Jggr,
That's a great way of going about it. I tried using the image gallery for the first couple of posts but I had to condense all my images to upload.
Anyways, here's my progress. For now I'll add the rest of the photos I have in Flickr that I've been stashing away for this update.
I thought about the feedback you guys gave me, and I realized I could just have my boyfriend paint the carbs at work. So we took one of the prismatic powder samples that I picked out and he was able to recreate the texture and get the tone pretty close. But I haven't given him the carbs yet so that's that.
The nutserts Ive been using from the local hardware store are total junk, so we used an astro pneumatic at work with the nutserts that came with that and those are now in the seat pan for the hinge. I also recovered the bottom of the pan.
I've been working on making a new steering stem. It's probably just going to be decoration and I probably won't end up using it but:
Looks like there was some deformation in the wax burnout process. I'm going to throw it on the lathe at school to clean it.
I refinished the side cover and extra fuse holder I made.
I sized down that ring I made, but I found out the improper fitment was actually from the weight of the handlebars pulling the ring back
I hung out at Madhouse Motors in Boston over winter break and got to help prep the RE Indian (Foot Throttle) for the unveiling at the New Tradition Motorcycle show. The show was super cool and the building was killer. It was mainly about old school choppers, mostly Harleys, but it was so badass and a very authentic show.
Super cool stuff. In CT, we don't have much of a scene like this.
As some of you may know, Dave did a fork upgrade on his bike, and he actually offered me his old 550 set up. This couldn't have worked better as now I don't have to worry about that sketchy damper rod that I "fixed", and it seems 550 forks have a few more part options. These fork tubes are also nearly mint which is awesome! And, now I have a dual disc assembly. Sure hope I never grab that brake lever too hard, lol.
The infamous Patina Hyena!
The black oxide was just not going to work on my bike, sorry Dave
So I sanded them down, and filed the rough casting edges down to clean them up.
Working on polishing them up. Also, here's a visual comparison of 500 vs 550 forks. The lower bodies are taller, but the actual whole fork assemblies seem to be the same height. I remember when I was looking into this and getting confused by the info I found, so I hope maybe this is helpful to someone. And yes I have the wrong side fork held up to the right side, but you get the idea. Thanks again Dave!
That's pretty much it for now. I'm likely going to convert to clip ons and do something with the triple tree and gauges, not sure what yet though. I truly love the OE gauges and what not.
