1972 CL350 "Scrambler" project

[ISMarco]

I picked up a fun little bike, from a guy's collection. It had been sitting for a long time, so it took some work to get it running, but so far I've been enjoying my first motorcycle very much!

But, it is in my nature to ruin good things in the name of "improvement" and "upgrades." The plan is to have a fun little commuter that can do some mild off-road adventuring.

So here goes the construction of my contraption -- it is my first motorcycle project, so go easy, and feel free to give me advice.


Unloading it after purchase


Oohhh.... pretty!


Put some Renthals on it and visited FGKouki down the street


Put some rearsets on it and welded on a CBR kickstand further up so I could shift without accidentally touching the stand end


Went on some adventures


Did some more fun stuff


Took it apart


Cut some stuff


Shaved some stuff


Tried to weld some stuff


Mocked some stuff up


Smoothed some stuff

And that's it for now. Going to keep smoothing some stuff tonight

[sphynx88]

Looking great so far! Cant wait to see where it goes.

[BarnBurner]

Looks cool so far. I have a CL and thought about a rear hoop but didn't like the idea of blending round bar with the stamped frame. Your flat hoop looks great though!

[Jacob Agaetis]

This was my first bike. Same color and year. I'll be watching this closely.

[teddpage]

Wowzas.  That bike looked way to clean to tear apart like that!  But like Von says, they made a million of em...cut it up. 
Cant wait to see how the finished product looks.

[ISMarco]

Thanks guys. I also had doubts about round + stamped frame. I kind of wish I had pictures of my first hoop attempt, it was a severe failure haha.

I had some reservations about chopping the CL up, but there are a ton of them around. I've been around enough old projects to realize it's best to start with a clean, complete base if possible, so I waited for a nice bike to come up before I jumped the gun haha.

[ISMarco]

Got together with FGKouki today and did some fun melty plastic things.


Made a magic schoolbus toy


Used it to form a plastic battery tray


Mocked it up

It kind of messed up, and is too thin, so I'm going to try for battery tray V2 with thicker ABS.

[L4NE4]

Wow thats cool.  Whats the process?

[AzHonda]

I ride one of these myself (73). Looking good so far. The rear hoop looks like it belongs.

[ISMarco]

The basic idea is to make a male and female "mold", heat up the plastic in an oven, and "stretch" it into the right shape. This was my first time seeing it, it was crazy. FGKouki uses it a lot to make headlight lenses and such though.

AzHonda I like the white/brown color scheme on your avatar bike!

[ISMarco]

Did seat things today


Cardboard


Aluminum


Foam


Finished

[L4NE4]

did you do the cover yourself?

[AzHonda]

Love that seat!!

[BarnBurner]

Rad seat. How'd you attach the vinyl to the aluminum?

[ISMarco]

I amateur upholstered using a sandwich of aluminum, foam, then leather. I just stretched the leather over the foam down to the aluminum then riveted it every 1/2" or so, and heated it up to get it smoother. Lots of hole drilling but it was worth it haha!


Did some fender things today


It's almost a bicycle again! I'll have to take it down again to powdercoat the frame though.


I've also started drawing out the headlight area. Getting the look I want is taking a lot more thought than I expected, but it should be interesting