I have always liked mountain biking.  It may have started with my old, purple Stringray Bike in the 60’s, jumping off plywood ramps (supported by bricks), doing stupid stuff like this.   But the feeling was solidified a few years later...

My dad worked for Huffy in the early '70's.  You may not know that in addition to bikes, Huffy made (or maybe they still make) lawnmowers, which was my dads division.  So he often brought home fun prototypes to test, including a variety of riding lawnmowers and even a plug-in electric mini-bike that was beyond fun! 

One day he brought home what would today be called a mountain bike.  Single speed with flat handle bars and just my size.  It was before mountain bikes where a thing and I rode it everywhere I could find dirt, especially in the woods near my house on the hiking trails.  I pretended I was racing and always took the jumps way too fast.

Anyway, fast forward to adulthood and I found myself racing mountain bikes.  I wasn't a great climber and didn't want to bomb down downhills and crack my skull open on a rocks so I stopped mountain biking and switched to road bikes, then I got into touring...

And it all worked for a while.  But I stopped riding, or at least rode a lot less, because of family stuff and sick parents.  Then Covid hit, along with 2 failed bike trips in 2021 and 2022 and I needed some motivation for riding again. 

Except I didn't want a new bike.  I thought it would be cool to find an older mountain bike (think late '80s early 90's), fix it up and give it new life.  Finding one was the issue.  Until my brother said "I still have the one I bought in the late 80's and only road it about 3 times."

After a revisit with my old brain cells, I remembered going with him to buy it.  So we dug it out of storage and I started in on the project...