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3/18/03
Since the frame had been modified a bit, the stock motor mounting hardware
did not line up, so I had to make my own. I cut some aluminum plates, drilled them , polished them
and installed them with some various spacers I had in the shop. The plates on the outside of the
frame are steel, and will be used to mount the footpegs and forward controls.
(click to enlarge)
I cut some 1/2 inch pipe to space between the plates
April 13, 2003:
With the engine mounted, I then mounted the fender and made the appropriate cut out for the chain. The chain lined up
perfectly between the front and rear sprockets, so no sideways adjustment was necessary, which was a good thing since every
other piece on this bike has been a custom fit so far.
Since I am trying to prove you can build a bike on a budget, I am intentionally keeping the cost as low as possible.
I was going to shoot the fender and tank with automotive paint but decided to see how good a job I could do with
rattle cans. Believe it or not, it came out looking better than I probably could have done with automotive paint and was
a hell of a lot less work!
I shot the bare metal with 4 or 5 coats of Plasti-Kote sandable primer.
I hit it with some 600 grit paper, wiped it clean and then shot it with several coats of
Rust-Oleum Metallic paint. I then wet sanded it with some 1500 and 2000 grit sandpaper.
Then I gave it several more coats of Rust-Oleum Painter's Touch clear lacquer. After that, I wet sanded
the clear to 2000 grit, then used some 3M rubbing compound, followed by 3M hand glaze.
All the paint products dried fast and the whole job only took a couple hours. It was a sunny day when I did it, so I
put the fender in my dark blue van after each coat of paint. It was like baking it in an oven!
All supplies were things I had sitting on the shelf, left over from other projects, so there was no cash out of pocket.
Even if I did have to shell out for supplies, it would have been under $20 and I would have used less than
half of the product.
The metallic paint with the clear makes a nice deep shine. It's kind of hard to capture with a digital camera
but I'm quite happy with it. If it gets scratched, I won't cry, I'll just grab the rattle can off the shelf and fix it!
I've not painted the tank yet, because I'm not sure which tank I will use.
Now it's time to start wiring. Since I have the stock wiring harness, I need to do some choppin here.
The stock Yamaha has all kinds of crap like safety relays, reserve lighting boxes and other stuff that
is not only unnecessary on a chopper but there's no room for it either. I used the wiring diagram to
weed out the charging and ignition circuits. Everything else gets hacked out. I'll build my lighting and
signaling circuits from scratch.
Here is all that I am keeping from the stock wiring
And here is what I am getting rid of.
Do you see why we call it a "chopper"?
So, we are getting there. A little at a time, as time allows.
More to come
Stay tuned.
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