Quarter Horse minibikes were made by a company called “Micro-Sound” in Los Angeles in the early sixties. It is rumored that the retail price was approx. $800 at that time, perhaps making it one of the most expensive minibikes of its time. After tearing this QH apart and rebuilding, I understand why! Very high quality parts were used throughout and the engineering is amazing! A patent search also yielded two patents that were granted for this design. Rumor has it that the frame section of the bike, which doubles as the fuel tank, was sourced from WWII surplus mortar shells. I cannot confirm this, but a quick inspection makes it plausible!
I worked my backside off getting this! I made a deal to trade labor, parts, and cash…and it became mine! Be careful what you ask for! This roller was rough, but I had a vision! First thing I did when I got this home was to see if the frame would still hold fuel. Because the bike had not been run for a very long time and was without the correct McCulloch MC9, I stuck a garden hose through the top filler that resides under the tilting seat. Every seam in the tank/frame leaked. It looked like a sprinkler! As it had a lot of rust and varnish inside, I decided to have it acid dipped. Not a cheap endeavor, but it cleans it up nice!
I have a welder friend that has done aircraft manufacturing. He was amazed at the precision of the very fine, thin welds and had no idea this level of quality was done in the early sixties. Ron worked on this for about a month. When I picked it up, we ran the hose again. Still leaked! Another month and we were sealed and ready!
At this point I was ready for the CarPlay touch. I am a fan of powder coat and chrome, with a splash of polished aluminum! Resto-mod is the way for me! The two stage powder coating looks better than my pictures could capture. It is a very nice deep copper color. The steel parts were chromed, and the swingarm was polished. I do like my shiny! I wanted more a of a road bike feel for this, so I put the street tread tires on the polished wheels. The tapered wheel bearings were in great shape and I just cleaned and repacked them.