Tracker Bike.

[Biltema]

I’m putting together a 60’s style tracker bike from the parts bin. Does anyone have photo’s of this type of bike, for inspiration.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Paulkentuk]

I seem to recall that they were pretty much 'standard' other than, the mudguards were removed, and the handlebars swapped out for a set of cow horn handlebars.

[Nearholmer]

My youngest bro was into all this in the early 70s, and he and his mates would take a basic single or three-speed with cable brakes, put either tall (ape-hanger) or wide (massive cow horn) bars on them, remove everything “non essential” like racks, lights, chainguards, mudguards etc, and fit knobbly tyres for riding in the woods. I remember the tyres very distinctly, because I used to get the job of fitting them - they were presumably intended for CX, and had prominent, wide-spaced knobs, square in plan, tapering, like pyramids with the tops cut off. They were made from some unbelievably tough, quite shiny, rubber that resembled wellington-boot material, and were as tough as old boots (fittingly).

Not much help, I'm afraid, but I’d love to see one recreated - you’d need to start with an already deeply secondhand bike from c1960, with a shot BB bearing, and knackered cotters on the chainset (I remember forever trying to get those tight, and not having the knowledge or tools to do a decent job!).

They called them ‘scrambers’, rather than ‘trackers’, but it was the same thing.

This is not one of they, but it is my youngest bro at the time, posing a crash on one of the many old bikes we got hold of - this one looks as if it has rod brakes though. I didn’t have a very good camera at the time!

[cycleruk]

I seem to recall that they were pretty much 'standard' other than, the mudguards were removed, and the handlebars swapped out for a set of cow horn handlebars.

More or less the same when I wer'a lad.
Cow horns and preference for a fixed wheel.
No mudguards and probably 26" wheels.

Felt very strange when riding my mates cow horns and then going back to the standard straights on my bike. (Trent Tourist)
They felt very narrow.

[Nearholmer]

Have you read this?

https://stoogecycles.co.uk/2023/08/30/w ... s-of-dirt/

Ferreting through what is on the web, it seems that these bikes were popular in phases, and that they somehow related to cycle speedway. That last phase seems to have been the early/mid 70s, after which came Raleigh Bombers, and then MTB.

[Brucey]

..... - they were presumably intended for CX, and had prominent, wide-spaced knobs, square in plan, tapering, like pyramids with the tops cut off....

IIRC the only knobbly tyres available for a long time were meant for cycle speedway and fitted to 26x1-3/8" (590mm) rims.

[colin54]

There's quite a long thread on the Retrobike Forum with some good pictures and info', here if you haven't seen it
already :-
https://www.retrobike.co.uk/threads/trackers.334891/