air cleaner (made by Arlo), back to chrome sprocket (needed the offset) a cool winged taillite, and a new 1 gallon tank. Here you also see the upstop roller on the chain and she’s good to go! Hope you enjoy this build as much as I did in the making, Mike