orange air-o pics and info needed

[zetecmk2]

hi people in my computer, at work we are painting an orange air-o, but the frame has an alloy checker plate gusset welded at the bb/chainstay , and a checkerplate bashguard welded to the bottom of the downtube, the welds are not as neat as the rest of the frame. can anybody shed any light on these frames? google image is full of chocolate bars.......pages and pages until i gave up! looks like a ms-isle with a round down tube. i'll get pics up tomorrow,when the air in the booth clears
any help appreciated, cheers, glen

 

[secret_squirrel]

Pics in this thread any good?

http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=165720&highlight=airo

 

[zetecmk2]

exactly what i wanted to see....cheers
no checkerplate on that one!! :shock:
any body know what this bike was intended for?, frame spec etc?
this one looks like it spent some time as a trials frame.......and lite it ain't!!

 

[brocklanders023]

Check this out

http://www.retrobike.co.uk/gallery2/d/3 ... 04b598efa6

 

[Barneyballbags]

The Air-O was a slightly less burly alternative to the MsIsle. It had the same box section rear end as the MsIsle, mated to a regular round tubed front triangle. It was designed as a long travel (at the time) hardtail and was designed for forks with around 100mm of travel. It has a slack head angle as standard.

I had an acid green one (built by Chris Akrigg no less!), built with XT running gear, Magura Tomac hydraulics and Bomber Z1s. It was ace

 

[zetecmk2]

3mm downtube :shock: that explains the weight then!
so the alloy gussets welded to this frame are an addition.
i think we're going urban camo with this.........we'll see!

 

[zetecmk2]

the black was a bit overthinned, i'll re-do it next weekend!

 

[zetecmk2]

 

[zetecmk2]

nearly finished

 

[mr_skinny]

I'm still riding my AirO, and as the name suggests it likes to spend more time in the air than on the ground! Too heavy for trials, too fat for hill climbs, too stiff for long rides - it's a jump bike and it does it well. Bought mine in '99/'00 and still going strong...I had Orange F9 rigid forks initially but it's a much better ride with bounce up front. currently running 130mm RC40s up front and handles really well.