Finally started putting it back together.

[Maxticate]

Hi,

the start of this can be found in the getting to know you section of the forum. via this link viewtopic.php?f=32&t=8994.

Long story short I bought a ZXR400 race bike way back when. I stripped it down completely with the intention of giving it a good going over and cleaning it up. As is nearly always the way I ended up with a box of bits and bike parts everywhere and nothing much of note happened for around 2 years.

The bike originally came to me looking like this,







The guy started it up and ran it for a while, I looked and listened and when warm revved the engine a bit. After that i stripped it down with the intention of rebuilding it. So far that hasn't happened, I have never even ridden this bike!

In the years that have followed I have stripped the frame and wheels down to metal, purchase a compressor, paint and paint equipment to give it a respray.

Last week after having put it off for ages because of the fear of messing it up I decided "what the hell, if I wanted a professional finish I would have paid a professional to do it, just get on and spray the bloody thing"

So now I am determined to get it rebuilt for summer and run it on a trackday as I always intended.

I started spraying the wheels last weekend and have just done the frame parts today. Here are the photos.



















Here's a film of the frame spinning



The frame parts were stripped with nitromoors and a wire brush then sandblasted to remove the stubborn paint. They came back really rough, I was hoping for a better finish on them, more like a bead blasted finish, however I had to make do with what I got.

The wheels were stipped with nitromoors, a wire brush, elbow grease and much cursing!

The stripping was all done a long time ago! I purchased the paint form a local company who were very helpful. Their website is here http://www.mkpe.co.uk/.

I purchased a #8 etch primer, colour coats in blue and yellow and a 1 pack clearcoat. I also purchased a decent 3M spray mask to stop the linings of my lungs being painted

I dusted off then degreased the parts, I put two primer layers on each of the wheels, cleaned out the gun and put on two layers of colour coat. Then I cleaned the gun out again and clear coated the parts twice. The settings on the spraygun were just put in with trial and error. I tried to get a decent spray pattern from around 4 inches and would play with the paint and air settings until I got it.

There were quite a few runs and accidents due to my technique and this being my first time using a compressor and spray gun. But I didn't mind as i really just want the thing back together and working. Plus I'm ascribing to the 50/100 rule I read on another forum, if it looks good 50 feet away dong 100 miles an hour then it's good enough. The paint job will certainly pass that test.

The body work of the bike is going to be a vibrant yellow colour, sort of buttercup/camel yellow. When I first thought up the colour scheme in my head it looked quite good. Now I'm a little worried it may turn out looking like a Jewsons lorry or like I got it from HSS. But after dropping £120 on the paint there is no going back now!

This appalling picture attempted in paint will help visualise the final colours.



Max

[Mori Man]

Hi Max,

Well done for having the courage to go the full strip down and re-build route.

Done my CG125 with Blue frame / swinger/ wheels (smoothrite) and Yellow bodywork - looked good with the chrome, so try polishing up the fork lowers , rearsets, can hanger , can etc....

Nice colour of Blue BTW

MM!

[Maxticate]

Cheers Moriman,

Any chance of a photo of the CG125 so I can see what the final look may be like? Also how much effort is it to polish those parts you mentioned? I don't want a high maintenance finish on it either if I can help it as it is a track bike only.

Max

[Mori Man]

Didn't have digi cams back then so quality aint the best.

CG125.jpg

Blue: Frame , swinger , centre and spokes out to inner rim or wheels , rocker cover , center engine casings , tail light holder , peg bar

Yellow: Bodywork and brake hubs

Last time I heard 6 people had past their test on it - centre thought it was taining company bike !

Most times I just strip the paint or laquer off the part in question and polish with Autosol and a cotton rag. I did however use polishing mops and soap on my ZXR apart from the fork bottoms.

Best keep painted if you want low maintenance.

MM!

[RedexRobB]

Nice shade of blue, i like that

[Maxticate]

Slow progress but keeps moving on. It'd help if I could remember where all the bolts and things went.

Had a time with the suspension today trying to remember if the bracket was spaced out or not and then tried carefully loosening the banjo bolt and moving the shock hose to allow better routing for the reservoir and ended up spilling oil from the banjo bolt

So that'll have to be sent away to be recharged at some point.

So far anyway.

[Maxticate]

Remind me never to try and fit tyres again when I'm ill! My knees and back ache like crazy now and i feel even worse than when I started.

First time for me trying to fit my own tyres, I'm trying to get Dunlop alpha 10's onto my freshly painted rims.

The front tyre is done and dusted, albeit with two big scratches in the new paint work on the rim. I can accept this. I already thought it would be difficult to mount tyres onto painted rims without some kind of scratching or gouging occurring.

The back tyre is being a total b**** :smt013 , Whatever I do I can't get the thing on. Anyone got any tips before I admit defeat, take it to the fitters and waste even more money. I'd been hoping to be able to do all my tyres

[RedexRobB]

new rims, new tyres and your doing it yourself? Id rather have spent the money and got a fitter to do it personally.

Umm, i guess doing it when your feeling better and you dont ache would be a good start. After that, brute force?

[edl]

doing your own tyre's piece of piss, squirt of fairy liquid run it round edge of tyre both sides, good tyre lever's at least 12" long, pop on the go, oh probably helps if you have been working out for several years

[Tirpitz]

It's just not worth the hassle fitting your own tyres as Mr Redex says. See if a local firm will do you a fit to a loose wheel with your own tyre. Speak to the mechanics themselves. My local branch of a national tyre firm will remove an old tyre, dispose of it, fit new, with valve and balance all for £10 per wheel - on the day the boss is off, cash in hand to the fitter and Bob's yer uncle. For £10 I can't be arsed.

[Maxticate]

After some more research I have an idea what was going wrong with the back tyre now.


I'm pretty sure the tyre soap kept allowing the upper bead to seat itself so what I'll do this time is use no soap on the first half of the rim and also tie the bottom two beads together with a ratchet strap that I'll then remove when it's all seated.

I'm going to give it one more go soon and then if it still doesn't work it'll be up the road to the tyre fitters.

I think the thing that pushed me to try it myself was that I like to do all the work on my bikes if I can. Also I phoned one place and they said it'd be £30 to fit two tyres to bare rims and balance them. They wouldn't even discount it for not having to get rid of the old tyres. As I am going to have 3 pairs of tyres to change this year that's £90 straight off. 1 dry track set 1 wet track set and a pair on my road bike (they really need doing!). The other place I have used which is very good is still £25 a pair of bare wheels.

I can't wait to get this thing into a rolling chassis so I can get it nicely out the way and spray the tank and body work. I really want to get it together and hear it running again!

Max

[Maxticate]

SUCCESS

It was exactly what I thought it was. It must have been the illness clouding my thinking on the day. I trod on the tyre at six o'clock and held the two beads together with a strap. Straight away I could tell I had more slack. The tyre went on like a dream till about 10 and 2, a quick flurry with the levers and it was done. I pulled the strap out with no trouble and it was ready to inflate. Bit scary popping the bead out as one area wouldn't go till about 55 PSI but it's all done now. There was a bit of paint chipping right on the edge of the rim but I've got an airbrush on order so I plan to do a tiny bit of touching up anyway.

I'll balance them both on Sunday and get the bike together into a rolling chassis and out the garage so I can do some more spraying (bodywork and tank). I'm very excited now.

Can anyone post a quick list of the order that I should assemble the bike in so I don't make any silly mistakes say like putting the rearsets on before the rear brake caliper torsion beam for example. It has been a long time since I dismantled it and I can't remember the full order I did things in. I know it should be fairly straightforward but any help anyone could give would be great.

Thanks


Max

[Maxticate]

I've assembled the bike into a rolling frame now so I can get it out of the garage.

I attempted to spray the fuel tank, front mudguard and fuel tank front plastic at the weekend. I say attempted because although the fuel tank came out ok I got a bad reaction on the mudguard and fuel tank frontispiece. As I applied the colour coats the paint then blistered. I'll have to strip the lot back to plastic now and do it again.

Here is the fuel tank.







It was not a good day for spraying. It was really windy and so there were lots of bits of grit in the air and being blown around in the garage. I damped down the entrance to the garage and the garage floor and I think that helped a bit but it was nowhere near as good as having a positive pressure filtered booth. The finish on the tank is pretty good but there are some small bits of grit and annoyingly a tiny fibre type thing on it in one place. On the whole though I'm pretty happy, it's shiny already and I haven't even compounded it yet.

I've decided to get the bike together a bit more and then spray up the remaining plastics.

[Maxticate]

Got some more done today in the good weather. The engine is back in the frame now and I've sorted out where most of the wiring look goes. I've fitted up the tank just to take a look, that too has now been reassembled.

I have put some black silicone sealant on the RAM air box, both to protect the frame a little and to seal it better around the join.

Here's the latest pics





I have decided I will remove the oil cooler. I plan to try and replace it with a 2 piece sealing block made from an old black aluminium heat sink I have at work. It will allow oil to flow between the two ports and cool it slightly. Albeit nowhere near as much as the original cooler. If the heatsink isn't thick enough I will make it from a two blocks of aluminium and bolt a heat sink to it.

[Maxticate]

I have replaced the RAM air box after a little adjustment and have managed to get the carbs refitted. I'm not to happy about running the velocity stacks completely open so I will try and find some fine'ish mesh to cover them with. I know it'll reduce the airflow a bit but I don't really want to have to refresh the engine every year as I won't be using the bike for racing.

The throttle cable is back on as is the idle screw and I've plumped for a able tie to operate the choke. It works very well. Last night I refitted the clutch and put on the exhaust system. I did want to polish the BEET system up to bring out the lovely titanium rainbow colours but for the life of me I couldn't find where I had hidden my metal polish. I want to make sure the thing works before spending any more time making it pretty so I will just polish them up next time they are off the bike.

Next step is to fit the oil filter and oil cooler bypass plate. Seal up the alternator cover , refill with oil, fit the radiator, fill with coolant and then try firing her up.