SHINGLEHOUSE, Pa. — Theron Hendershot is “kind of famous” in Shinglehouse, according to his family.
If you’re driving through the town this summer, you may see Hendershot riding atop his homemade big-wheel bike.
“It’s a different perspective when your head is eight feet in the air and you’re eye-level with horses,” Hendershot said. “I guess I’ve always wanted one in the back of my mind.
“They were invented, well, it was their heyday from 1880 through the 1890s,” he explained. “The idea was the bigger the wheel, the farther you go in one revolution.”
He attempted to keep his build to as close to the original big-wheel bicycle, but he laughingly said, “The old bells and clown horns” were a route he wasn’t going down.
Keeping it close to original meant he had to manufacture or craft all the components except the pedal arms.
“That’s the only thing I didn’t manufacture in some way,” he said. “The grips, they’re shovel-handle grip style. That’s my tip of the hat to the old way. The handles and the pedals are maple.”
The rim on the 47-inch-circumferance big wheel is two 26 inch bicycle rims welded together. The spokes are TIG welding rods with one threaded end and one end with hooks. Hendershot fashioned two 4-inch round, one-eighth-inch thick piece of steel with a hole in the middle and 36 holes on the outside, into which the hooked end of the spokes.
He made as many parts as he could out of steel tubing, including the axle, in order to keep the bicycle under 50 pounds in weight. The backbone is the top rail from a chain-link fence.
“I ended up building a bender,” Hendershot said. “All the commercial vendors only bent short lengths and they cost about $200.”
Even the seat is modified, as it was commercially sold as a regular bicycle seat that didn’t conform to the backbone.
“I cut away the bottom (of the seat) and refitted the front part of the seat,” Hendershot explained.
His family was totally supportive, although his wife Carlene was admittedly a little nervous about her husband getting hurt. But his other family members knew he would build the bicycle, regardless.
Sabrina Perkins, one of Hendershot’s daughters, said, “I thought he was a little crazy when he said he was doing it, but I had no doubt he could do it.”
Another daughter, Natalie Seely, said, “He builds anything he can put his mind to.” Her husband, Rev. Philip Seely, agreed, “He lies awake at night and his mind just computes.”
His three daughters have set up a Big Wheel Guy Facebook page with pictures so everyone who may not go to Shinglehouse can see it. But it may just be worth it to take a ride on a sunny afternoon — after all, that’s what Hendershot does.
May 27, 2021 at 07:00PM
https://www.oleantimesherald.com/news/shinglehouse-man-builds-1880s-style-big-wheel-bike/article_8d6214d5-e78b-5ec5-a82c-e2da26596d33.html
Shinglehouse man builds 1880s-style big-wheel bike - Olean Times Herald
https://news.google.com/search?q=Wheel&hl=en-US&gl=US&ceid=US:en
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