Author Topic: 88 RL20ii Kiwi Build (Read 11801 times)

McQUEEN · « **on:** February 26, 2016, 06:38 AM »

Hi, thought I would add on my build thread for my Kiwi '88 RL20ii.

I left BMX behind me around 85/85 so had always been old school. I did follow the scene occasionally and watched what we call mid school come to be, along with all the different bikes and the way they were set up and liked the look of them, the move from Tuffs/Masters to 48 rims was great along with the lower brakes and brazed on AD mounts and how the bikes started getting plastered in decals. I'd never thought of building a mid school bike but I bought Banachek's Salmon 88 RL20ii, as I'd always been a Redline freestyle bike fan (I've got an '84 Prostyler and a '85 RL20ii), and as soon as I saw it I loved it and thought it would look great next to my old school Redlines, you know, it would show the progression of how the bikes developed etc.
Salmon 88 RL20II

Hazard Yellow 85 RL20II

White 84 RL20 Prostyler

After buying the salmon RL I did lots more research in the mid school bikes, really liked the look of some of the Haro's, so I decided to build a mid school bike of my own. After searching for awhile I didn't really turn anything up that took my fancy.

When I was looking at buying Banacheks RL I referenced the 88 RL Catalogue and found that the RL colours that year were Salmon and Kiwi and also found this picture from a guy in USA. I'm a big Miami Vice fan (like so many of us on here) and the colours reminded of the Art Deco buildings in Miami and some of Sonny Crockett's outfits, so hit on the idea of having a pair, so that's how I decided to go for a Kiwi 88.

After looking around for awhile on the Museum I was finding lots of really battered frame and fork sets (mid school did look a lot more aggressive on the bikes than the old school freestyle moves) so I widened my search to include 87 frame sets and found this beauty on the Museum, in its original black finish, paint battered but metal work pretty straight. After doing a deal with the owner I had it shipped home and cleaned it up ready for powder coating and chroming.

So here goes the build thread.....

McQUEEN · « **Reply #1 on:** February 26, 2016, 06:59 AM »

The frame and bars went off to SBD and the front forks went down to Capital Chrome and when I picked them both up they had both been completed excellently!

Dan's usual high level of excellence

- Pictures say enough! Choosing the Kiwi colour was a pain though. I haven't seen an original Kiwi colour, most of the photography on the Museum has bad colour rendering, colour effected by flash etc. I contacted a few guys on the Museum and found that the Kiwi colour was only referenced as an American Dupont colour code, Kiwi GS316. Theres no job referencing this to a panatone or RAL number, so I spent some time with SBD looking through loads of pictures to find the best match. In the end we went with a match of Imortals recent build on the Museum and the RL catalogue.

Front forks by Capital Chroming - we all have our favourite Chromers, and these guys are mine. Really deep level of chrome and polish but not over polished, none of the welds are over polished. Based on the Old Kent Road in SE London, easy for me to get too. They inspect each part you drop in and talk it through and make notes so no problem there.

deeman · « **Reply #2 on:** February 26, 2016, 10:01 AM »

that really is not fair....A man does not need more than one RL 20 II!!
Love the kiwi and the Salmon colours, looking forward to this one immensely, I would love to own one one day...

dancetothedrummersbeat · « **Reply #3 on:** February 26, 2016, 11:46 AM »

Great thread and a really interesting read too. It's already clear that this is going to be an amazing build. Mikes old mango one is a real beauty. Pleased it's stayed in the country. He lives round the corner from me. Shame he's out of the game now

Top work so far by all concerned

McQUEEN · « **Reply #4 on:** February 26, 2016, 01:40 PM »

So, this weekend I'll be adding the decals to the frame. Not really sure what was going on back at Redline in 88, but the Kiwi RL20ii's came out the factory with loads of different decal colours - some Kiwi's came out with the downtube Redline in Salmon, some in Kiwi, and some in white, and it was the same for the Salmon RL's. I did toy with the idea of going Salmon on the Kiwi and changing the downtube decal to the Salmon RL, but after searching around for awhile I found that there would be very little chance of scoring some Kiwi, so I went for Salmon. Salmon was used on quite a few Kiwi's and I ordered these up from AJK Bikes and they arrived looking pretty good. I also ordered a set in white (they where for RL20b's that year), but one evening trawling through Ebay USA I found a NOS set still in the bag, sealed, and scored them for $18.00. Thats cheaper than the repro's!! So that's whats going on the frame set!

AJK Repro's in white:

AJK Repro's in Salmon:

"S**t my pants, Mum look, I got NOS in white!!":

And for reference, a salmon RL with Kiwi downtube sticker:

Faze 3 · « **Reply #5 on:** February 29, 2016, 11:31 PM »

Top collection of Redline's fella

Good to see the ol fireplace still loaded with top framesets.

Interested in getting some forks chromed myself, do you mind if I ask how much it cost ya?

CustardLips · « **Reply #6 on:** March 01, 2016, 12:04 AM »

Not big on freestyle but love these.

McQUEEN · « **Reply #7 on:** March 01, 2016, 02:06 PM »

Quote from: Faze 3 on February 29, 2016, 11:31 PM

Top collection of Redline's fella Good to see the ol fireplace still loaded with top framesets.

Interested in getting some forks chromed myself, do you mind if I ask how much it cost ya?

I had them done along with lots of other parts, but I recon you're looking around £70-80.

McQUEEN · « **Reply #8 on:** March 01, 2016, 02:17 PM »

Decals applied and headset fitted - I opted for the white repops as the originals had a slightly different 'zebra' print to them and found my joy that I'd found some NOS short lived - they were actually from a RL 400C! If anyone wants them lmk. Now I've got the white downtube decal on I'm thinking of changing back to Salmom, but I'll give it a few days to see how I settle to it.

Also, time to explain a difference I found on the front forks. All RL20ii's up to 86 had the fork-standers in the 3/4 up the forks positions - '87 onwards they dropped then down to the 1/4 way up the fork position, and in '88 Redline changed them from the original smaller diameter standers to the larger diameter ones. The bigger ones also had a larger diameter thread, so, using a '87 fork on a '88 build threw up my first problem - I needed to get the threads cut down. I posted a thread here
(http://www.radbmx.co.uk/forum/index.php/topic,181267.msg1819948.html#msg1819948) and didn't get much response but finally found a local engineering shop who turned them down and threaded them to suit. And only a tenner! As the bike is not a rider I'm not really too worried about the smaller thread, although most of the strength comes from the face of the fork-stander tight against the bezel in the forks.

Finding a decent engineering company in the London Area is getting harder by the day. The guy has almost every machine you can imagine, you walk in the door and it's the smell of cutting oils and metal that hit you. If you can think of a single metalworking exercise I get the impression he can do it! As the guy who owns it said to me "we're Victorians in here!"
http://essex-engineers.co.uk

I also found time to tire up the wheels and apply the decals to the hubs. I sourced some IRC Free Style Pro's in mint condition last year along with a set of 48spoke Araya 7X's and Suzue sealed hubs and they all came together pretty good. The 'stock' 88 RL20ii's had Hard Anodised Araya 48 spoke aeros but prefer these and the Salmon one has the same.

There's also a works in progress 'buffguard' I'm cutting out of an old raceplate sneaking into the last picture!

deeman · « **Reply #9 on:** March 01, 2016, 02:28 PM »

Really enjoying this thread too...I am glad I am not the only one having to get bits machined. Great find on the engineering shop, as you said a dying trade. The one I would have used in Watford shut last year...such a shame when these places go but simple case of supply and demand I suppose. Can't beat the smell too...

McQUEEN · « **Reply #10 on:** March 01, 2016, 02:41 PM »

managed to leave the wheel pics off in the last post...

Robbo · « **Reply #11 on:** March 01, 2016, 09:44 PM »

Awesome thread

McQUEEN · « **Reply #12 on:** March 01, 2016, 10:10 PM »

Sourcing the parts has been a pain, but its a pain we all know and love. Where I can I've gone NOS but where I can't I've done my best to refurb old original parts. One item was the brake levers. A NOS/mint set of Tech 7's go for silly money, but I did find myself a mismatched set on Ebay USA that needed some work.

I ordered a set of tech 5's and a set of the Dia Compe lever kits from Porkchop BMX for donor parts and, after a very careful strip back, file, shape and emery cloth finish got them ready for SBD to powder white. Once they were back I reassembled them and was pretty happy with the outcome. You would be hard pressed not to think their new.

I going to make up the bars/stem/brakes later this week to drop into the frameset...

deeman · « **Reply #13 on:** March 01, 2016, 10:18 PM »

The levers look mint! Which set are going on this build? Should it be the Tech 7's as it is a later bike?

McQUEEN · « **Reply #14 on:** March 01, 2016, 10:45 PM »

Quote from: deeman on March 01, 2016, 10:18 PM

The levers look mint! Which set are going on this build? Should it be the Tech 7's as it is a later bike?

Yeap, on this. Matches the levers of the salmon one.

deeman · « **Reply #15 on:** March 02, 2016, 12:08 AM »

Quote from: McQUEEN on March 01, 2016, 10:45 PM

Quote from: deeman on March 01, 2016, 10:18 PM
The levers look mint! Which set are going on this build? Should it be the Tech 7's as it is a later bike?
Yeap, on this. Matches the levers of the salmon one.

Would an earlier 85 one have the Tech 5's? You never know, I may build one one day!

McQUEEN · « **Reply #16 on:** March 02, 2016, 07:20 AM »

[/quote]

Would an earlier 85 one have the Tech 5's? You never know, I may build one one day!

[/quote]

My 85 RL has Tech 4's on it. RL did what they called a 'combo' which was frame,forks, stem,bars, and brake sets all colour coordinated and they came with Tech 4's as well.

oldscool · « **Reply #17 on:** March 02, 2016, 01:01 PM »

Nice work love the salmon colour

factory pilot · « **Reply #18 on:** March 02, 2016, 02:41 PM »

A great thread ... I feel Redlines are often rather overlooked here on

was always a fan of their freestylers and the wild colours bitd... Hazard yellow and radberry spring to mind. Always loved RL from reading the American mags... Really looking forward to this one

Jaan · « **Reply #19 on:** March 02, 2016, 05:06 PM »

Nice thread. They're well past my 'use by' date but delicious nonetheless

McQUEEN · « **Reply #20 on:** March 15, 2016, 05:31 PM »

Okay, some progress photos here. Started Building up the front end with straight out of the packet NOS Ame supersoft grips, ACS Pro Rotor and NOS Dia Compe cables (date stamped 88)....

Set of minty (second time out of the box) Tioga Sealed BB and the double dimple flight crank -

and AD990's on the rear

I might actually be considering this a dry run build....or calling this a custom paint colour, or I might redo the frame and bars more 'kiwi'. Its half a shade lighter than the RL 88 catalogue, but about three shades lighter than the survivors and the other resto's I've seen. I won't tell SBD till I drop it round though, if of course I do!

Here's a great one from the museum...
http://bmxmuseum.com/forums/viewtopic.php?id=675238

deeman · « **Reply #21 on:** March 16, 2016, 02:05 AM »

Looking real sweet...
Hard call on the colour...it looks right to me.

That resto on the museum looks too dark and wrong shade imo $:-\$

McQUEEN · « **Reply #22 on:** March 16, 2016, 06:53 AM »

wheels on

Ignore the dynamax seat, I have a Redline embossed version on its way.

McQUEEN · « **Reply #23 on:** March 20, 2016, 09:07 PM »

Found a few hours this week to finalise a few bits and pieces....

drilled the rear drop outs for a set of Whale Tail Chain Adjusters. Crazy thing to do after the frames been finished!

just waiting for my Redline embossed seat and thats it (after I've cut and crimped the cable ends). will have course get the wife to take and post some proper pictures in the sun....

factory pilot · « **Reply #24 on:** March 21, 2016, 09:53 AM »

Super build thread this .. Nice work.. Get it in this months BOTM dude