My old Minson skatebike before I restored it.

In the mid 1980’s while shopping in Eaton Centre in Toronto, Canada I spotted this SkateBike in Collegiate Sports. It was love at first sight and I bought it. After we moved to the country it got little use as we lived on a dirt road. For years it sat in my barn rusting. In June 2013 I pulled it out and restored it.

My bike is badly rusted and the tire cracked. I have been collecting up measurements to replace parts. Fortunately most of them are common. As I intend to actually use it I want to replace the wheel with a coaster brake one. The tire is 16×1.75 so finding a coaster brake unit should not pose a problem.

A longboard truck will work on the front. The included truck is an old-school mounting with 2.5″ holes front to back. Once I settle on the tire and truck/wheel I can select the appropriate riser thickness.

The biggest challenge is the cranks. The old bottom bracket is a common British/ISO unit but the cranks are only 100 mm long. The shortest unit I can find is 115 mm for BMX riding. You can see from the videos there is room for a longer crank and as I recall the short length makes for hard pedaling. This weekend I will investigate the bike parts. I may have to just restore the old BB/crank.