Scott Loveless

Haha, no problem Tom. Better to make a little mistake on the post is way better than making a small mistake putting that bike together. I love detail, and that bike has that in spades. I ended up on YouTube all weekend watching old KR and Hannah racing. Really cool to see that stuff now and remember how obsessed I was with motorcycles and racing. It was a lot of fun. So I thank you for putting that ride together and bringing back memories. Hey turdburd, yeah, that’s an amazing bike. Notice where KR is in that pic. Coming out of a corner and accelerating with the typical spinning of the back tire when he nails it. The fact that his front wheel is almost a foot in the air. That’s a demon of a bike! I read KR’s wiki and it tells the story of that bike and it turned out that the bike was so complicated to build and test that it was finished at the last minute so that race was the first time KR (or anyone else) had ridden it before. He came in cold and figured it out during the race! He was amazing. That race is on YT too. Lots of fun to watch. Thanks for a great weekend Tom! Some fun trivia: The pic below is Bob Hannah ahead of Scot the OM (RIP).

Looks fantastic and very trick. I started with motorcycle motocross and followed all forms of motorcycle racing. ”King Kenny” Roberts in MotoGP and Bob “Hurricane” Hannah in motocross were heroes of mine. I would have killed somebody to get my hands on that bike in 1976! KR started as a flat track racer and he made the step up to MotoGP on factory Yamaha. They used 750cc 2 stroke motors that were so powerful that they were almost unmanageable. King Kenny was the first guy I remember seeing race with his knees scraping the track. He somehow got the idea to take the motor out of his TZ750 2 stroke factory team bike and stick in in a flat track bike frame made by Trackmaster which also made quite a lot of small BMX company’s frames like RRS and early Pattersons. It was technically legal to race in the top class in Flat Track class which only specified a 750cc motor. The Harley XR750 like Evel and Mert Lawill rode “On Any Sunday” was fairly dominant along with the occasional Triumph or BSA. All of them were 4 strokes which were a whole different kettle of fish than a 2 strokes screaming like a banshee. He raced the TZ750 and it was so evil and out of hand that only King Kenny could ride it quickly. It was just for fun, but I remember watching it on “Wide World of Sports”. My 8 year old jaw was on the floor. Sorry for rambling on, but that bike just pushes all my buttons and brings back some vivid memories. Outstanding job Tom. One little boo boo is the topic title. I doubt Kenny Rogers would able to do that… Here’s the bike I’m talking about

Me too.

It’s Pat! Man, I remember back when I found BMX again in 2003 or so, you had some absolutely amazing stuff. Your early Pattersons alone could pay for a couple kid’s college educations nowadays….

Wow! A Pat/STR-1 sighting. How ya been man? Always loved your GT Don. Looks great with the changes too.

My favorite line: "He Said any Changes in Geometry Would be Minor and Covered Up by the Chroming Process."

It's some sort of "return" spring for a motorcycle. Looks very similar, but smaller, to the kickstart arm spring on my '48 Harley. Here's a pic of mine I found and cropped. Look just above where the two exhaust tubes join near the kicker arm.

Thanks Guys. I'm glad you like it. I like it better than I thought I would when I decided to slap it together. I was reorganizing my parts stash one day and realized I had what could be a pretty decent build sitting there in boxes... I usually have everything planned out WAY ahead of time, so this was kinda a new thing for me. Not sure if you're talking about my Sting or John's frames, Lee. My red Sting is in good shape, but it does have a few honest racing battle scars. The Schwinn paint is very distinctive. Both the Cardinal Red and the Sky Blue they used were similar to a candy apple type of metallic paint process but looked different than anything else. Lots of Schwinn collectors have tried to duplicate it, but I don't think anyone has really come close to the original Schwinn metallic finishes. It also seems to hide scrapes and chips too! lol Here's the closest-up pic I have for now. I'll get some better ones when I take the final pics. You can see some of the scars and beauty marks in this photo though

Here's a preview of a bike I put together recently. A 1981 Schwinn Sting in original Cardinal Red metallic put together (for now) with "orphan" parts that I hadn't used on other builds over the years but were still nice. Some stuff isn't year correct for the frame (XC-II pedals, sealed 1984'ish Graphites, Oakley I's, tires, etc.) I finally realized one day that it's way more fun to build it and ride it rather than have the parts in boxes waiting for "the perfect build" to use them on. Everything is OG finish and the only repro items are two numberplate stickers; the Rockville BMX sticker and even though the Oakley sticker was sold to me as real, I have my doubts.... It's actually alot of fun to ride. It's not the lightest bike in the world, but it's sure stiff and solid even with my 180lb old man body riding it. I'm 6'0" and even though the ESP XL reach stem helps, it still feels a bit short at first. I'll start a new post soon and include more pics and a parts list.

Wow! Somehow I missed this thread the first time around... When I picture a dialed-in early JMC race bike in my mind, that's the way it's put together. You've really been killin' it lately William!

Thanks for posting that. I knew they were around in at least '79, since I had they on my YZ-80. Still to this day my favorite grip ever! I have them on my RRS which I ride daily and I'd have 'em on my Harley if I could find some MX versions. Lizards dig them too... :-)

That's a "Sting Competion"/SX2000 model you have there Bad Company, and like Sodbuster said about King Stings above, it doesn't follow the "The Sting" Paramount Room made format. Sting Competition's, SX2000's, King Stings and Mini Stings were all made on the standard Schwiinn production line. Only the top of the line "The Sting" model used the serial # scheme I described. On Paramount built Stings the Serial is on the rear dropout and on all the others it's stamped on the front of the headtube. The quality of the Paramount Stings was much higher than the others and they were also a lot more expensive. The Schwiinn Paramount line of road bikes back then was considered the best you could buy. They were completely hand made in a special area of the factory by the best guys Schwinn had. Marc Meuller was the guy who ran the Paramount Division and was the guy who designed The Sting. Here's a Paramount Track frame of the same era as the Stings were made. I would LOVE to have one of these someday! Big $$ though...

Stings don't follow the same serial # format that most Schwinns do. They were made in the "Paramount Room" and not on the regular production line. The first character is the month ( A=January skipping the letters "I" and "O") Your "H" is August Second character is the year (9=1979, 0=1980, 1=1981) Yours is 1980 Third character is always a "T" with Stings. It stands for the "Trioval" tubing Stings featured. The remaining numbers are the production sequence. Yours is "0160" or the 160th Sting built in August 1980.

Thanks Owl. Sorry to say, you won't be getting mine unless I die before you do...:-) Thanks William. You've built several of my faves over the years and your recent hot streak is fun to watch. Do you still have the FMF you did a few years ago? I LOVE that bike...

Really nice to see you building bikes again William. You've certainly built some doozies recently!