Topic: My first rigid build up

[Trav-i]

Just thought I'd start a thread here to keep track of the build and let everyone see it too as it goes along.

Here is what I started with (not much to look at eh?)



Here is what I have gotten down to (my bike is the one on the right, my brother-in-law's bike is on the left).  If you look in the upper corner of the photo you can see part of one of his massive radial drills.  The forks laying against mine are a recent acquisition along with the engine on the floor.



Here is another pic (note the use of alum. tig filler wire as a layout guide)



Well that's all the pictures I have for now.  Hopefully I will have some more after Saturday when we work on them some more.  Feedback and comments are aways welcome.

[KB02]

On your layout, you might want to move the upper point forward about three inches to that big junction point. It will give a much better layout to the design. (But that's just my opinion...)

[Trav-i]

Well I wish I could report on some major progress made Saturday, but unfortunately I can't.  I ended up helping my brother-in-law make a muffler for his 75 750 and doing a full tune up on it as well.  I was only able to work on my stuck carbs Saturday.  I did get them working again but that's all I did.  The tubing should be in this week so hopefully I can get some work done on them this week.

[Trav-i]

Well I finally hit my first major milestone today.  I finally got that old motor running today.  there is no teling when the last time it ran.  But last week I cleaned and rebuilt the carbs and did some general clean up on it (in between workng on my brother-in-laws bike as well).  That old motor ran pretty darn good it seems to start right up and idle well, I just need to do all the usual little adjustments to it to make it run a little better.  Now it's off to the fabrication side so it can get its new tail put on, also it's time to focus on the other bike sitting beside mine.

[Trav-i]

Well things have been really busy so I have not worked on the 750 much lately.  However the custom rear axle adjuster plates will go to waterjet this week, so hopefully we can get started on the rear end next weekend.

[Trav-i]

Finally last weekend my brother-in-law and I had a chance to start on the rear section of my frame.  After a marathon fabrication session we have come up with this so far.

This is my frame just after we fixtured it down to frame jig table.



The point of no return.




This was all we had left after we did a little minor surgery.



Here we began the fit up of the lower extensions, and the lower part of the rear triangle.



We used the old swing arm for reference while we did our fabrication.  I took this shot just to show where the rear axle used to be, and where it will be now.



Here is the completed frame, (all that's left is final weld up).



Here you can see it begin to take shape.  I still have to modify the fuel tank some more (to better clear the back bone of the frame), and we need to finish the oil tank as well.



So as you can see we came a long way in an afternoon, but I still have a long way to go to get it completed.  Now it's time to finish sourcing all the parts I need to finish.

[Fabricator]

Whose the goofy guy with the dirt moustache?  Oh... I forgot you had a camera out there.

Chris

[ProTeal55]

Bike's looking good..
Once warmer weather hits I plan to do something like this to my CL450 thats sitting in the garage..

[DCopp]

Wow, that weld behind the engine and at the "bend" scares me.  Be sure to brace the hell outta that thing there as most rigids use bent tubing not cuts and welds there.  Better safe than sorry!

[andy750]

Good photos and Im really interested to see how this turns out!

good luck!

cheers
Andy

[crustyxpunk]

+1 on what Dcopp said.  That rear is going to need some major reinforcement to hold up under normal riding conditions.  Just think about riding along down the road and hitting a pothole, your going to want the frame to be able to handle abuse like that. 

[Trav-i]

My project has been kind of idle the last few weeks, but this weeked I plan to get a lot done with the help of my brother-in-law (AKA Fabricator).  Were going to try to finish weld out of the frame, finish the oil tank, and set up my riding position.  I also got most of my control parts in so they will be going on as well.  Maybe with a little luck it will be off the table, and back on its wheels this week!

As for the welds at the bottom of the frame there actually well and strong.  The tubing was just plain rusty down there so it gave him some real fits, but I trust his work with a welder more then anyone elses' (this is what he does for a living).  And what that picture does not show is the base for the battery box which is fully welded on both sides, so there is plenty of support there already.


I'll be posting pix of the progress this weekend.

[rat550]

cool rigid here are some pictures of my project

[Trav-i]

Looks good man.  I always like to see what other people are doing with their rides.  Hopefully after this weeked mine will finally begin to show what it's gonna look like when it's done.  We just got another bike to do, but for mock up reasons I'm gonna scavenge some of it's parts for mine (as some of mine are STILL out for blast and powder coat) .

[Trav-i]

Well as I promised here are some more pics of my build up.  I was not able to make quite as much progress as I wanted, but I was able to move to move ahead with some stuff.

The first part of the day was spent getting the new bearings and triple trees back in.  Then we grabbed a set of forks from the back of the shop and stuffed them in just for mock up reasons (the actual forks for this bike still need to modified before they go in).





Then we broke it free from the jig table so we could temporally mount a rear tire and try to get some ideas for mounting the rear fender and mounting the seat as well.  The tires and wheels came from an old F bike we recently aquired (it's also donating some other items as well).



The old F bike





So here is how it sits right now, low lean and mean pretty much how I wanted it to come out.



Still a lot to do though, the forks have to be shortened about 3 inches (notice how far they stick up out of the clamp) in order to get the front end down out of the sky, the fuel tank needs finished, the oil tank needs finished, and so on and so on.  Hopefully just a few weeks more to go before it rolls out the door for the first test ride.

[78CB750CAFE]

good start...
good luck, and keep us up to date.
I need some inspiration to get me going on my bobber project

[Trav-i]

Well I did a little bit of grinder work on my bike today (got rid of the last unneeded mounting tabs).  Then I cleaned up the shop, Fabricator said in return for cleaning he'd get my oil tank done, fix the axle adjuster plates, and try to get my forks cut down and get them tapped for the new plugs.  So hopefully I'll have some completed parts to put on this week, also should have wheels and tires this week.

[Trav-i]

Well today was a good day as more progress was made today.  We were able to get the forks cut and machined, and fix the goofed up axle adjuster plates.  So now it's on to to other things like locating a place to hide the electronics, hooking up the controls, the front brake, and so on.  My hope is to roll this out the door by the end of February...  So we will see.

Here are some pics from today

[754]

izzat a Jacobs  flex collet chuck on that lathe ?.. cool

 I take it you will not be using that axle adjuster...?...or ?

[Trav-i]

Yup to answer your question it is a Jacobs collet system. 

And actually I am going to use the stock adjusters, what we did was drill the plate all the way through and them tapped it only 3/4 of the way down to give the stud something to stop against.  Then we drilled the old adjuster to clear the stud, and used a plain nut to tension the chain and the nylock to back it up.  Ta da reversed adjusters Fabricator thought it wold be a nice touch to my bike.

[UnCrash]

Ta da reversed adjusters Fabricator thought it wold be a nice touch to my bike.

You got that right.  Very cool, and practical!

[Bonafide]

Cool project for sure. You guys ever roll into the Big Bear Cafe on Saturday mornings?

[Trav-i]

Not yet, this is my first bike so until I get it done I won't be riding.  However I do stop in and eat from time to time.  Although as soon as I get it done I will be riding it there (just to mess with the Harley guys ).

[Sprocketwerx]

I don't want to burst anyone's bubble, but that welded bend joint will break at some point.
Unless there is an internal slug taking the loads, you need to at least weld a load spreading plate on the inside of the "bend". This will let the tubing do it's job and not concentrate the loads on a small area. You need a plate that will cover the whole weld and act as an external slug. It can be formed from sheetmetal to follow the bend exactly by hammerforming
I don't care how good a welder he may be (nor am I challenging his ability as a welder), the joint will eventualy fail. Not necessarily the weld, but the surrounding base material. Rigids see a lot more shock and vibration than the stock frame was intended to see and repeated cycles will cause the weld affected material to crack.

I just don't want to hear about the results later while you're riding it, it's not pretty. and it doesn't take much to do it right.


I know I'm new on this forum, but I've been a fabriacator for 20 years including choppers and drag racing chassis.
Safety is important to me, otherwise us garage builders get outlawed.
It's just the world we live in.

[Trav-i]

I thought I would update my thread since it's been pretty dead for the last few weeks.  Unfortunately I have not gotten a lot done over the last few weeks.  Fabricator has been busy, so that means no fabrication progress to note.  I talked to him Sunday and he said starting Wednesday evening we are going to work to finish the fabrication because if we don't finish this week it could be several months before he gets back to it.   Once the fabrication is out of the way I will be on the down hill slide to the finish.  My goal is still to roll by the end of the month.

P.S.  I am aware of the of the fact that the lower weld on the frame needs help.  As I said before the frame is not done yet, and it will be getting a very large, very thick 1/2 plate gusset there this week.
L8er

Travis