Who wants to go 35 MPH on their Bicycle?

Call me overly cautious, but the idea of strapping an engine on my bike and reaching car-like speed never really appealed to me. I had friends though who were real speed demons and saved their money and begged their parents until they finally got an engine like this Bumble Bike one they always sold in the back of comics and magazines.

Here is what I remember about it, it did not deliver on the promised speed and it was so loud that everyone on the block complained to his parents about it. They complained enough that his father got tired of hearing them complain and he took the motor off one night and we never saw it again. I never climbed on his bike to give it a try because at an earlier age I was traumatized in a dirt bike accident and was fearful of anything with a motor, but I don’t think I was missing anything.

Maybe it was hooked up wrong or the technology just wasn’t up to snuff, but in the 1980s, this sort of thing was just 200 bucks worth of sound and fury.