The Latest from Shocker Choppers Garage
Photos/Story by T-Bone
It all started when Billy said: “Hey Pop’s I want to build something that will help me work out my arms and shoulders. What do you think of this?” as he showed me some pics on his phone of some garage-built hand cycles.
He continued: “We can use one of my old wheelchairs and put a bicycle on the front of it.”
We got to working. He found a neighbor who had an old Tony Hawk 24″ bike and we cut it up, mocked it together with some duct tape. (Handyman’s secret weapon) and took the monstrosity over to Jacks to expertly weld-up the aluminum frames. We cut the fork extension out of 3/16″ sheet steel, ground it smoothed and welded it to the steel fork tubes.
The progress was captured on the Shocker Choppers page on Facebook with a secret unveil of the color when it was completed.
And boy is it workout. I didn’t realize how much I would enjoy riding this thing. You can feel the biceps, triceps and all the muscles from the core on up to the shoulders as we roll this single speed machine around the 1/2 mile lap of our block.
Most people say we should put the pedals opposed from each other. In-fact myself and Jack insisted it too. Saying that you can get consistent push on the crank. Billy kept his ground that the pedals/grips have to be together. It wasn’t till we got it together that we agreed with Billy. When the grips are opposed and you are starting from a stop, the bike steers one way then the other as you pedal.
We are offering a poster of the build to help off-set the cost. If you’d like to contribute to more Father/Son projects in the Shocker Choppers garage, please take a moment and order the two-sided build poster for only $3.00 plus shipping and prove to Billy that there are people out there who would want to hang this in their garage! Click here to preview and/or order.
We hope you are inspired and will share your build with us. Now get out there and make something!