Virago update

Been working on the Virago again, despite the weather (it was extremely cold in the bit too well ventilated shed where we build the Virago). Tried to solve the noisy start issues, but the normal remedy (a shim between two of the starter sprockets) only seemed to make it worse. We'll have to see what else we can try. We've done some minor other things that you won't see on the photo's and we rolled the bike outside to make some of those photo's and a short video clip. The bike is reffing very high in the clip because of an air leak in the intake manifold, we've pretty much solved that now.

Ducati 900 SS special

Tempo fa ho scannerizzato questa pagina da un "In moto" di fine anni '90.
La serie supersport a carburatori mi è sempre piaciuta parecchio, forse anche più delle coetanee 8 valvole a liquido (per non citare quelle attuali).
Dico subito che non condivido la frase dell'occhiello "..è una Ducati 900ss masherata da 916" ma capita spesso di leggere didascalie troppo riduttive per non dire sconsiderate.
Dateci un'occhiata, so già che qualcuno apprezzerà la frase d'esordio in cui si manifesta qualche dubbio circa il monobraccio, che quì comunque viene presentato come il pezzo forte.

Wayne Gardner - Donington Park 1982

Derapata di potenza dell'australiano sulla sua Rsc 1000,
con tanto di rigona nera che esce dalla ruota posteriore!

Voronoff CBX 550

Sul sito http://www.knalnaarpotz.nl/
ho trovato questo interessante progetto motorizzato cbx 550.



Il preparatore è olandese,
evidentemente non è il milanese Voronoff specialista dei pantah (tral'altro è solo un soprannome preso in prestito da un famoso russo che diceva di aver inventato l'elisir di lunga vita) .
Interessante la ciclistica, belli i cerchi da 18" (ma forse l'alteriore è da 17") che sembrano dei campagnolo in magnesio, magari non convince molto la piastra che abbraccia inferiormente il motore e sale fornendo supporto alle pedane.
Sinceramente non so se sia una semplice special o la replica di una moto che magari correva nella F2 dei primi anni '80.
Di seguito, la Moriwaki-cbx 400 con telaio in alluminio per la F3 giapponese, sullo sfondo la sorella strettamente derivata di serie.

Guess what my girlfriend bought

And guess who's going to have to install it on her bike....

Do cafe fairings get any cooler than this? I hope it'll fit on her CX500.

Also finished the throttle cable of the Suzuki this afternoon.

Bike building in HD

I had a small Olympus photo camera that I used mainly for filming, like the BMW clips that are on this site. I also used it to film the build of the Suzuki, but while doing that I managed to ruin the camera. I found a new one on marktplaats (the dutch equivalent of craiglist) for very little money. It's cheap, a bit flimsy, but it films in HD. I still needed to make a spacer (or however it's called) for the throttle cable for the cable to fit onto the twister (or however thàt is called...).

A good opportunity to test the camera.

I used a bolt:

Drilled a small hole trough it for the inner cable to go through, than a larger hole not all the way through to hold the outer cable. 

One of those days...

Some days nothing works, today was one of those days. Tried to make a new bushing for the rear axle, but couldn't get it to fit. Tried to disassemble the two spare sets of forks that I have, finally being able to find them back in the garden after the snow has melted. But the bolts are really, really stuck. I'll need to drill them out. I couldn't find tools I had laid down only seconds before so I called it quits for today. Hopefully tomorrow will be better...

Caldwell Park 1981

1981, a Caldwell park è in programma l'annuale confronto tra GranBretagna e Stati Uniti.
Le superstar dei Gp sono Mamola, Roberts, Sheene, Crosby, Haslam e la gara si svolge in 2 manches con formula open.
Tra i campioni con le loro Yamaha e Suzuki 2 tempi ufficiali, nessuno fa caso ad un giovane australiano con una Z1000 senza carenatura e con il manubrio alto preparata da un giapponese (Moriwaki) che di famoso ha solo il suocero (Pop Yoshimura).



Nonostante le premesse, il giovane Wayne Gardner si classifica secondo dietro la moto di Crosby, mentre in gara2, se non ricordo male, riesce addirittura ad aggiudicarsi la vittoria!

Joe Bar

Found these on Perth Streetbikes. It's the only time ever that I've seen this great strip translated into english (In Holland you can get the Joe bar strip translated to Dutch at several stores). Joe Bar is a French strip, so most of the ones you'll be able to find on the net are in French. I love them and they are caferacer related, all the excuse I need to post them here:

I won't be working on the bikes the next couple of days, so there won't be any updates in that period. Merry Christmas and all that!

Buone feste!

CBX 550 special

da http://www.cbx550.de/

Rearsets part deux

Eventhough I liked the rearset I made (and posted on this blog) a while ago, I thought I could do better. I had to buy new threadcutters and I made some steps on the lathe.

and this is the result:

I like this look a bit better, so I'll make another one for the other side of the bike. As soon as the snow's melted I'll be able to roll the bike back outside and weld some mounts for the rearsets on the bike.

Honda CB 750 Dholda endurance

Jean d'Hollander, importante concessionario belga,
preparò varie moto da endurance motorizzate Honda 4 cilindri.
Prima di passare alle RCB, a meta '70
realizzò questa "ugly duckling" alias brutto anatroccolo,
motorizzata con l'unità del cb 750.
Difficile non notare la complicata struttura della sospensione posteriore
a parallelogramma deformabile.
Interessante è rendersi conto del fermento che c'era in quegli anni,
dimostrato dalla moltitudine di prototipi che affollavano le gare di durata, mentre oggi si vedono solo delle derivate di serie assolutamente convenzionali.



da http://www.dholda.be/ & http://pagesperso-orange.fr/1000vx-club/

in-between updates

Didn't get much done on the bikes the last couple of days. Can't even find my spare forks anymore, they're somewhere in the garden, burried under the snow. So in the mean time: Check out this very radical CX500 that's being build by a kiwi:

http://cx500custombuild.blogspot.com/

Talking about CX's: as soon as the postal services over here start working again there'll be a very rare update on my CX500 caferacer. 

Laverdonen!

Vecchie foto - Dr. John's Guzzi

Snow!!!

Wanted to work on the Suzuki today, but the weater made that impossible. This much snow is highly unusual these days. It made the city really entertaining though. Lots of snowballfights with strangers :)

Against the odds

We worked on the Virago again today. After doing some minor modifications we decided to try and start it for the first time. expectations were low because:

The intake is home made

The Intake manifold is home made

The exhausts are home made

The carburator is of a Opel Kadet

And the weather wasn't exactly ideal either.

We would have been happy with any sign of ignition what so ever. This is what we got...

This is with a very cold engine. Later on it started running even better. That's all without any adjustments to the carb.  

rearsets for the Suzuki

One of the things that's still missing on the SP are rearsets. Saw some really nice ones on the swap market last week, but there really is no money for them (student, remember). So there's only one possibility: make 'm myself.

Started off by taking a wheel off of one of my rollerblades. I wanted the bearings. Found a bit of tubing that had exactly the right diameter.

did some cutting

Some welding

and some drilling

It took a long time. It's just too cold outside, so I had to go in and warm back up again a couple of times. I'll have to make some steps on the lathe and the other side, but I'm pretty happy with the look so far.

The BMW story part II

When I'd build de CX500 caferacer for my Girlfriend I was still riding my Yamaha YZF 750R (that I had customized, naturally). The YZF is an absolute fantastic bike, but it was just impossible to ride with both the YZF and the CX at the same time. 

The person on the CX would have to race like an idiot while the person riding the YZF would hardly pass the 2000rpm mark. So that's when I decided to sell the YZF, buy a bike and rebuild it to something special.

I went looking for a god bike to build into a cafe. The first thing that came to mind was a Moto Guzzi. So off I went to a shop with a Le Mans.

I hated the fact that it had a steeringdamper. I just hate those things... but I still liked the bike. However, the guy also had a BMW R100 and he insisted that I would try that bike too. I fell in love within 200 meters. The bike he let me ride was too far gone for me and it had two rear shocks. I prefer the monoshock R80 eventhough it has less power. During my search I came across a crashed R80 monoshock with an R100 engine and Wilbers shocks. Perfect (I thought)

Here's the beauty I bought :). And a few hours later:

More on the BMW next time...

Dome DCF1 Black buffalo Endurance

Guardando un video sugli hilights della 8 ore di suzuka '85
ho notato una moto bianca con il numero 12 di cui avevo già pubblicato una foto, sperando che qualcuno avesse qualche informazione a riguardo.



Nella classifica finale risulta 38esima con i piloti
Hiroo TAKEMURA(JPN) e
Vesa KULTALAHTI(SWE)
del "TEAM DOME with Super Monkey"
sotto il nome di "Dome DCF1".
L'azienda giapponese fondata nel '65 (dome significa sogno di bambino)
si occupa da sempre di prototipi auto, negli ultimi anni si è specializzata nella lavorazione della fibra di carbonio e nelle energie alternative.
Della moto in questione, da quel poco che si vede
sembra essere motorizzata col 4 cilindri cbx 750, mentre la ciclistica pare piuttosto convenzionale, anche se la particolare forma del trave centrale del telaio potrebbe essere in carbonio (purtroppo nel sito non c'è alcuna descrizione a riguardo).
Decisamente caratterizzante la carenatura integrale che lascia scoperte solo le ruote e una piccola porzione centrale.

And the handlebars finished

The front brake is working now, still need some small parts to finish the throttle and the clutch controls, than that part will be completely finished. There's not going to be any switches on the handlebars, I think. I'll wire the lights in such a way that they'll always be on. There's not going to be a high beam (tried that with this headlight on the BMW, there was hardly a difference between normal and high beam). I've got no plans yet for the indicators.