It would mean a lot to me if you read my introduction. Thanks in advanced.
I'm not a rider. I'm not even really a fabricator. What I can do is, with a bit of patience, the help of extremely talented friends who run their own auto and bike shops, a bit of blood and some curse words is get #$%* done. The time I have spent on bikes is moderate, I've just never had a license or my own.
Here's my back-story. I spent time every week being surrounded by friends who built, fixed and broke things for a living. It's in their nature, it's always been my passion. I became extremely versed and quite self-impressed with my ability to work on cars by just being around them. At the same time, I was into hot hatchbacks and ran a problematic (see: self-induced) boosted Mazdaspeed. While I loved working on this car, it was my daily driver, and having your oil catch can freeze overnight with oil-water condensation and plug up PCV and vacuum hoses in mid January made for extremely inconvenient times to jack your car up and crawl under. It really turned me off from the fast, fun car life. I was ignoring my roots... I spent more time doing car things and less things doing the things I loved. I sold the car, bought my truck (2012 Nissan Frontier Pro4x) and got back out to the range, back to the marshes and hills to shoot ducks and coyotes, back to camping, back to rock climbing and back to my worry free life. The boosted cars that were slammed to the ground... I was over that. I turned 26 in 2013 and I wasn't going to be associated it anymore, it wasn't really me.
After a year of worry free frustration, another job with a different IT company that sat me in front of monitor for 8+ hours a day staring into cafe-racer-blog-invoked-insanity, a relationship with a girl that unfortunately has to live just on the other side of the state line (to finish dental school)... I needed something to fill my free time with.
I bought a 1975 Honda CB550K from a friend and a Miller 211 MIG welder. I'm going right in.
My father has been a motorcycle cop for nearly 20+ years and a rider since his teens. His first bike I believe was a 77 CB750F, with one of his brothers having a Yamaha 400 that he learned on. He has 4 brothers, all of them riders as well.
My grandfather on his side was an aviation mechanic for American Airlines for 35 years. He was an extremely smart technician. I have factory service training manuals from 1977 for certain jets and it is insane the detail in these books, all which are in mint condition. My grandma said he never used the books because he didn't need them, he was that good. However, he was notorious for half finishing his own projects around the house. He passed away in November 2013. My grandmother, who raised 7 kids while he worked is without a doubt the greatest lady in my life besides the one that brought me into this world. She showed me the basement of her house the other day, an open unfinished room with a recessed area filled with tools, workbenches, shelves and car parts. She said if I wanted to store my bike down here I could, which was great as I live in a garage-less apartment only one mile away.
My Grandfather went by Scotty, passing it down as Scott to the middle name of my father and then onto myself. Being English and Irish, I have a great deal of respect for heritage and tradition, in loving memory of my recently deceased grandfather and in his spirit of always have things "never quite finished", I am building my first cafe racer:
Scotty.
I could list out all the things I want to do, but you know that will all change as I go on, so I've got an open book for ideas. The only thing I am planning for now is a motorcycle safety course in the spring, some more dirt bike riding and continuing to improve my welding.
Enjoy. More threads, questions, stupidity, cursing, drinking and riding to come.
You can follow me here:
http://scottycb550.tumblr.com/You can follow me here:
http://instagram.com/scottycb550/ @scottycb550
You can follow me here, on sohc4
