Author Topic: College build '78 cb550 cafe. Creating the Old (Read 27000 times)

Strangexj86 · « **Reply #25 on:** January 29, 2013, 03:11:45 PM »

Quote from: Geeto67 on January 29, 2013, 01:28:44 PM

couple of points:

1) if you keep those mini gauges the tach won't be accurate. As far as I know there isn't anybody making a mini tach in the appropriate ratio for the 550/500/400/350F and twins. If you don't believe me put a dwell meter on it and check it yourself.

2) you needed to have the swingarm in place with the fully assembled rear wheel/tire and the shocks (minus the springs so you can compress them to the bumpstop) to check for clearance when you were fabbing up your hoop. I would check your clearance before you paint the frame.

thanks for the input

1) i was going to eliminate the tach anyways so we're all good there. haha

2) I checked the clearance numerous times throughout the building of the rear hoop. Everything clears and is good to go. And the frame wont be painted, what you see in the pics posted earlier is the finished frame.

Quote from: Viktor.J on January 29, 2013, 01:32:46 PM

I love your Twin Peaks themed garage

haha thanks! Its actually the "spare bedroom" in our tiny little house. Oh and the entire interior of our house is the same. Interior cedar siding, super weird. haha

Geeto67 · « **Reply #26 on:** January 29, 2013, 03:20:16 PM »

pics of the e30 btw. I used to have a 1991 325I convertible in bronzit beige with a 5 speed and LSD. I sold that car last june with 178,000 miles on it and the new owner drove it 500 miles to canada that day. I always wanted to do either an M50 swap or an LS swap to it but I had a kid and bought an audi A3 instead.

Strangexj86 · « **Reply #27 on:** January 30, 2013, 05:32:29 PM »

thats a nice car man. The 24v swaps are an awesome project to have with an e30. I have an s52 swap with e36 m3 ZF transmission in my e30. Building my megasquirt system right now for turbo.

pics dont show it, but i just finished up a late model body conversion on it.

Geeto67 · « **Reply #28 on:** January 31, 2013, 08:39:13 AM »

that's awesome. nice to see it is a vert too.

Strangexj86 · « **Reply #29 on:** January 31, 2013, 10:07:19 AM »

tnanks. i was going stir crazy without a project to work on over at school. Thats why I bought the bike.

Can't realy pin down a color scheme for it though. The brownish of the frame is a little tough to match with. I was thinking a dark gold. GOing for the real old rustic look. GOing to have copper plated accents in a few places

Strangexj86 · « **Reply #30 on:** January 31, 2013, 10:12:28 PM »

small update:

here's the start of my custom rear sets. going to mount them in the existing passenger peg holes. I had planned on making a mounting plate that would rest in the triangle space of the passenger peg frame, but after doing a bit of design and mock up, it looked to busy or cluttered so I'm going with this for now.

Strangexj86 · « **Reply #31 on:** February 07, 2013, 05:19:03 PM »

made some changes to the foot peg and made the first lever. It turned out pretty decent but the second one will be a bit better.

bjbuchanan · « **Reply #32 on:** February 09, 2013, 11:00:22 AM »

You seem to know what you are doing with fabbing stuff up so just a thought if I may

The rearsets are all about placing your body at better ergonomics than it had to work better on the bike overall. Do you want uncomfortable rearsets for looks or cluttered rearsets for use? Unless you are real tall then maybe back that far works

With the fab skills you have and some searching I'm sure you can come up with a better mounting setup.

The progress so far looks great, keep it up

Strangexj86 · « **Reply #33 on:** February 10, 2013, 09:31:20 PM »

thanks man. Im not sure what you are trying to say though. As of right now the rearsets will just be in the old passenger peg hole. I'm about 5'8" so back that far feels pretty nice.

Are you saying that you think the passenger peg hole will be too far back?

seanbarney41 · « **Reply #34 on:** February 11, 2013, 02:53:32 AM »

yes he is...passenger peg mount is too far back unless you are real tall, or a smaller bike like a cb350 twin. You want your feet right under your butt...

Strangexj86 · « **Reply #35 on:** February 11, 2013, 09:52:47 AM »

ok. I'll try and figure something else out then. Going to finish up the actual foot peg and lever and then take the frame back to the metal shop. Ive been spending a lot of time cleaning and painting the engine so the fabrication has been slowed down.

bjbuchanan · « **Reply #36 on:** February 11, 2013, 04:34:42 PM »

Yeah seanbarney got what I meant

That far back you will be laying down at your height. Land speed racing maybe but that would be no good otherwise

SOHC4 Cafe Racer Fan · « **Reply #37 on:** February 11, 2013, 04:45:25 PM »

Nice start. This thread should be transferred to the Project forum.

Bluegreen · « **Reply #38 on:** February 11, 2013, 05:28:36 PM »

Subscribed.

Strangexj86 · « **Reply #39 on:** February 17, 2013, 01:48:56 PM »

Quote from: Bluegreen on February 11, 2013, 05:28:36 PM

Subscribed.

thanks! I have been spending a ton of time cleaning and painting the engine the last week or so. I will have pics posted soon. Engine is back on the frame now, just have to finish the cylinder jugs and it'll be a complete engine.

Getting a 650 cam today, been waiting a bit on this to finish the engine rebuild.

deafcaferacer · « **Reply #40 on:** February 18, 2013, 01:01:29 PM »

Love the bar end mirrors. Where did you get them from?

Strangexj86 · « **Reply #41 on:** February 18, 2013, 01:10:29 PM »

Quote from: deafcaferacer on February 18, 2013, 01:01:29 PM

Love the bar end mirrors. Where did you get them from?

Thanks! They're from Dime City Cycles actually. I really like 'em.

Strangexj86 · « **Reply #42 on:** February 18, 2013, 07:32:09 PM »

Update: lapped the valves, didnt want to buy a spring compressor so I made one out of a C-clamp in the metal fab shop.

Valves, head, and cylinders weren't that bad for being such an old bike. This thing must have been taken really good care of because this engine was clean.

took teh entire engine apart, cleaned and painted each part. Took a ton fo time without a sandblaster but the end result was worth it.

Viktor.J · « **Reply #43 on:** February 19, 2013, 11:21:43 AM »

Yeah the enginge looks really great ! Did you do it with spray can or compressor ?
Great work man !

Strangexj86 · « **Reply #44 on:** February 19, 2013, 11:51:15 AM »

Thanks! I just used primer and engine enamel paint rattle cans. 2-3 coats of paint with wetsanding 1000-2000 grit between each coat really gave it a nice feel and appearance.

deafcaferacer · « **Reply #45 on:** February 19, 2013, 09:36:29 PM »

Beautiful engine, man. Love the uniform color.

Strangexj86 · « **Reply #46 on:** February 19, 2013, 10:00:04 PM »

thanks! I definitely wanted it all the same color. I was always curious as to why people chose to paint the cylinder portion of the top end different from the rest of the engine. I was always seeing silver engines with black cylinder jug section.

Is this some cafe style I don't know about? haha

Strangexj86 · « **Reply #47 on:** February 20, 2013, 07:13:23 PM »

first attempt at some electro-plating with copper. License plate holder started out bare stainless steel. Small battery charger, some aligator clips, and hydrochloric acid, and a sheet of pure copper. Here's the result.

I'm pretty happy with it.

Bandit18 · « **Reply #48 on:** February 20, 2013, 07:56:51 PM »

very nice...you got skills.

Strangexj86 · « **Reply #49 on:** February 20, 2013, 08:13:28 PM »

Quote from: bmoffitt18 on February 20, 2013, 07:56:51 PM

very nice...you got skills.

thanks! Im really excited about how the copper turned out. I am now trying to figure out what else to copper plate on the bike. Shift, brake levers, possibly rear sets, kinda mulled over the idea of plating the entire gas tank but I'm a little warry of the outcome.

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Author Topic: College build '78 cb550 cafe. Creating the Old (Read 27000 times)