$1000 Challenge

I'll throw some history up first as this is a personal project....

Years ago (alot of yrs when I was a teenager) I was working on a go kart, it was late at night and the old man came to make certain I was alright... at the time I was struggling with something, can't remember what... but I was just about at the stage where I was ready to throw something or pick up the hammer and perminintly fix the problem
He tells me "Building something is a journey, you want to get as much enjoyment out of getting there as you do once your there, otherwise why bother as... your twice as slow and no where near as good as what would be done if you spent this time working and paid someone to build it for you...." at the time all I could think about was proving him wrong
Years later I came to realize the journey is more fun for me than whats at the end.... the side effect of knowing this is I don't care if my projects drag on for years

This is one of my projects.... it started back sometime in 2011
The friday night piss up at the workshop... had a couple of lads in who I'd built up 4wd toys for, both of them great to work for as if I had to touch something reguardless of condition I was supplied with the kit or parts to rebuild it. Anyway talk got round to them moaning about the cost of cert and requirements of keeping things road legal.... I couldn't resist winding them up and argued its them that make it expensive and as a joke told them I could heavily modify something for $1000.... by the end of the night (and the box in the fridge ) I'd up the bet to "For a $1000 I can buy a vehicle, modify it and pay cert..."
I forgot about it till the next time I caught up with one of them and he reminded me, not to let him win I decided to do it as good a reason as some of my other project for starting them

So I put the word out with all my collector mates thinking I'd do a rat rod... about a month later I'm round at a mates place talking projects when he suggests I do a rat bike instead, after a few cold ones my drunken logic convinced me this was a top idea, to put this in perspective it had been 20yrs since I'd last ridden a bike and they were dirt bikes, back then I'd gotten my learners licence but not long after sold the bike so never did anything more with my licence.... Tony reakoned he had the ideal answer... a pile of 1987 DR250, he had sold it as a potential runner and it had been returned... they did get it running but the carb was so calcified up it couldn't be used
Two box's of woodies and he even offered to drop it round to the shed deal

The start


Motor has next to no compression left and no carb.... but it came with a spare motor that someone had pulled the cam cover and cam off and left outside long enough there was moss in there, but the oil was clean and it felt like it had a good top end.... a bit of swop around and a second hand carb and it'll be away n racing

Think I might brake this down into managable bits thats enough typing for me for today

Cheers Reece

Epic I love a good challenge Ill be keeping a good eye on this one Reece.

now I had something to start with I had to work out what to do with it you guys like bikes and have had that passion for a long time, me I was so far from it... other than a couple of retirement resto's I had sitting in one of the old mans sheds (that I'd get around to one day) and a daft idea for a 2 up front trike similar to the adrenaline I hadn't thought about bikes in yrs.... so onto the internet for a bit of inspiration I wasted days going from one site to the next reading old build threads, found some really good information... rake & trail, frame building, balance, tyre size etc
About the only thing I could commit to (kept changing my mind every time I seen something cool ) was I wanted to hard tail it .... so mocked up wheel base and sat down and calculated how much rake I could get away with and still have resumble handling
About this time a pomy mate of mine had one of her old friend coming out for summer he was a custom bike and trike builder from the UK (porky trikes) could he hang round the shop sweet as
Well that was the beginning of alot of wasted days drinking piss and telling tales thankfully I didn't have alot on at the time

We did achieve a little bit on the bike on occasion First was the tank.... the DR was early enough to have a steel tank so I figured a bit of massaging and a bit of trimming it might make a good chopper tank, so filled it with water and cut the bottom out


Then marked it out for a bit of a tuck


Then since I had the right tools I flanged an overlap on one side


A few spot welds later and


Since the pair of us had been all nostalgic about the 70's choppers I decided to trim the front of the tank so it would look right sitting up high on a steep frame .....and wanted to change the look from the original tank.... kind of got a bit carried away on this


We put the tank aside at this point so we could work out how to mount it to the frame this is where we kinda realised our mistake the little motor wasn't going to work in a tall open frame and the forks were no where near long enough to reach hmmmm time for another direction....

After a lot more mocking up and discussing (drinking...) decided to rake out the front as far as practical, don't want any odd handling as this is the first bike in 20yrs lol and stretch it out a bit boober style
So mocked up tyres, forks, motor and me a real balancing act bits propped up... me sitting on a bit of scrap with a flat welded on top at seat height and feet resting on jack stands.... we ended up with something I felt comfortable and cliff reakoned was cool or what ever the welsh equivalent is

This left one problem the forks were too long thats an easy fix....
The spare bits that came in the box of bike included a disk front end (minus caliper) I figured I'd rebuild the drum front end using the spare parts from the disk forks and just shorten the forks down in the lathe

Started pulling the forks apart... or trying to.... one of the allen key bolts on the bottom wouldn't come undone and the oil in the other side was a gritty rust coloured sludge
After trying all the tricks I could think of to get the allen key out, without success and rusty gunk that was getting washed out of the other leg decided we would have to go with the other set the disk brake ones The oil was clean, no rust just blown seals, after we pulled them apart discovered why the seals were shot, the guides were worn out, Rang up the local zuk dealer $30 for seals all good got them in stock... "your guides can't be worn out they never go..." asked the mech if its normal for the fork tubes to show wear marks "yep they are gone, will have to call you back we don't have a part number for them..." Rings back the next day to tell me $150..... each!
Na!

A bit of measuring I found the rusted forks have good guides, took a bit to get them out


Once I had some good forks, biffed the staunchens in the lathe and cut them back 30mm and threaded them to take the end caps...


Just going to pre-load the spring on advice from the bike mech filled them with 30wt mono oil

Time to do the frame

I read all the stuff online about frame building.... how your sposed to build a jig first so everything is nice en true, but..... I kept looking at the expense of all that steel and couldn't justify it for one little bike

So I did what I do when I'm building bar work for 4wd's, I wire framed it to concept my lines



With my lines sorted started to build.... This bit might upset some of you, if you buy into the american bs about using pipe, the pipe we have here is alot better grade than what the americans seem to get I've spent alot of time researching it
Any way to keep costs down I used 19Nom black pipe for the smaller tube and 25Nom for the larger tube these are all offcuts from doing bar work on mates trucks so haven't cost me anything

Started off with the two bars under the motor
Welded some scrap box onto the ends so I had somewhere to rest the angle gauge


Then using a chinese pipe crusher style bender that I'd modified to work properly These things do work if you use them right, I've used mine to make competition roll cages I even bend tube with it

The flat on the end is there so I can follow the twist the pipe does as it bends and try and copy for the other side, the angle of the bend is set by measuring on the pipe itself

More to come

What mods did you make to the pipe bender? I can see the weld on it.

Yup who needs a frame jig aye ?

Irishjon wrote:

What mods did you make to the pipe bender? I can see the weld on it.

Welded up the sides of the side rollers and polished them up so they work like rub blocks.... found the rollers dint'd the pipe
The smaller die's are all good but the bigger die's needed tightening... heated them up and crushed them in the vice then welded bracing on the bottom then ground the die's with a die grinder to get them to fit nice and tight
I've used it like that for 4wd cages and bar work for yrs no issues with kinking
I've modified it to bend U bolts and made up a few slippers that fit inside the die's so I can bend tube, works alright on the smaller dia stuff up to 25mm

Woody wrote:

Yup who needs a frame jig aye ?

A rafters square, plumb line, tape measure and chalk.... all ya need

I do like the wire frame outline idea, This frame has great lines and real good proportions.
Should be a blast to ride, heaps of ground clearance etc.
By the way before you start slagging off the D.O.M. tube, The main reason I use
it when modifying Harley frames is that its what the factory use and its the correct size
ie imperial vs metric.
Its also seamless therefore stronger than your seamed tube, Plus the fact its nicer to bend and its finish is perfect (no clean up needed before you start welding etc)
However in saying that the tube your using will be more than adequate for the job your doing.
Harley's are a different kettle off fish, If you build a weak section into a frame the harmonics of the engine will find this area and slowly but surely crack or fracture it leading to failure.
Keep up the great work.. I look forward to your next instalment.

I'm not bagging "DOM" if I could get it I'd be using it, (well maybee not for this project, bit out of budget ) problem is the NZ market for specialty metals is to small and motor sport doesn't take into account new carbon steels so theres no specs ... its cromoly or mild steel
The closest thing we have here is ASTM line pipe its not as high tensil but it is seamless and is about a 3rd stronger than black pipe and I use alot of it but list it as mild

Since I'm parked up in bed (back pain is too bad to go into workshop) here's another installment

Since the bottom two pipes are the worst (matching 3 dimensional bends) I sorted them first... as I did the first one I made notes on angles, how far the die was from the top of the bender housing lengths to center of bends and rotation angles then tried to copy them for the other side... I say try because between the "lay" of the tube (As you bend pipe it rotates a bit for each bend) and the rub blocks dragging in the bender (this can drag one side in more than the other changing lengths)
All my die's have a center mark that I line up my center of bend marks on the tube with as you bend your pipe will flake the scale off loosing the center mark but so long as I had it lined up at the start I watch the dies to see if they move to one side and adjust things if its too bad
The lay I tweek into line in the vice I know its sort of cheating but its the best trick I've come up with
Any way here's the two pipes pin'd into position for comparison


This allowed me to lift the pipes in and out to grind the fishmouth to the front upright
To save work I'd cut the rear axle adjustment plates off the swingarm when I offered this section of the frame up to them it just didn't look right


So a couple of really auckward bends later....


Alot better

The top bars were alot easier as they were all in one plane


Here its all together



Think the lines come up really well

That looks the shit alright. Really like how the lower rail meets the axle plate.
And yeah that API or seamless line pipe is good too but the finish on it sucks
big time. Are you still going to use that tank that you cut up ?

Na the only way that tank would have worked was if I had alot steeper and taller top tube so I tossed it.....
found a tank at a mates that is from a failed NZ motorbike.... Agri, was a fat wheeled farm bike got a real cool shape sort of english look

I kinda jumped ahead of my self a bit.... you might have noticed the new road tyre on the back and if your real good the fact that the rear wheel don't look like the alloy DR one

Having a measure up of the DR rear rim found it can't take a very wide tyre so decided to see what I could pick up off trademe.....
after getting scam'd by some tosser on tardme who measured the outside of the rim bead, instead of the inside as I discribed.... swopped it to a mate for some mechanic'ing
I picked up a GN250 rear wheel, axle and swingarm for $80
Was keeping an eye on trademe for a cheap tyre when this happened

A mate of who owns a tyre shop down the road calls past the shed one arvo.... been doing a bit of engineering work on his stocky and helping out in the pits ... any how he has bought himself a new T5 trans and a mate gave him a top shift setup... all good he pulled things apart, but once he pulled it apart found the jig saw puzzle was more than he could deal with.... could I put it back together and maybe fit the shifter he even had the bits that he could leave me with

One morning later I call him up "all done"
"Great, great what do I owe you..."
"Na na its all good I can't charge ya I'm pitting for ya..."
"Look I've got to give you something...."
"Bugger it then find something interesting for the rat bike..."
"Sweet..."

Comes past and grabs the rear rim....
Next week rock up with a new Maxxis rear all fitted up... no charge
So we load up his trans into the back of his tyre truck

Now there is two corners and a round about between my shop and his

He rings me up an hr later
"seen the side door flap open on the second corner.... but figured it will be alright shops not far will shut it when he gets there...."
Yea well as he is driving round the roundabout watches the trans slide out the side door and self destruct as it hit the road .... nothing worth sallvaging
He sold the stocky in the end.... just did two meetings but I think that had more to do with the stick he got in the pits

That is disgustingly cheap, I hate it when people make everything themselves and don't buy parts

Seriously though, it looks pretty good

Edit: and what a waste of a trans

Been a bit busy, made the call to wind up my business as I'm looking at surgery... ACC will cover my drawings but not my out goings so it was the only option, I've got it down to just one job left to finish (and alot of crap to sell)... well two I want to get the rat bike done to the paint stage so after surgery I can do that

so I'll be getting this up to stage

First off I braced the neck... had to follow the lines for the frame, then the back support bar for the motor all looks good then after main lines on the bike I mounted the motor.... and mounted the motor and mounted the motor lol



Looked good till I got to the back engine mounts and they grated on me, tube and tab... na just didn't look right
So


Gota find a better way to do it.... after a bit of faf'n round I came up with this


Now that worked looks alot ... funky'er
On to the front, made up some bits to bolt to the motor, but this needs to bolt right out to remove the motor so I decided to drill the frame and weld in some solid bung's that I could bolt to


Here they are welded in


That worked well so do it on the back as well


all done



Naaaa.... that original back one didn't... flow with the rest so ditched that.... again lol and this is what I came up with



Thats more like it... done

Damm that looks mint! Would love to have the gear (and skills) to to this.

The skill's are self taught, I started with the old man's welder and went from there... don't be afraid to start

Another bit... the pegs and pedals
I liked the pipe and plug look of the engine mounts so played around on that idea for the frame to hold the pedals
kept looking at the pedals and thinking they were just low enough I needed folding pedals in case I lean it too far... dont like the idea of catching a fixed pedal lol but I couldnt come up with a way to spring them that looked good till I tried this


Using lengths of galv pipe and second hand heater pipe from a wreck, the heater pipe acts like a rubber spring to keep the peg down and it can fold up and back

decided to put the clutch on the left foot pedal just for a bit of fun lol, going to put the gear shift on the side of the tank

Next bit the seat
This was paint by numbers, I have found heaps of how too's on this.... so machined up a couple of bits to make a hinge, made a seat pan out of some rusty scrap, put a curve in it to keep my ass on there and then beat the sides to a down slope where my legs sit
then a frame to join the hinge to the pan a couple of valve springs from a wrecked motor and all good sat on it to see how cumfy lol not! .... I dont know what motors Americans use for valve springs but with two of them I couldnt get them to move and my ass an't a light weight lol

a bit of playing round I found 2 lots of 2 worked.... so tweaked the frame to sort of hide the extra spring.... because it just sorta looked ugly lol

Nice lines. I really like cool brackets instead of some old bent plate. Woody's frames are always good like that.

Need to get this upto date as I'm working on it now lol next bit was the fuel tank
I bin'd the original blue one, it would have only worked on a steep frame and I sort of changed the look I wanted lol started off chopper style... then a cafe racer cross and then this a boober/chopper cross, alot different from my normal builds lol
Any way i spotted this tank at a mates (the same collector) it was on a home bake trike, told him I was keen on it but Im too cheap to buy the whole lot, he sold it to someone else but he did tell the bloke I was keen on the tank and the project, turns out he had bought it just for the motor so he gave the tank to me lol
so here it is



turns out its from a kiwi outfit that back in the eighties they made farm bikes a 125 & 175 with fat wheels, I can vagely remember them... it was about the time the atc honda trikes came out
lol I pity the poor resto dude who see's what I did to a near mint tank

First off I wanted to see what the rust was like inside so I cut the bottom out of the tank


then gave it a bit of shape, I wanted the back end to slim down a bit... but still keep the cool embossed bits


Next was how far to cut it to fit round the top tube.... never thought of using photoshop and I have damm near a degree in computing lol no I carved it out with a grinder


or


or


or


or for the jap look


stewed on it for a bit (Ive never waisted so much time on a project just staring at it lol)
In the end I went with part way down
then beat the snot out of the bottom edge to shrink it so that tank would curve in a bit on the base and then welded a modified base in so the mounts are out of sight


welder started playing up on me almost like it didnt want to hold the voltage settng.... notice some of the welds start flat and gain height.... the end result is they are still good welds just not pretty
got the welder fixed $360 for the guy to come test and replace the voltage dial lol I need to learn electrickery.... it has since die'd again this time I'm selling it lol will be on retardme soon, I'm working on borrowed gear at the moment

Nice work

thank you

Here is a couple of shots of the finished tank



Oh and I forgot the rear brake stay lol keepin with the tube theme


got the seat at home painted up with some foam, got hold of a bit of leather and some of my grandma's old leather work tools... just stuggling with the design lol getting nice form when engineering, no problems... the whole artistic thing arghhh lol its frustrating just cant get it right on paper

Sold the motor out of this as another one has rocked up... traded some 4wd bits for a DR200 lol yea I know Im getting smaller but it comes with a running complete motor and I'm still on budget
So Ive removed the old mounts and I'm in the process of mounting the new motor, nothing much to show at this stage its just been grinding
Did also pick up a rear gaurd for the back... its come of an old AG100 and it was free...


got a bit of rust tho lol


think it looks cool, really got that 70's vib

Started to fit the new motor, the electric start sticks out a fair bit but there is still enough room to do the mounts the same way I did them on the other motor

A wee update got distracted taking the rust out of the rear guard but she is done now

Heres a shot showing how much I had to replace.... would almost have been faster to make a new on lol


Got part of the new mounts done, the motor side of the mounts, hopefully get the motor mounted up this week