My uncle picked up this bike last summer and he gave it to me as payment for the work I do around his shop for him. The bike was 350.00 and is complete but in very rough shape. I spent my nights after work getting the thing running and waiting on parts to make it ridable, then winter hit and it sat for a few months. Now I'm on spring break and the weather is getting nice so this is what I'm doing with my time off.
It has been a major pain getting the Keihin carbs dialed in so I finally said forget it and ordered a Mikuni conversion kit off eBay. The auction said 3 day USPS priority mail but they shipped it UPS ground. Apparently when they said 3 day shipping they meant 7. Normally I would not care but that means the carbs won't arrive until after break ends, not much I can do about it now.
My inspiration here has been from Chris' bike. I have never liked all the extra shit people tack on to their bikes (luggage racks, fairings, blinkers, fenders, etc.) so just cutting it all off seems like the sensible thing to do. The main goal in this project is to do as much of the work myself as I possibly can. Anyone can go buy a bike and ride it but I want to be able to say I made the bike myself.
With the build it myself plan in mind I started thinking about how I could get this done. My uncle is an experienced machinist, as is my grandfather, they are always willing to help with projects so any major fabrication would be no problem with their help. I decided I wanted to make my own seat, my mom and sister are really into crafts and have been very helpful there. My mom has volunteered to help make the seat cover and my sister has made a mold of the seat we can use to lay fiberglass. It became clear pretty fast that I had all the resources I needed to get this done so I skipped the last two days of class and came home early to start the project.
I am now 4 days in and have the bike completely torn down. Today I pulled the engine out of the bike and pulled the front end apart with the help of my sisters boyfriend. I talked to the high school machine shop instructor and he will build me a starter cover and any other small parts I need. If I can find a good headlight I will have him make brackets for it. I am also going to draw up some plans for clip ons and have him fabricate those as well. I wish I had the resources to make them myself but I don't. Since I don't have a set of clip ons or clubmans I cut the crossbar off my existing bars and flipped them over. They fit surprisingly well but there are holes on the (now) top which I need to fill in.
Tomorrow will be spent mostly on cleaning the frame and engine and prepping the frame for paint. I have the tank nearly stripped with just some small spots to finish, then I can start paint on that as well. Hopefully by tomorrow night my frame and tank will be painted. I also need to extend my pipes a bit, I got a bit trigger happy with the hacksaw on them and need to extend one so they are roughly the same length. Then black paint and exhaust wrap will finish those off.
I don't have tons of pictures but there are some decent before shots of the bike.
Here is the before shot
This is the bike 2 days later
And this is the bike (frame) today
Here are the rearsets in progress
The fork tubes are in really rough shape, hopefully I can clean them up, otherwise I will be robbing parts from my uncle.
So there it is so far. I gave myself 11 days to get this done and after 4 I am up to my eyeballs in it. I think I will be able to finish this in time actually but the carbs will arrive late. Hopefully by this time next week I will be riding. So what do you think, am I crazy or is it possible to build a cafe racer in 11 days?
It has been a major pain getting the Keihin carbs dialed in so I finally said forget it and ordered a Mikuni conversion kit off eBay. The auction said 3 day USPS priority mail but they shipped it UPS ground. Apparently when they said 3 day shipping they meant 7. Normally I would not care but that means the carbs won't arrive until after break ends, not much I can do about it now.
My inspiration here has been from Chris' bike. I have never liked all the extra shit people tack on to their bikes (luggage racks, fairings, blinkers, fenders, etc.) so just cutting it all off seems like the sensible thing to do. The main goal in this project is to do as much of the work myself as I possibly can. Anyone can go buy a bike and ride it but I want to be able to say I made the bike myself.
With the build it myself plan in mind I started thinking about how I could get this done. My uncle is an experienced machinist, as is my grandfather, they are always willing to help with projects so any major fabrication would be no problem with their help. I decided I wanted to make my own seat, my mom and sister are really into crafts and have been very helpful there. My mom has volunteered to help make the seat cover and my sister has made a mold of the seat we can use to lay fiberglass. It became clear pretty fast that I had all the resources I needed to get this done so I skipped the last two days of class and came home early to start the project.
I am now 4 days in and have the bike completely torn down. Today I pulled the engine out of the bike and pulled the front end apart with the help of my sisters boyfriend. I talked to the high school machine shop instructor and he will build me a starter cover and any other small parts I need. If I can find a good headlight I will have him make brackets for it. I am also going to draw up some plans for clip ons and have him fabricate those as well. I wish I had the resources to make them myself but I don't. Since I don't have a set of clip ons or clubmans I cut the crossbar off my existing bars and flipped them over. They fit surprisingly well but there are holes on the (now) top which I need to fill in.
Tomorrow will be spent mostly on cleaning the frame and engine and prepping the frame for paint. I have the tank nearly stripped with just some small spots to finish, then I can start paint on that as well. Hopefully by tomorrow night my frame and tank will be painted. I also need to extend my pipes a bit, I got a bit trigger happy with the hacksaw on them and need to extend one so they are roughly the same length. Then black paint and exhaust wrap will finish those off.
I don't have tons of pictures but there are some decent before shots of the bike.
Here is the before shot
This is the bike 2 days later
And this is the bike (frame) today
Here are the rearsets in progress
The fork tubes are in really rough shape, hopefully I can clean them up, otherwise I will be robbing parts from my uncle.
So there it is so far. I gave myself 11 days to get this done and after 4 I am up to my eyeballs in it. I think I will be able to finish this in time actually but the carbs will arrive late. Hopefully by this time next week I will be riding. So what do you think, am I crazy or is it possible to build a cafe racer in 11 days?