Seat Loop, Part 1

Alright, so the seat loop finally came in. This is a big step for the bike, it brings the full form of the frame together and also integrates the rear signaling devices. I.E. Brake light, Turn Signals, Running light. So, bending steel isn’t really my thing, and while that never stopped me from doing anything in the past, this loop has a fancy little indent that the signal light lays flush in. There is no way I could have achieved that on my own, so I ordered it……From England. Full price for the thing, with the light, and shipping. $80.00. And I got to make a new English buddy who had lots of questions about why we would elect Donald Trump president.

Installation was remarkably straight forward. Cut to desired length, Open up the frame, Cut notches in loop to overlap with frame, apply generous booger welds, Grind grind, grind, grind. Honestly we are not done with the grinding yet, that will be part 2. By the time all is done, there will be some little gussets that come up from the bottom to give it a smoother transition and everything will be brought smooth and level, filled with bondo, and painted. With any luck, it will be indistinguishable from the rest of the frame. My artistic abilities aside, the thing is on there. I picked the bike up by it last night and put my full weight on it without any give. Mom will make a comment right now about strong the weld must be….ya know, because im fat. Anyway, here are abunch of pics and your daily dose of the girls being silly. 

BIIIIIIIIIGGG day for the CX

                  The tank arrived last night. It would be a stretch to call it perfect, there is one minor dent and a chip. I couldn't do a very good job of capturing either. They are simply that minuscule. The paint is great, Ill get some polish and it will be like new. No rust anywhere. It needs a lid, a petcock, and the mounting rubber and it will be ready to roll. I cant believe how much money I was about to spend on far shittier tanks. 110 dollars I ended up paying for this thing. The guy who built my carbs had a buddy down the street who had this lying around. Maroon wasnt my first choice, never would have gone for it if left to my own devices. But this thing is too pretty to repaint and now that its sitting there, I kinda like it.

This box may not look like much, but inside is a set of Mikuni carbs, with custom intakes and afew other magical bit and pieces that are going to make the bike run like new. They are the heart of the machine and I hope they are worth the $550 that was spent on them. Literally more than the bike itself and easily the most expensive component of this machine. Ive spent enough time dicking around with carbs on other projects that I am now of the belief they are not worth fucking around with, I lack the time, patience, and sobriety required to reconstruct a set of carbs. Better to buy new, bolt it on, and be done with shit. A claimed boost of 20HP and 35Ft/LBS of torque may also have played slightly into my decision. 

The Rear Wheel

        Ok, So the rear wheel is finally done. It was somewhat more complicated than it needed to be, and that is entirely my fault. The original rear wheel that came on the bike was 16 inches in diameter. This is not an uncommon size for a street bike, however I was pretty determined from the get-go that this bike was going to sport some knobby tires. After looking at the selection online, I realized that very few offroad tires were offered in a 16inch rim option. Once you got to 17inch and above, a world of options opened up to you, but 16 was basically a nonstarter. So I determined to put a 17 inch wheel on the bike. Well, the CX500 has a fairly unique rear wheel, It has fairly distinctive comstar rims and spokes, and is attached to a very proprietary shaft drive/hub assembly. So after alittle research, i discovered that it was possible to swap the rim and spokes from a 1980 Honda GL1100 directly onto the existing hub, and end up with a perfectly matching, 17inch, comstar rear wheel.
   
     So i ordered a GL1100 wheel off of ebay. It arrived, it was ugly, I had to cut the tire off with a sawzall (massive pain in the ass). The bolts that held everything together were some weird security head, specifically designed to prevent the kind of behavior I was engaging in. Literally every single spoke is engraved with the words "do not disassemble" . Awesome. Lacking an appropriate wrench, I cut through the center of the bolt and nut on the backside, the two halves fell away, and I was able to easily pop the bolt through the backside. The rivets holding the spokes to the rim were pretty straight forward, Center punch, drill, hammer. Eventually everything was disassembled, cleaned, sanded, another pisspoor paint job was applied, and the wheel was reassembled. with new stainless hardware, nylock nuts, and shitloads of red loctite. I stopped short of throwing a spot weld on each nut, but if anything loosens up, that is the next step. Thing looks pretty straight, I cant really tell, Tire is alittle small presently but I can step that up later. One step closer to a real live motorcycle. Next project, weld seat loop on the rear and paint the engine.

Burning up a Friday

     Well, it looks like my last post was sometime back in 2015. Shortly after that, I had a child. So not alot of progress on the motorcycle, and not alot of updates. But now things have calmed down abit and we can get back to our regularly scheduled updates. Annika is alot of help in the garage.

     The CX has made some progress lately. Had the front brake rotor drilled/vented by my machinist buddy Brad. He did a much better job with a proper drill press than I would have done, half wasted free-handing a Dewalt.

    This is purely an asthetic upgrade, but for a case of beer (of which i drank half) I think it was more than worth it.

    Also finished painting the front wheel, I did an awful job, but you cant tell from the pictures so i dont care. Also got some new rubber for the wheel. It is a Shinko 241. Got it for Xmas. Rebuilt the forks using the seal kit I mentioned acouple years ago, also recently rebuilt the brake caliper. The front end is taking shape rather nicely.

       This winter I also took the time to take the heads off this thing and do a general inspection of the inner workings of the motor. Things seems to be tip top in every regard. Very Clean and very low miles. I dont have any pictures but it looks great.
        Next up on the todo list, purchase seat loop and weld together, acquire GL1100 wheel and bastardize the thing to get my rim size up to 17'', and register the bike in Vermont. Regarding the later point, the logic can be explained here in great detail.
   
I said i would keep score of costs on this thing. So lets see where we stand.
Bike - $400
Spray paint/sand paper/wire wheels - $100
Front tire - X-mas Present Fork Rebuild Kit - $20
Brake Caliper Rebuid Kit - Xmas Present
Rotor Venting - $20 worth of Budweiser minus half that i drank
Ignitech ignition module - $134
Gasket Kit - Xmas Present

    Also, Christi has started to get on board with the CX. She has been caught throwing a leg over it and going "vroom vroom" more than once.