Recent Restoration Project ARCO Mini Bike

[partyofone]

Greetings everyone.

Just wanted to share a little project I've been working on. I bought this mini bike frame at an auction recently. I had a 5.5 hp Honda sitting around that needed a home. After many hours of work and some new parts, this is what I came up with. Just waiting for a new seat to be made and it will be all done. I never had one as a kid. I guess 49 is still young enough.

Erik

 

[DIG5050]

Nice restoration job. It looks great. It reminds me a lot of the Lil' Indian mini bike I had when I was a youngster. Almost the same color blue, too. My dad and I bought it in a kit form and it had to be painted then assembled. I had it a couple of years, and then it was stolen. A couple years later it was recovered and returned to me. I was on to cars by then, so i fixed it up and sold it. Sure was fun to ride though!

 

[hoser]

Good going. That's going to be awesome when it is finished. I like it a lot.

 

[stetam]

Looking good Erik. Be careful, I had some bad moments trying to jump one off a ramp 20 years ago

Steve

 

[GroundSweeper]

I had one in AZ when I was a kid, but it had a fiberglass gas tank and I don't recall the HP but it wasn't enough Had a TON of fun with it! Yours looks really nicely redone!

 

[scoundrel]

I just turned 60. When I was around 50, I got back into minibikes. I bought a tiny Azusa minibike. I was riding down the street in my neighborhood doing about 15mph. I took one hand off of the handlebars to adjust the carburetor air fuel mixture. Big mistake. The minibike got a bad case of a speed wobbles. it was not pretty. After the crash, I immediately got up and walked it off, like people do when stuff like this happens. And I was bleeding from my shoulders to my feet. I had road rash everywhere. I looked around to see if any cameras had recorded my crash. Unfortunately, there were none. This would have been YouTube gold. for some reason I found the whole thing hilarious. I was 50 years old. I just rolled a Minibike down the street. I went to my buddies house so he could take pictures of my bloody self. I did have a puncture in my leg that would not stop bleeding and eventually filled my shoe with blood. I have road rash scars to this day on my arms and legs. After that, I bought a doodle bug, which is a bigger frame and much more stable to ride. good fun. By the way, I was getting my motors from Harbor freight. The predator 6 hp was only $99. It’s a Honda knock off, but it’s a good little motor. I put it Mikuni carb on it with stronger valve springs and it would do 50 mph. Harbor freight now sells a racing version of that engine for $299. I bet it screams. I still have my doodle bug but it has seen better days. One day I’m going to tear it down and do it over.

 

[mudwhale]

Greetings everyone.

Just wanted to share a little project I've been working on. I bought this mini bike frame at an auction recently. I had a 5.5 hp Honda sitting around that needed a home. After many hours of work and some new parts, this is what I came up with. Just waiting for a new seat to be made and it will be all done. I never had one as a kid. I guess 49 is still young enough.

Erik

I had that exact same model ARCO when I was a kid in the '70's! Cool project!

 

[vmc1161]

My oldest son use to rebuild them with his buddies many years ago. Also my granddaughter would ride them around when she was maybe eight years old… she didn’t crash. So maybe it’s a young person’s thing.

 

[too_pointer]

My first minibike was called ( a Sand & Snow minibike,) Had big ole tires on it, it would go almost anywhere, I remember using tape for a 6 volt handheld flashlight, I taped on the front. Looked dorky, but all I had, lot of relation. had the Honda mini's, but my parents couldn't afford something like that ? Thanks for the pics, brought back good memories.
too_

 

[GroundSweeper]

Man there's an ad locally here with someone selling an old tote gote.... very tempted but don't need another hobby