Long overdue

A long overdue update....

I was in a fairly minor motorcycle accident in February, but the bike and I are now reassembled.....well, mostly.

The damage to my daily rider caused the CJ to take a back burner while I got my primary two-wheeled transportation back in order. The engine case was damaged, along with the usual suspects of handlebars, gas tank, rear cowl, turn signal, etc. It took a while, but it's almost completely done, and looks better than ever. However, this site is about my Honda and I doubt anyone's paying attention anyways. Drop me a comment if you'd like to see some pics of the GS.

I'm looking forward to getting back to work on the 360, and will begin posting updates again within the next couple weeks.

Finally.....

I've had an interesting couple of days. I made a new friend who happens to be a fabricator. He has opened up his shop to me in exchange for some technical help for his business. I'm going to make him a basic website and help him get it all up and running and make sure his data is secure. How he's been doing this for so long without keeping up with the times is beyond me, but he must be good at what he does because he's off to Egypt for a job in a couple of weeks.

His shop is roughly 10,000 square feet and it's pretty much all metal working equipment. In some places it's a bit hard to walk. Messy for sure, but I imagine one could make a lot of cool stuff in here.

Back to the bike.

My welder buddy was able to find time to come by this weekend and give me some tips....Well, he makes paper now, but he was a welder up until a couple years ago.

Along with the HF welder I recently picked up, I've trying my best to get all the necessary accoutrements as well. One of those items was a spool of Lincoln wire as opposed to the factory supplied flux core spool. A lot of the online reviews mentioned less spatter with the Lincoln wire. However, Aaron and I agreed early on that since we were just practicing, and I'm just learning, we'd start off with the cheapy factory supplied spool. I also picked up some scrap steel from the local hardware store, as well as a helmet, some gloves, an apron, various types of clamps and magnetic holders, seamers, etc. Aaron is a kickass person and brought two of everything as well.

We first cut some strips from an approximately 2' x 2' sheet of flat steel and cut those into sections about six inches long. Then Aaron dialed in the welder by tack welding the strips into essentially six inch long T-bars. Aaron commented on how easy the machine was to get up and running and dialed in.

As I'm in the process of rebuilding the front forks on my GS, rather than pay $70 for Suzuki's dampening rod tool, I picked up a 1/2" steel rod about 2' long and we figured that would be the first thing we welded. We cut five inches off one end and welded it on as a T-handle. On the other end we welded a nut. Aaron did all the work on it while I watched. He wasn't really going for a nice weld on it, but was more interested in having me understand the sound I was looking for. Bacon-esque. I'm pretty stoked that I can actually make something useful from some scrap metal and the stuff in my garage.

Fork tool.

He then did a couple quick passes on a piece of our T-bar to not only show me what I'm shooting for, but also to see the quality of welds from this fine $99 piece of HF dreaminess.

He wasn't tooting his own horn or anything, in fact he pointed out some mistakes like the porosity on the left side and what not, but overall he was pretty impressed with the quality of weld from such a value priced welder. We only attempted to clean up the slag and "dingleberries" on the right side of the piece, to get an idea of what it could look like, otherwise we just took the wirebrush to the welds to get a look.

I did a short pass or two on some other pieces with him watching and pointing things out to me, but then both of our "dad" responsibilities called us away and I put everything away for the day. I was able to sneak in the garage a bit later and clean up some of the mess Aaron and I made, and made a few more quick welds.

I know they're terrible....trust me.....I know. I'll keep practicing, though, and hopefully sooner or later they won't look half bad. I won't be doing anything on the bike until I'm confident in my skills. I'll get there.

Didn't get any welding done yesterday. A shitstorm of things came up on my end and I just didn't have time. On the bright side, I replaced the coil in my Subaru Forester and she's now back on the road. $120 parts and $0 labor is nice. Fork seals came in for the Suzuki, also. I hope to get that taken care of later this week when the rain comes back 'round.

Just started seeing some ads for a vintage and custom bike show in Portland. I'll definitely be checking that out.

"The One" Motorcycle Show

2011

It's hard for me to believe another year has passed. My kids continue to get bigger and I continue to well......Swell.

Tomorrow morning a friend of mine is coming over to give me a crash course in welding. I've been holding off on starting until this, but have been watching some videos and doing some reading. I'm really looking forward to it. Also, since I had never tried my hand at polishing, and plan to do a lot on my CJ, I thought I'd try my start with the engine covers of the Suzuki. I wasn't really sure how well it would work out, and the Suzuki is my rider, so I started simple by wet sanding with 2000 grit and using some Autosol metal polish. It brought it back to what I'd call "close" to factory finish. I'm quite pleased with the results and feel better about doing it on the Pariah. I'm going to work on removing the engine covers tonight and will start polishing this week.

This is the before....

First cover done....can't stop now.....

A vast improvement.

A couple of them really need replacing, but they'll do for now. I'm starting to think that bike needs its own blog. But, hey, it's my blog. I'll do with it what I please.

New grips and mirrors. Engine covers polished.

Fork seals and head cover gasket are in the works for this one. After that, paint for the engine and tins and she's done.

School's In Session

Time to learn how to weld.....

Tentative good news

Recently I asked an old friend of mine who used to weld for a living about helping me with my project. He was able to stop by last night to talk about the bike. As it turns, he is not only willing to show me how to weld, but excited to do so, since he's no longer doing it as a profession and misses it (damn economy). It also turns out he's got an old Yamaha 400 sitting in his yard that he's been considering trying to put back on the road.

In return for his help, I've offered up my garage, my tools and my limited knowledge to help him get his Yamaha back on the road. It was a daily rider a couple years ago, and it's complete, so it shouldn't be too bad.

After talking with him, I feel confident I'll be ready to send my frame out for powder in about a month or so.

It's Better In The Wind

Here we go again

Okay. I have the next round of purchases figured out. To be bought with the next paycheck are:

1. Harbor Freight welder, some wire and some practice materials.
   
2. A used scroll saw and some extra blades.
   
3. Carb rebuild kits and spark plugs for the GS.
4. Sisal and Canton buffing wheels.
5. Chemical gloves
6. 09913-14511 (Fuel gauge set for float adjustments)
7. 09900-20803 (tappet gauge)
8. Suzuki fork oil #15
9. Fork dust and oil seals
10. Head cover gasket
11. Breather cover gasket
12. Gasket sealant
    
13. New grips
14. Oh yeah.....and a space heater

Once I've got all that in my hands, I can get to the fun stuff--

On the Pariah:

1. Break down the front and rear wheels.
2. Break down front forks.
3. Remove engine side covers.
   
4. Start polishing bits.
5. Teach myself how to weld.

On the GS (No name yet):

1. Drain and pull the gas tank.
   
2. Check air filters. If they're not factory, replace them with factory (may involve ordering airbox).
3. Tune up (Rebuild the carbs and inspect boots, replace spark plugs, change oil filter along with primary, secondary and final drive oil, flush brake fluid).
4. Replace head cover and breather cover gaskets.
   
5. Mask off everything but the engine.
6. Paint the case, cylinders and heads black.
7. Polish side covers.
8. Sand outside of cooling fins.
9. Rebuild front forks.
10. Replace mirrors and grips.
11. Check valve clearances.
    

All this should be starting sometime between the twentieth and Christmas.

To hell with it....

.....I'm buying a welder and teaching myself. That shouldn't take hardly any time at all....

Hopefully I'll finish the bike some time in 2011. I'm no longer looking at a spring finish. It's possible, but highly unlikely. Thank fucking Christ for the GS. I'd go nuts with absolutely nothing to ride in the spring.

Fuckity fuck fuck fuck.

Well, sadly I have nothing new to report, aside from the fact that there is nothing new to report. I've been waiting on my wife's dad for the welding portions, as I'm not setup to weld. He's become very busy with other projects and hasn't had any time. Subsequently, I'm looking for a local welder to help me out, but I also want to learn some things, so yeah....it may take a couple of weeks to find someone.

On the bright side, I picked up an '82 GS1100 in good shape last week. I've already put 150 miles on it and it's fantastic. Power for days, smooth delivery and it's comfortable to ride. In short, I like it. I'd still like to get something more modern, and perhaps with a warranty, but for now this will do.

How it looked when I got it.

Holy Windshield, Batman!

Removed the windshield and replaced the handlebars with some euro superbike bars I had. This is how she sits now. I've since also removed the grab bar.




Almost a proper man-cave.

Appetizer

After hours of grinding, everything is finally smoothed out now. Some time in the next few days, I'll take the bike over to the FIL's for welding and fabrication of some bits. After quite a few hours of cutting and grinding, I was starting to feel a little bummed about not being able to see a lot in the way of results, so I decided to take a look at those new clip ons and rear sets on the bike.

As I'm not set up to weld, I cut some pieces of wood to length then drilled two small holes in each (for some wire) and one larger hole in each (for the rear sets). I ran some wire through the wood then attached the wood to the frame with the rearsets already mounted to get an idea of how everything will look.

I like.


Notes: I'll have to modify the steering stops a bit. The bare clip-ons do not make contact with the tank, but the controls will. I've a couple ideas on how to do this already. I'll discuss them with Don (the FIL). Also, the top of the tree needs something. It either needs those useless tabs ground off, or it needs some type of plate over them. I already planned on running the neutral and signal indicators in the risers holes, but some type of plate could be added into that plan quite easily.


A quick idea, but more of a jumping off point.....


Could add some sections of rubber tubing as spacers, or could bend the plate. Not sure how to handle yet.

Going to fab some type of mount that will hold the ignition under the tank using the horn mounts, and will mount the horn elsewhere - perhaps under the back of the headlight bucket?

Bike porn v2.0

Thanks, Roc City.

In the near future....

1. Finish grinding the frame smooth.
2. Seat pan (Try and save/modify the old one or make new one)
3. Fab mounting plates for the rear sets
4. Fab battery box above swingarm and tray under seat for electrics.
5. Mockup
   
6. Disassemble triple tree
7. Disassemble wheels
8. Soda blast small parts
9. Get everything ready for powder

That should do it for the next couple of weeks. Updates will be posted in the mean time.

Pipeburn

Did a bit more grinding on the frame this weekend, but had a lot going on so I didn't accomplish as much as I'd like.

Since I don't have anything worth while, check out Pipeburn.

Pseudo-update

Squeezed in another few hours on the bike today......

All the desired tabs have been removed from the frame, and I'm about 50% done grinding everything smooth. So, yeah, pretty much the same as yesterday.

Don't forget to check out the new Tarozzis.

Weight loss...

Already a vast improvement...

Bike porn.....

Obligatory frame grinding pics

First time using an angle grinder.......I dig it.

The Silence of the Swingarms

I finally removed the swingarm bushings.

I had to cut a couple (well, to be honest, a few) relief lines down the length of the bushings, using a micro hacksaw. The key here is to cut all the way through the bushings without cutting into the swingarm itself. To do this, I would run the end of a straightened paper clip down the length of the cuts. I could feel from the pressure on the paper clip what sections required more sawing and what sections were cut through to the swingarm. After two lines were adequately cut in each bushing, I removed the sections between them. Then, the bushings were flexible enough to compress, and could be tapped out from the opposite side of the tube using a punch and mallet.


Tools of the trade -

In other news, I recently picked up a 20 gallon, 4hp air compressor (used off CL) as well as some new power tools; A DeWalt angle grinder and Harbor Freight (cheapy) sawzall.


I've already started cutting the frame. With any luck, and a bit of determination, updates will start coming more frequently now.

So, in the interest of updating, here is what I've been up to for the last week.

I've ordered my rear sets, clip-ons, and some stock CB360 headers (just in case my ideal exhaust situation doesn't pan out). I picked up the last of my needed polishing supplies, and have also purchased an air compressor, some air hose, and some attachments, and will be rigging up a home soda blasting setup.

I STILL have not gotten my swingarm bushings out. I've cut the relief sections in the bushings, but can't seem to get them out to compress the plastic. I'm certain that if I saw any deeper, I'll be going into the swingarm. But, alas, I also picked up a punch, the end of which I will wrap with a bit of electrical tape (so as not to gouge the swingarm) that I hope will get them out.

When I get home today, I'm going to get my new compressor set up and start gearing up to do some soda blasting. And some polishing. Lots of polishing. Exciting times ahead for me.

In the mean time, here is a very rough mock up (I don't have Photoshop) of some of the changes I hope to make on the bike. This shows what a shortened seat pan, clip-ons and battery relocation could look like.

Updatelet

Update: Unfortunately there's not a lot to tell. A lot of my spare time recently has been spent organizing my garage, getting my work space set up, and cleaning/polishing nuts, bolts and etc.

In order to fully break down the swingarm, I had to buy a hacksaw, to cut a section out of each of the swingarm bushings. With any luck, this will make them easier to remove. I'm still trying to work out how to remove the rear suspension bushings. Plus side - At least I got the swingarm collar out.

I'll be ordering my clip-ons and rear sets in just a couple of days. Their arrival will presumably bring more and better updates.

I was also able to get the covering off my seat, and the foam removed from the seat pan. What I found was fairly disappointing.

First, it's fairly rusted. Also, it appears that the previous owner affixed the old cover by snagging it over metal spikes that were poked out using an old can opener. It could be factory, but I have a hard time believing that.


The question for the seat pan has become, as asked by the Clash, should it stay or should it go now? That rust seems problematic.






Next on the plate:

1. Get bushings out of swingarm.
2. Order Clip-ons and rear sets.
3. Make seat pan decision.
   
4. Mock up.
   
5. Get triple tree disassembled.
6. Chop and grind frame down.
7. Sandblast frame, wheels, swingarm, rotors, triple tree.
8. Get crank case covers off the engine.
9. Learn how to use all this polishing shit.
   
10. Get a new, smaller battery and build a box.
    
11. Rebuild front forks.
12. Get a space heater for the garage.

That should just about cover it until I get some more scratch.

Down time

Not much going on with the bike at the moment. I can't pick up any new parts for about another week, so I've just been picking up things I need for cleaning and polishing. I bought an angle grinder, but then had to return it when I read in the manual that it wasn't rated to cut metal. Might have been cool for the employee to tell me that when I bought it - along with ten cutting discs. I'll pick up a replacement for it today.

HD Theater began airing Cafe Racer last night. I was only able to get the first of two episodes watched last night, but it was great. Awesome to see the pics and footage from the old Ace Cafe.

Met a cool guy on a BSA Lightning Bolt last night after work. He ran out of gas alongside the highway, so I hooked him up with a gallon of super to get him home. I could see that he was wearing an Ace Cafe jacket, and he was about to start pushing his bike along the highway. Turns out he's a member of Oregon Vintage Motorcyclists, a group I've had lunch with and am thinking of joining. Hell of a guy. Hope to talk to him again in the future.

Anyways, to add some beauty to the page, this is similar to what he was riding.

Disassembled.

Everything is disassembled. Well, as much as it can be right now. I have to mock up the tank, clip-ons, seat pan and (separately) the rear cowl, before going any further.

In the ten days or so before I can order my clip-ons and rear sets, I should be able to get some cleaning in on some of the bits, but I'm going to hold off on rebuilding the forks or wheels or anything until after the mock-up. Plenty of time.

I also have to give my father-in-law some warning that his welding, fab and paint services will be needed soon.