I'm Down.

[Scott221]

Whats left of the old bike (now minus the shock)


New frame

And some goodies - What a nightmare the powdercoat was. This stuff is SO thick. To save me having to go around drilling and re-taping every thread, I put as many old screws as I could find in the holes. However, I realised this was a bad Idea when I came to unscrew them and the powder coat had setlle on the thread sticking out the other side. bullocks! Out came the hacksaw and I speant an entire day, hacksawing bolts off!:censored:


Getting the bike to rolling chasis state was fairly simple. Re-greased all bearings and brushes and started to bolt things back up. We were debating on how to get the engine back in.
Me and my Grandad used an old tool-kit trolley some blocks of wood and rags to maneuver it to the middle of the garage then simply dropped the frame over it. 15 minutes of bashing and shacking the frame the engine was sitting snug. Result!!


Then came the mamouth task of re-routing the loom. It may not look like much, but when you've got 7 foot of wiring all in the same place its like trying to get double sided sticky tape off your hands, you get it off one only to get snarled up on the other hand. Absolute nightmare.
The way to do it is to take it in sections, i.e wire up the engine, then the fuel pump, then the radiator rather than trying to do everything at once, the length of wire gives you an rough idea of where things go.

Engine - radiator - exhaust all plumbed in and ready to go. Carbs on!

I bought some stainless steel polishing wheels and gave the system a good going over with the black and decker for 2 hours! Came up nice though!


At this point in the day, the garage was left looking like someone had been bomb testing.:beat:


The garage was in need of a clean, so I thought that was a good enough excuse to get the wheels on and see how it looked out the garage.








All in all, a good days work today. Got a lot of little niggly bits to do, brake lines cable tie-ing stuff, painting the tourqe bar for the rear caliper etc. Sorry for the toad pics, I must have got some oil/grease/sweat/blood (or any other liquid tats involved with bikes) on the lens.

Stay tuned!

[RedexRobB]

Looking good scott, i had the same problem with my loom when installing it. A lot of messing about, i labelled mine up to say which end was which and also numbered the connecters on masking tape so i knew what went where. took me about and hour to get everything in and cable tied!

[Mori Man]

Nice re-build, looking forward to doing mine.

For plastic coating frames ect - I filled the bolt holes with Acrylic sealant and made caps from thin alloy sheet (Plywood would suffice) with a hole drilled in the middle and bolted all the way through (Cheap 4mm threaded bar B&Q) for the bearing cups in the headstock and swingarm mounts.

After the heat treatment the Acrylic dries up and all is needed is a cut around the opening with a new stanley blade and the plugs came out OK.

Don't forget to bare the frame where your coils mount or run some earth straps from them back to the battery or engine ground.

Your certainly sounding a lot more positive about your £50 scraper

[Mori Man]

Just noticed in a photo,

Did you remove the wheel bearings then fit new ones?

Although sealed they will still dry out with the heat process when the plastic coating was done.

[masterofinsanity]

scott thats looking the dogs bollox, bet your well chuffed with it!!

[Scott221]

Yeah, I specifically told the plebs at the powdercoaters to either mask off or remove the bearings. They didn't and the bearings were siezed. So I had to replace them all. Oh well, theres another job done I suppose. The coils have rubber mounts and dount actually touch the frame as they use spacers. I'll be sure to scrape off the podercoat though!

[crushedlizard]

Looking good Scott. Inspiring me to try and save my wreck.

I see you're going for this look:


Apparently that's worth $110 000... yes, $110 000. Read below
http://blog.wired.com/cars/2008/10/confederate-mot.html

[will#224]

I noticed you've got a dent on your swingarm, there is a tidy none damaged one on ebay for £15?

[Ballsout Racing]

That front wheel looks a bit close to the rad !!!
























Running away fast

Seriously though that looks great, sounds like it's going to be one of the best ZXR400s out there

[Wabby]

My front wheel is that close to my rad, and I never get any catching issues etc.

[Scott221]

That front wheel looks a bit close to the rad !!!

Piss off! I even had my struggling brother holding the fairing in the right position whilst I checked how it looked.

[Scott221]

*UPDATE*

Been on holiday for a week and the week before that my internet went down (fucking BT Broadband)

As said before the Loom is all wired up, routed and in place. Just need to attack it with cable ties to neaten it all up and it will be 100% done. As soon as I got home from hols I rampaged through the post to find that my engine nuts had arrived as they nearly rounded off when I was un-doing them, they were on very very tight and nearly snapped :O! I swapped them with the old ones which I had left in place simply to hold the engine secure. Did them up until I nearly fainted from all the blood rushing to my head. Tight is tight as they say. Then it was time to top up the coolant and see if the engine would fire up, or explode and melt...





It works!!!
After a couple of minutes priming the carbs and a handful of choke, she rumbled into life. The exhaust is blowing as it needs a good thrashing to seal hence the knocking noise. All I need to do now is go and pic up my chain from the post office (fucking missed it didn't I!!) and hey presto, someones back OTR. Saying that though my brakes are absolutely awful. Gonna try re-bleeding them and will also attempt to pry out the stuck pistons, but if that doesnt work, its hello Mr Brembo!

[masterofinsanity]

looking good scott!!

[Wabby]

Looking VERY good!

[Scott221]

Hows about one of those badboys for it?