1976 xl250 recycle

oldnbroken

Active Member
6 months ago I bought a pile of broken bike parts that were assembled into something that looked a bit like a motorbike, the compliance plate says it is a 1976 Honda XL 250(exactly what I wanted for nostalgic reasons).

The Plan

As I have never built, re-built or customised a bike before I thought the first thing I should do is get it up and running as something similar to the original and then get it road registered.

The top end was shot and needed line boring as well as a new cam and rockers so I bought another pile of broken parts of the same year and model. Luckily for me the previous owner had started a re-build on the second one and had got as far as line boring, re-bushing and adding a new cam however there was no piston or rockers in it and the bore was bad. All I needed was that lid with the cam. I bought
second hand rockers, new rings and a cam chain. The bore and piston were good on the first motor, just had to find Honda 1mm oversize rings, again I got lucky and found a NOS set in Thailand. So the motor was up and running.

The first thing I did was reassemble it as a no lights dirt bike and took it for a blat in the bush(first time in 20 years and I had a ball)

I then scrounged second hand bits and pieces to get it on the road like a harness and lights etc. That was all fairly cheap as I was not concerned with genuine.

The top photo is a pic of the bike I bought(as pictured on Ebay 4000kms away from me so no test ride, not that a ride was possible anyway)

The one below is as I got it registered(close to original except exhaust and air box)

I road it for a day or two on the road then pulled it apart again to turn it into the finished bike I have in my head.

"Specials" seemed to be the place to put it cause although "Cafe Racer" is the closest genre to what I want in the end it is not quite a cafe racer and it will not be anywhere near a racer.

Jim
 

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Now that I have worked out how to add a photo I will start adding a few.

The seat was important to me, I didn't want a typical cafe type seat and the original seat was out of the question so I got on the tools and made one. I had to make a pan that would give me space underneath for a battery and some electrics. I wanted a low seat but not too low and it had to be comfy under my middle aged arse. I only have a stick welder and don't want to go out and buy a heap of new tools as my shed is already full but with 2mm rods tacking the 1.5mm sheet was okay.

On top of the pan I used 25mm dense foam rubber then covered that with 10mm of a lower density foam. As I don't have a sewing machine I hand stitched boat grade vinyl with some sail thread and grey piping then added the typical Honda logo to the back of the seat using vinyl dye( I want to maintain as many original features as I can and still get a custom)

I would also like to thank the dude who invented those really thin metal cutting disks(refer to last pic)

Jim

Seat pics
 

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signing up for this one, it's gonna be neat.
your seat looks fantastic. you've done upholstery before?? i want one for my 72 RT360!!
 
Thanks for the feedback SMV any feedback positive or negative is appreciated.

I am not a upholsterer but I did do a trial run using the fiberglass pan you can see on the original bike I bought, as the pan was suited to a k0,k1 or k2 (mine is a k3)I swapped the trial with a guy who had a rough seat on his k0 for a few parts. I am very familiar with making 3D objects though and sewing is not hard just time consuming if you are not a gun at it. If you look at the seat compilation pic I added strips of teak to the metal pan so I could staple the vinyl as that made it easier to get all the tension correct rather than hooks. You could use pine but teak is forever and pine rots.

Jim
 
Here is a bit more recycling.

I wanted clip ons for the bike but found many are a tad shorter than I wanted as I still want to maintain a bit of control on the dirt as were I live there is lots of dirt.

I came across the bottom triple clamp off a late 70's DT175 and a mate gave me a set of drag bar that had been sitting unused in his shed for too long. My forks are 35mm and the Yammie triples were 31mm so I chucked them up in a 4 dog chuck and turned 2mm out then cut the drag bars in half and welded the two bits together.

Unfortunately the clamps hit the tank so I ground them down and welded bolts in the opposite direction to the originals and used nuts to clamp them up.

Free recycled clipons, the planet is now a little safer and my wallet is happy.

Jim
 

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i was wondering what the timber was. thanks for the tips.. but i dare say i'll be doing my seat myself. hoping to find a decent upholster somewhere in my neighbourhood. i am still tossing whether to run a battery or not so once that's settled i'll figure out how i want the pan to sit, i think.
if i lived in the States i'd be knocking on your door by now with a cardboard cut out.
 
I am pretty sure you need a battery for rego in NSW, to light the parkers but I am sure most of those postie bikes get through inspections with dead batteries so you may be okay. You would need even longer arms if you were in the USA to knock on my door, even from Syd it would be a bit of a reach as I am in the land of the endless summer, Darwin. If you manage to get a pan made and the foam well cut to shape(a bandsaw with a 6mm fine tooth blade is great) any upholsterer would be fine for the vinyl.

Jim
 
hilarious. i don't bother checking stats of other members anymore since every other time i have- they have been from the States.
i had raised the question in the Australian threads regarding registration without battery. i got mixed responses since the bike doesn't need a compliance plate as it's pre 76 (or what ever the year was)..
i'll have to look into this with RTA.

you can't complain about the heat Jim, it's not very nice working in a cold warehouse down here in sydney. we are all waiting for the warmer days!
 
When I first got the bike up and running with lights it was fine till I got the revs up then the headlamp and tail lamp both burnt. The bike only came with a rectifier, no regulation AC or DC. I bought a 6v AC regulator and A 6v DC reg/rec. I have not run it as only added them to day but my best guess is it should work.

In case it may be helpful I bought the parts off Rex Caunt Racing in the U.K. Rex was very helpful too.

The fit for the reg/rec was easy as it colour matched my original wiring, all I did was add a four way connector to the reg/rec and plug it into the harness replacing the original rectifier.

The first pic is deciding where to put them, the second is T'ing the AC reg into the headlight then the last is the set up finished all under the seat. I put the reg/rec upside down to get airflow across the heat sink.

Jim
 

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I now feel like a fully qualified bracket maker.

Just a few brackets not all of them. The top one is my bracket making tools and materials, a bit of frame off a solar hot water tank perch has done most of the brackets I have needed.

Jim
 

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oldnbroken said:
..................In case it may be helpful I bought the parts off Rex Caunt Racing in the U.K. Rex was very helpful too.....

Of course they are. The lady that handles all the correspondence is Rex's wife and by some coincidence, she's also the mother of one of our own on DTT.
 
Your opinion or advice

I am undecided about where I should mount my rear turn signals. Would there be any reason not to hang them directly off the read mudguard rather than the seat hoop?

Jim
 

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As much as I like the open frame look I didn't want all the mud flying under the seat and into the air pod. Shiny stainless seemed like a fair compromise.

Jim
 

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oldnbroken said:
Your opinion or advice

I am undecided about where I should mount my rear turn signals. Would there be any reason not to hang them directly off the read mudguard rather than the seat hoop?

Jim

For the most part, it would be personal preference. The only reason I could thing of to mount them on the seat is if you are registering it in a strict state that requires they be DOT distance apart, which for CA I believe is 9". You'd have to verify that though.
 
Thanks Seek, I had not even considered a "DOT distance apart" so I went with caution and shoved some brackets on the frame to get them a fair distance apart. I did not check the local rule and just hope they are fair enough(I went with what I liked).

Jim
 

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Thanks Seek, I modeled it in the same simple style that the factory used on the upper shock mounts so it didn't look too out of place.

Jim
 
Cheers E. There are 4 tabs on the stainless that you can see from the wheel side and they are simply screwed onto the frame(two each side) with metal cutting button head screws, I then blacked out the tabs and screws to match the frame.

Jim
 
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