Author Topic: Finally the CrisPDuk project 550 gets under way (Read 22900 times)

CrisPDuk · « **Reply #50 on:** January 04, 2008, 03:18:59 PM »

Well thanks to a couple of stubborn bolts and spacers, the engine didn't leave the frame until this afternoon, so it won't be getting it's new bits welded on now until Monday $:-\$

On the plus side though my new brake lever and front and rear calipers (new to me anyway, they're from an '89 CBR1000) turned up this morning, there will be a bit of work involved in fitting the front calipers, but the rear one went straight on The only work needed will be to slim down it's bracket to fit inside the 550 swingarm, and fabricate a torque arm

Now the frame is bare I managed to get better access to finish fitting the Giuliari seat too, that will be getting the necessary welding done on Monday too.

I'm off to my local BK Forktruck dealership tomorrow morning, they have all the bits need to make up my stainless steel braided hoses

CrisPDuk · « **Reply #51 on:** January 09, 2008, 06:31:10 PM »

Had a bit of spare time today so I had a scoot down to see my buddy Tony, who owns a machine shop, where we got busy with the milling machine and lathe and made all the various components that will comprise the front and rear ends

Unfortunately this is the only picture I have at the moment because the camera died, but I'll do a full illustrated write-up tomorrow.
Suffice to say the only parts now outstanding on the fork assembly and swing arm are the stainless brakelines

CrisPDuk · « **Reply #52 on:** January 09, 2008, 06:32:39 PM »

Oh yeah, and I think we may need to fabricate a fork brace

Terry in Australia · « **Reply #53 on:** January 09, 2008, 06:46:19 PM »

What forks are you using Crispy?

CrisPDuk · « **Reply #54 on:** January 10, 2008, 04:02:52 AM »

The fork legs are the standard 550 ones that came with the bike Terry, although I've modified the caps to take an air valve so that I can pressurise them in accordance with Hondaman's advice

At first I wasn't sure whether I was going to use the polished lowers that it came with (I've also got a set of normal ones), but they just look so damned good when they're clean, that I can't bring myself not too

CrisPDuk · « **Reply #55 on:** February 07, 2008, 10:52:08 AM »

As you may have noticed, things have been a bit quite on the 550 front for the last few weeks

Unfortunately MrsD had a spell in hospital with a bout of peretonitis(sp?) brought on by a ruptured appendix, so major garage stuff obviously took a bit of a back seat!

I did manage to get out for the odd hour or two here and there to try my hand at aluminium polishing on some of the smaller components and am quite pleased with the results so far:

This is the left side rearset from a Suzuki Hayabusa, it's foot peg has been replaced with one from a '98 GSX-R750 and the gearbox crank is from a FireBlade. Most of the brake caliper parts are now polished and I'm well on with the top triple clamp but their photos didn't come out to well, So I'll try again tomorrow $:-\$

The major occurrence this week though is the arrival of a little package from the good ole US of A

Courtesy of one Mr M Rieck, occasionally of this parish, thanks Mike

The big job now will be to get the rest of the bike up to the standard of that beauty

Now that MrsD is pretty much fully recovered the focus is back on, the frame should be off to the powder coater's place in a week or so, there's some more machining needed to bring the 750 back wheel onto the bike's centreline, and there's still plenty of painiting and/or polishing left to do $:-\$

Finally, last weekend my Sister and I were instructed to clear the last of our crap from our parent's house. In amongst all the junk I came across this rather well preserved specimen:

It's a 1:12 Tamiya kit, I built it whilst I was still at school, over twenty years ago, and thought it was long gone

Spikeybike · « **Reply #56 on:** February 07, 2008, 01:56:03 PM »

Damn when my parents gave me those orders all i got was some cassette tapes and some old nudey magazines .

motor's gonna be very sweet , do you know witch cam your gonna run

CrisPDuk · « **Reply #57 on:** February 08, 2008, 02:21:43 AM »

Funnily enough Spikey my car did get loaded down with a few 'interesting' magazines

and I'd forgotten just how many bootleg recordings I own

Not sure on the full engine build spec yet, I only got the head done by Mike because a reasonably priced S/H head came available in his neck of the woods so I saved a bundle on shipping.

The intention was to send the engine down to BryanJ over the Christmas period, but thanks to MrsD's illness and other assorted delays, I still haven't got round to doing it

I might leave that until the end of the year now though, as I want the bike up and running by Easter so that I can get some good riding in this year

That delay would also leave me time to maybe save enough to afford the machining work involved in fitting a 605cc kit into the equation

bwaller · « **Reply #58 on:** February 08, 2008, 05:22:45 PM »

Looks like your moving forward, it's nice when stuff starts arriving! Keep up the good work.
Glad to hear the Mrs. is doing ok.

bill440cars · « **Reply #59 on:** February 18, 2008, 07:02:22 PM »

Quote from: bwaller on February 08, 2008, 05:22:45 PM

Looks like your moving forward, it's nice when stuff starts arriving! Keep up the good work.
Glad to hear the Mrs. is doing ok.

Seems like I'm kinda late checking out several builds and yours is one of them Cris. I DID go back and go through the entire thread, so I could be up to date on what you've got going. It DOES look like you're moving along fairly well, even with your setbacks.

I also would like to say that I'm glad that MrsD is doing well!

Later on, Bill

MRieck · « **Reply #60 on:** February 18, 2008, 07:15:47 PM »

Quote from: CrisPDuk on February 07, 2008, 10:52:08 AM

As you may have noticed, things have been a bit quite on the 550 front for the last few weeks Unfortunately MrsD had a spell in hospital with a bout of peretonitis(sp?) brought on by a ruptured appendix, so major garage stuff obviously took a bit of a back seat!

I did manage to get out for the odd hour or two here and there to try my hand at aluminium polishing on some of the smaller components and am quite pleased with the results so far:

This is the left side rearset from a Suzuki Hayabusa, it's foot peg has been replaced with one from a '98 GSX-R750 and the gearbox crank is from a FireBlade. Most of the brake caliper parts are now polished and I'm well on with the top triple clamp but their photos didn't come out to well, So I'll try again tomorrow $:-\$

The major occurrence this week though is the arrival of a little package from the good ole US of A

Courtesy of one Mr M Rieck, occasionally of this parish, thanks Mike

The big job now will be to get the rest of the bike up to the standard of that beauty

Now that MrsD is pretty much fully recovered the focus is back on, the frame should be off to the powder coater's place in a week or so, there's some more machining needed to bring the 750 back wheel onto the bike's centreline, and there's still plenty of painiting and/or polishing left to do $:-\$

Finally, last weekend my Sister and I were instructed to clear the last of our crap from our parent's house. In amongst all the junk I came across this rather well preserved specimen:

It's a 1:12 Tamiya kit, I built it whilst I was still at school, over twenty years ago, and thought it was long gone

You are most welcome Noel.

CrisPDuk · « **Reply #61 on:** March 05, 2008, 04:58:19 AM »

Thanks again Mike

MrsD says thanks for all your thoughts too

She's now fully recovered and back into nagging wife mode

The frame has been all welded up and is currently at the powder coaters for blasting and painting in satin black
Meanwhile I'm getting stuck into cleaning and polishing all the parts that will be going back on. I'm steadily accumulating a large pile of nuts bolts and fixings that will eventually head over to a plating company that we use at work for a fresh coat of nickel.

This weekend I took advantage of the nice (if cold) weather and attacked my tank's paintwork with a twisted wire wheel in my grinder, it had been painted so many times in it's life that it was over 1/8" thick in places

As can be sort of seen from the picture,

It looks like it left the Honda factory in Candy Gold, the fact that someone then painted over it seems almost criminal to me

In fact I'm now considering changing my final colour scheme to it from bright yellow

It has now been fully releived of it's paint and dropped of at the platers for an internal coating of nickel, there's currently no rust inside it, and I'm hoping to keep it that way

DCopp · « **Reply #62 on:** March 05, 2008, 12:21:24 PM »

you know, aircraft stripper is oh so much faster and much less work too!!!

CrisPDuk · « **Reply #63 on:** March 05, 2008, 03:47:40 PM »

But so much less fun too

I also wanted to remove the traces of surface rust that were evident in a couple of places too, and the wire brush is really good for that

Spikeybike · « **Reply #64 on:** March 05, 2008, 06:54:51 PM »

nickel on the inside ahh...... thats a new one
(beats the hell outta Kream

)

CrisPDuk · « **Reply #65 on:** March 06, 2008, 02:12:29 AM »

No point in having contacts if you don't make use of them Spikey

Soos · « **Reply #66 on:** March 06, 2008, 06:10:38 AM »

Nickel plated.
NICE touch!

Why not just nickel plate the whole tank?

I've always loved the look of nickel.
Everyone has chrome this and that. Nickel has a ... warmer? look to it.
Softer? Either way I like it.

l8r

CrisPDuk · « **Reply #67 on:** March 06, 2008, 07:43:12 AM »

Shame nobody will ever see it though Soos $:-\$

If the tank was in better condition than it is, I would possibly have considered plating the outside

But unfortunately, it being nearly 40 years old and decidedly second hand, it does have a fair few scratches and dings that are going to require filling before painting, plus I also want the tank to match the side covers and fenders which, being plastic, cannot be plated

James · « **Reply #68 on:** March 06, 2008, 08:19:17 AM »

There are places that will chrome plastic for you, or you could use that chrome paint stuff, although I'm not sure how good it is or you could.......www.thetankshop.com

CrisPDuk · « **Reply #69 on:** March 06, 2008, 11:28:08 AM »

Those guys are making some really nice stuff James, I think I'd struggle to justify the cost to the houshold authorities on this project $:-\$ But it's something to bear in mind for the next one though

Sam Green Racing · « **Reply #70 on:** March 06, 2008, 05:19:40 PM »

Things are looking good Noel, glad to hear Mrs Duk is OK.
Make sure you look after that Head, mind it doesn't fall off the mantle piece.

Sam.

CrisPDuk · « **Reply #71 on:** March 07, 2008, 01:50:28 AM »

Quote from: SamCR750 on March 06, 2008, 05:19:40 PM

Things are looking good Noel, glad to hear Mrs Duk is OK.
Make sure you look after that Head, mind it doesn't fall off the mantle piece.

Sam.

How did you know that was where it was sat

It's OK though it's in a nice glass case

HondaMan · « **Reply #72 on:** March 08, 2008, 09:09:34 AM »

Quote from: CrisPDuk on December 23, 2007, 10:34:09 AM

After a long, work related, absence from, and much buying of parts from various sources, I am now in a position to start the rebuild of my '78 CB550K3

Acquired in September 2006 as a non-runner that had spent several years unused in her previous owners garage, this is what she looked like by the time she was roadworthy:

I had already added the headlight ears, turn signals and DOHC mirrors by this point, and a better quality rear fender to replace the rotten one that originally there.

During my first stint abroad I ordered a new exhaust system from BCR, and dropped lucky on a cheap, unused set of Tomaselli clubman bars on ebay, these went on during my first return home in May 07

The bars made for a far better riding position as well as looking rather and the exhaust sounds fantastic and allows the motor to rev more freely. As a bonus the whole Benji system weighs less than just one of the original 4-4 pipes.

At this point I had already acquired a Giuliari seat and a K0 tank for my project but decided to hold back from fitting them as the weather was so good then that it would have been rude to not ride the tyres off her

Fast forward to today, and it is decidedly not riding weather, so fitting of the new tank and seat commenced. At this point the seat was off but the original tank was still fitted:

Fitting of the K0 tank was a lot easier than I thought it would be, requiring only shortening of the pegs and rubber bungs at the front and relocation of the rubber mount at the rear:

The Giuliari seat however was going to require a bit more work:

Because it was designed to fit a 750 all the fittings and mounts were in the wrong place, and the brace across the rear of the frame got in the way. I stripped the cover and padding from the seat, cut of all the brackets that were in the way, and cut out the brace (don't worry, a new one will be fabricated) in order to get the seat pan to a position where measurements could be taken:

After a bit of cutting, grinding and drilling, I managed to get the seat pan sitting where I wanted it, using the lock from my original seat, the hinge from a 550F seat that I'd bought along the way ands a selection of rubber mounts form a variety of sources:

I have loosely refitted the padding and cover to stop them losing their shape. They will be refitted properly once the new brackets and spacers have been welded in place by a welder friend of mine.

The steering is likely to be a bit restricted with the new arrangement, but I'm sure I'll be able to live with it

Crispy! We missed you!
Some of your countrymen in UK are missing you, too. I've had several inquiries about the Transistorized Ignition, if someone can "import" them in a batch for sale there. The postage is killing the individual buyers...

bryanj · « **Reply #73 on:** March 08, 2008, 12:51:59 PM »

Chris, give me a ring sometime on 07795162623 after 7pm (just in case you lost it) I will be in leeds for 23:00 tomorrow (Sunday 09 March)
Regards to the dearly beloved
Bryan

Head · « **Reply #74 on:** March 08, 2008, 02:54:30 PM »

You stated that nickel gives a warmer look than chrome, I agree, for polishing your aluminum
I love a product called Semi-Chrome, It give aluminum a luster that I think looks better than chrome. I bought my last tube from a Jewelery store @$10.50 which I needed right now but I
know you can find it other places for about half that price! Bike is looking good!!!
Head

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Author Topic: Finally the CrisPDuk project 550 gets under way (Read 22900 times)