Picked this up today…
- Thread starter DaddyJohn
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your correct, except for the MTD part. They had nothing to do with that bike other then getting the western auto contract and replacing it with a smaller sized bike in like 1971. It was made by General Appliance which was the maker of trail horse bikes. "Wizard ss300" was the western auto name, early off the line correct engine was a Briggs 3hp, but most survivors have showed up with the Tecumseh H30's on them. I think WA wanted briggs due to what they sold on the wizard line of lawn equipment, but briggs really did not want their engines one MB's and did not want to supply them to bike manufactuers so that ended quickly.
Thanks Markus, not sure why MTD popped into my head. I’ll probably end-up putting a Briggs 5hp I have, or a Tecumseh HS50 on it. I don’t usually use Briggs, but I got a great deal on a Montgomery Ward snowblower so equipped…
I’ve also got this mini that I built that is highly similar, but different in minor ways. The crummy Azusa wheels were on it when I got it…. What would you say its model is?
I’ve also got this mini that I built that is highly similar, but different in minor ways. The crummy Azusa wheels were on it when I got it…. What would you say its model is?
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Your orange bike is the Western Flyer SS-300 as far as I can tell. Markus had a post about his https://oldminibikes.com/forum/index.php?threads/western-flyer-ss-300.68865/
That is the MTD made version of the western auto "ss300" that they used when they switched mini bike manufacturers from General appliance made bike you just purchased, as explained in my post above. They have a similar frame shape, but pretty much ends there. since you own both roll them up next to each other and see they are not really alike. The MTD was a much shorter bike, smaller tubing, had some pretty cool provisions built into them Like an easy adjust chain/engine pressed tabs to lock the headbolt in place etc.. Well built little bike except for the long and not well supported headtube/bolt.
There’s definitely tons of minor differences. Even without rolling them side by side, you can see differences in bracketry, etc. Totally makes sense if Western Auto had to change suppliers for whatever reason, but wanted a highly similar bike to what was already working for them. From what I can tell, it looks like the MTD version might have been cheaper to manufacture…