Mr. Sinister
Been Around the Block
So I picked up this little bone stock 81 Suzuki GS450 from a buddy of mine for a song, back in June. The deal was, it belonged to a buddy of his, who has lost interest in it. My buddy had built a few bikes for himself and for others, so he had it at his home shop. The previous owner had removed the carbs to have them rebuilt, and didn't want to pay to get them out of the bike shop that did the job. So, my buddy contacted me, and said if I paid to get the carbs back, the previous owner said I could have the bike.
So yeah, what would you have done? This is what it looked like when I took possession (not my actual bike, but an exact copy):
Anyway, we got to work on it. We were fortunate that the bike was mechanically solid, and a runner when it got parked to have the carbs done. So the first thing we did was to strip all the body parts off, and began cleaning things up. This is as naked as it ever needed to be:
My buddy had a cafe seatpan and a bobbed fender sitting around his shop, so we decided to use the, both. We fixed a few odds and ends, and I set about paining the body parts. I used rattle-can Duplicilor engine black, with Metal Specks Shimmering Green, and cleared it with Engine Clear. I got a roll of gold pin-striping from Pep Boys to trim it out:
So yeah, what would you have done? This is what it looked like when I took possession (not my actual bike, but an exact copy):
Anyway, we got to work on it. We were fortunate that the bike was mechanically solid, and a runner when it got parked to have the carbs done. So the first thing we did was to strip all the body parts off, and began cleaning things up. This is as naked as it ever needed to be:
My buddy had a cafe seatpan and a bobbed fender sitting around his shop, so we decided to use the, both. We fixed a few odds and ends, and I set about paining the body parts. I used rattle-can Duplicilor engine black, with Metal Specks Shimmering Green, and cleared it with Engine Clear. I got a roll of gold pin-striping from Pep Boys to trim it out: