Back to the Project

It's been a while since I did anything to the cafe racer but when I got home from work on Friday, there was a box on the steps. I did a little bit of work on it Friday night but not much. Too tired. Most of the work happened today. Thing hardly looks like a motorcycle at all here. 

One of the things I ordered was a set of gauges. For a while I looked into taking the stock gauges apart, rebuilding them, installing more modern faces, and upgrading to led lighting but that's a lot of work and the gauges would still be...huge. I went back and forth between these 2.5" units and some 1.9" ones. Chrome or black? I ended up going with the 2.5" model and, obviously...black.

A while ago I made a bracket to mount the ignition to. It worked with the larger gauges but with the smaller ones, it was too busy. So I made another one that is fairly well hidden. I wanted the ignition to look like it was floating. I also wanted the ignition to sit down lower and be a third sphere. It's easier to see the ignition now that the huge gauges aren't the focal point.

Much better. I got everything mounted up and then wired the gauges. The tach is easy as it only has 2 wires for the backlighting. The speedo has the same and then a + and - for each of the four led lights (hi beam, turn signals, oil pressure, and neutral). Everything seemed fine here. I don't have turn signals yet so that wire gets capped off. Hi beam is connected but I'm still wrestling with some other wiring so I don't know for sure if that's done correctly. Oil and neutral should be wired correctly but I can't start the motor either and I don't know if that makes a difference (pretty sure on the CB's the idiot light only comes on in the event of low pressure as opposed to most cars that come on with the key).

Next up was wiring in this switch. The previous owner had this bike stripped pretty well. I need/want to have enough stuff on it to keep the police at bay. So I installed a horn, and then started installing this left side control. It has the ability to run turn signals, headlights (hi and low), horn, and kill switch. Initially I was going to drill the bars and run the harness through them to hide things but the harness is damn big and I didn't like the idea of having that big of a hole in the bar. Twice. I did have to shim the bar with some tape to make the switch tight but that was easy.

This...has not been easy. Or fun. In fact...it sucks. Remember...I'm dealing with a 550 frame. 500 motor. I think a 550 harness but Im not sure (I've found a few wires that are colored such that they don't show up on schematics at all). I also don't know if the previous owner wired things the right way to begin with. I'm close to having this done but...it's not done. I've got some calls into some friends in the CB community so hopefully I'll have this squared away in a jiffy here. Stay tuned.

Birthday Cafe

So today I am 41. I don't feel 41 at all. In fact...I feel closer to 60. 

Today was gorgeous up here and my big day had a lot going on. I'm pretty sure I have an ulcer right now so I'm laying off coffee (which is a real bitch) as well as beer (although I have had some beer today but...it's my birthday). I've also been taking Zantac for about a week now and feel much better. After some morning Chai, I went down to the garage. It's so great to work on the motorcycle with the doors open. Since I don't really have a ton to do right now, I decided to look at some of the wiring harness. I've been thinking about doing this for a while now but I've had bigger things to do. I'm glad I did it today. This was the first thing I found. 

Then I found quite a few more questionable splices. I also found 2 wires that were just cut and left hanging.

I got this cleaned up, put back together and hooked up the battery tender. Heather and I took the pups for a walk and then went to watch the new Mark Wahlberg movie Lone Survivor. If you like military type movies, I highly recommend it.  We had some BBQ for dinner and then came home to relax.

I've been thinking about making a workbench for the motorcycle project and I'll probably start on that tomorrow. It's a real pain to bend over and work on stuff for a few hours. Stay tuned. 

All the Latest Cafe News

There really has not been much going on with the cafe project here lately. I'll post what little news I have in order to keep some (Dan) folks happy nonetheless. It should not come as a surprise that I was not happy with how the body work on the tank turned out. Looking back...this was not a good first project for someone new to body work because of the convex and concave areas of the tank and the need for everything to match all the way around. People that saw it in person thought it looked great but being the perfectionist that I am I just couldn't stop finding imperfections that would only stand out more when painted. It was when I began talking about painting the knee dents in flat black that I knew I had to walk away from things for a while. I just think that (at times) flat black says, "I gave up." I have an active thread on the single overhead cam forum about this build and I told those guys that I was going to step back for a while. A few hours later I received a message from one of the guys that had been providing me with a ton of help/advice. Many of the guys that are into these older Hondas just really want to see them keep going and they are willing to offer way more help than members of any other forum that I have been a part of. I have received more advice and hard to find parts from these folks. All for free with the only requests being that I pay it forward and post pics of the project as it moves on. Anyways...this guy asks if he can do me a favor and take the tank back to bare metal, work the metal a bit more, TIG weld the holes again, remove the areas where the badges mounted and TIG those up, reapply filler, sand it all out, prime it and ship it back to me ready to paint. Again...for free and he was insulted when I offered to send him some money. So the tank is in Virginia right now (arrived yesterday) and he will have it for a bit. This guy has built some amazing cafes and other styles and he does really nice body work so I'm excited. 

The next piece of the puzzle was to try and find a replacement side cover for the one that was cracked beyond repair. As I started looking more closely at these I realized that I had a 550 left side cover (the trashed one) and a 500 right side cover. I prefer the look of the 500 covers so I went on the prowl for one. I called in a ton of favors but was not able to find one as these are very rare to stumble upon and many are cracked and in need of repair. They do make aftermarket replacements but I thought it would be cool to have originals so I looked hard. I was finally able to find one in Alabama with no cracks. I bought it for $40. Both of my covers would now need sanding and prep and I would fill in the badge holes with body filler and get them ready for paint. Well I was excited when the new cover got here and went to put it on the bike. The damn thing cracked. The 40 year old plastic is simply too brittle so I'll fix the broken one and then sell them both off and buy newer replicas. 

These gauges will be here soon and I think they will go nicely with the bikes thinner look now. Stock gauges are 4" and these replacements are 2.5". I did consider opening up the stockers, and replacing the green faces with something black, upgrading the horrible lighting to led, and rebuilding the internal gears but it's a lot of work and the inside looks like a watch. I wasn't sure if the size of them would still bother me after all that effort. It probably would. So I'll sell the stockers and almost pay for the new ones. The speedo has nice led's mounted in it for warning lights too so I won't have to mess with that. I will have to make a new mount for the ignition switch but that's fine as I'll also get rid of the start switch that I have there because I also have a left side control that will be going on so I can have a horn, start/kill switch, an option to run turn sigs (which I eventually will), as well as a hi/lo for the headlights. I'll probably also drill the handlebars out when installing this stuff and run all the wiring from the switch through the bars to make it look anal boy friendly.  

This is the new tach. Not much to say about this but it'll be so much cleaner and minimal.

This is horrible picture of the tail light that will be here soon. It's small but, more importantly, it can pivot up and down. All the others I have looked at just mount on the fender but since I bobbed the fender a bit (and may go even shorter) I need it to adjust for the right angle. It's kind of bullet shaped. I really wanted to find a light off a 32 Ford but the style was just too different and more appropriate for a Bobber/Rat build.

I did get around to making a few adjustments to the plate mount. I bent it up a bit more because I kept looking at the lines of the back end and wondered if it would look better. I'll get a profile shot of the bike because it's easier that way. I also added this little 1" by 1" tab to the outside of it that sits up tight against the swing arm. Only one bolt holds this thing on and I didn't want the entire thing going into the spokes in the event that one bolt came loose. This tab will keep things safe if that happens. I also recently found out that my plate mount is illegal. The plate is not horizontally mounted, it's bent, and it's less than 12" off the ground. So that's 3 strikes. For a few seconds I did consider coming up with a way to mount it back on the fender but then...no. I'll leave it here. I see tons of Harleys with plates mounted this way. If I get pulled over I'll claim ignorance and deal with it then. This bracket is now ready for primer and paint.

That's about all that's going on right now. I did get my hands on a compression gauge and will be checking the numbers on the cylinders and that will give me an idea of what condition the top and bottom end are like and see if that needs any attention (hoping not). That's all. It's my birthday weekend and I'll be 41 but I feel like I'm trapped in the body of a 70 year old. Hanging out and keeping busy in the garage brings me happiness though so I'm sure I'll be down there for at least a while over the weekend. Thanks for checking in. Go do something fun outside or build something in the garage. 

More Cafe

Today I played around with the motorcycle a little bit. This was the clapped out seat cover that was on the bike. 

Heather got a replacement for me from the UK. I've never done any sort of upholstering so I didn't know what I was getting into. It's not easy. But I'm happy with how it turned out. My new mirrors also showed up so I got those installed too.

Been a While

As honored as I am to work at my new job, it is the busiest I have ever been as an educator. Because of this, it has been so long since I have fished. I didn't fish at all during the fall spawn. I went out once right before school started and got into it with a shitty guide. I went out with my friend Scott several months ago I think but I was so tired I don't even know that I casted at all. I know I wanted to nap. I'm just too damn busy to fish during the week and on the weekends, I'm just too tired. So now that I have a few weeks off, I decided to get out. Yesterday was a beautiful day but it was still a tad cold. I have lived here for 9 years now and I fished a section of the South Platte that I have never fished before. Right away I spotted some big fish. I worked some for about an hour and finally got a Rainbow that was pushing 20" hooked but it didn't last long. I blame it on rust. I started walking. I didn't cast at all for probably another hour and a half. I just walked. I finally ended up back where I started and went to work on another small group of fish. It wasn't long before I hooked this fish. This is one of the prettiest Rainbows I've caught in years. What a great day. 

I just realized...

My longer commute each day has given me plenty of time to ponder life. One of the things that I have come to terms with is that…I am getting older. Next month I will be 41. Life is different these days. Don't get me wrong. This is not me whining and moaning about my poor life. Far from it. I am loving where I am in life right now. I work at an amazing school where I am pushed/challenged to better myself each day. I have a cool house that I should be able to build a bigger deck on to this spring (everybody wants a bigger deck). A wonderful wife. Two great dogs. And a bitchin motorcycle (this has been a killer experience because I have always wondered if I had the skills to do this kind of thing much like my father did but without all the cursing and wrench throwing). However, sometimes, I do look in the mirror in the morning and wonder, "Why is this area not as taught as it used to be? "What's up with all the gray in my beard? Why does my face look like an old catchers mitt? And why the fuck does this (any one of several muscles/joints) hurt so much this morning?" I guess it's all part of the process.

Last week I almost got into two wrecks on the highway and it was completely because of me. I turned on my blinker, looked, and went ahead and switched lanes only to hear horns. I looked in the rear view mirror and saw nothing but headlights flashing and middle fingers flying. What is one to do in this situation while traveling at 65ish mile per hour? I put up my hand to say sorry but then got the flailing arms from one driver. Accurate and truthful vehicle to vehicle communication is rarely possible in circumstances such as this. It wasn't long before the driver pulled along side of me. I mouthed, "Sorry." but he obviously interpreted it as something negative about his mother and ensued with his own barrage of insults and gestures. I tried to convey to him through a myriad of motions that I do not read leaps and what you are doing is not American Sign Language. This seemed to upset him further still. I pointed at the back of my neck and mouthed, "THIS AREA DOESN'T WORK LIKE IT USED TO! LIMITED RANGE OF MOTION!" Clearly, he received, "KISS MY ASS!" Then I thought, "Self…let's just motion for him to pull over so we can clear the air." Then I realized that this probably wasn't a good idea either. I finally just went on my way. Words like Shingles, rash, bad disc, big ass bunion, gray hair, and gas don't transfer well from car to car while on a major highway.

Not being able to cycle much really blows but I'm learning to cope with it. I do hate it a little when people on Facebook post pictures from their rides and have considered un-friending some folks but then that would leave me with like 3 people to stay in touch with. Yesterday I noticed that a friend posted some photos from when he rode Tour Divide. I would still love to do that ride but it's just not a possibility any longer. At least not on a bicycle. I'm hoping that I am able to ride the cafe racer without a lot of pain. If that's the case then maybe one day I can get a motorcycle that would be good for that type of ride. Now instead of a long bicycle ride, I think about whether or not I could do longer moto rides like up the Dalton Highway in Alaska all the way to the ocean? Or continue to utilize two wheels to see all the amazing stuff we have here in Colorado like alpine passes and old mining ruins? That's what I'm hoping.

In the end though, I wouldn't trade any of the things that I have if it meant that I could do one more big ride on a bicycle. A wise man I knew once said, "Everything happens for a reason." I never used to believe that much but as I get older I know that things in my life are precisely how they are supposed to be. Thanks for checking in. Happy Holidays to you all.

Snow Days in the Garage

I have had snow days the last 2 days. They haven't really been for snow but for the really cold temps. This morning it was -18. Despite the fact that my Shingles are still kicking my ass, I decided to venture owt in the garage for a bit yesterday and a bit more today in between naps. I spent most of the time working on the tank. Yesterday I had sanded to 600 grit. This morning I put more filler on some spots that I just wasn't happy with and then started sanding over again from 120. I'm back up to 400 and, wouldn't you know it, I found some more spots that I'm not thrilled with. I'm done though. I gotta stop at some point. That point is now. This tank will never look custom because I'm not a professional. I am, however, very happy considering this is the first time I have ever done any body work. In hindsight, this was probably not the best thing to start trying body work on. The knee dents are really a critical piece of the bike and they just have to look the same. 

The other job I started on today was the rear fender. The stock one was just too long and I didn't like the look. Don't even get me started on that gigantic tail light. I took the fender off and decided to chop off about 4" from it. Here it is after it was bobbed and I re-drilled the 2 mounting holes on the side. I still need to drill new mounting holes for it under the seat but I'm going to have to come up with some spacers to put between the fender and frame (about 1/2"). The first attempt didn't work out so I'll give it another go tomorrow. 

Then I started playing with the license plate location. This is where I want to mount it. You can't tell from this picture but I've bent the plate to match the curve of the rear hub. I'll use aluminum to come up with a mount that gets the plate mounted in the spot I want and then take that bracket to work and fab up something out of steel. I plan on making a small hood at the top of the bracket where I'll mount an LED so it shines down on the plate to keep Johnny Law happy. I'll run the wire to the swing arm and then up into the electronics so it'll be hidden. A new seat cover is on the way from the UK as we speak.