Back in the saddle!

Whew that was fun....not! Whatever the 'bug' that's been going around happens to be officially called I call it 'The Suck of 2013'....and not the nice kind.
Finally seeing the back end of that and back working again.

Jordan's bike for Old Bike Barn's Greasy Dozen build-off is moving forward, frame re-work, a custom swingarm, a front end swap, custom Ducati spoked wheel swap, custom header....loads of work. 
I won't give much away here but will tease you with a few pics and tidbits of info just to stir your interest.

One of the build points I'm handling is a stem swap for a ZX7 front end. It's a standard style 41mm cartridge fork that works quite well but still has a touch of retro for the stylists out there. I've done stem swaps before but this one has been a challenge.

I start by grinding off the weld goober on the bottom then cut a notch in the triple. At this point I can usually whack it with a brass faced deadblow hammer and displace the stem enough to then whack the side of the notch with my 4lb hammer and a drift. This will normally break the weld and I can clean the stem up and go from there. "Usually...."Normally" I said.

 

 

But not this time.......the good little fellows at Kawasaki did a REALY good job welding this one. Really good.....

Can you see the color shift in the metal within the notch? Hmmmm......great weld depth there Yoshiro san! Note that this pic is 'pre-whackage', also note that the original bearing race hasn't been cut completely through as I wanted to be careful not to nick the stem. Fat lotta good THAT did me!

Huzzah for carnage. If at first you don't succeed......chop the shit out of it until it gives up. Always works for me!

I used my angle grinder with a .110" cut off disc and proceeded to chop off each side to make it easier to turn on the lathe. 

Here's the result, lumpy and ragged but sans arms.....

A wee bit of grinder work later to knock off the worst of it and I'm ready to center it in the lathe...

Poor sad little triple clamp......DIE DIE DIE!!!! Sometimes carnage is cathartic! I used to keep a few old gas tanks around just to smash with a mallet when I was feeling cranky. I'm out of suitably bad tanks but this felt pretty good too.

Think of it this way...I'm not beating on people who make me cranky. That's good....right?

After a bit of clean-up on the lathe it looks pretty good. I turned down the base of the stem to 28.95mm, removing roughly 2.05mm for a nice tight press fit into the ZX7's lower triple stem bore which mics at 28.85mm. Obviously there's more to it that just slapping the two into a hydraulic press and mashing away.....but we'll leave that for the next installment.

Yup!

Boo-TAY!!!

I 'found' this on my hard drive.....I don't know where it came from or how it got there....I hate clowns. Ronald McDonald's girlfriend kinda scares me. I'm ok admitting that.....I'm a big, viking scary guy myself and I'd run like hell was on my heals.

Easy like Sunday morning.......

The incomparable Stacy Dash.

Someone's Grandma was a hottie!

You mugs thought I forgot.....be good humans!

Sorry for the lack of action here lately, that little bug I picked up turned out to be pneumonia and by picked up I mean, that's kicking my ass.
I did make it out to the One Show here in Portland, Oregon and saw some pretty neat bikes but between the angry lungs and a few too many the night before, I just didn't get much out of it. Had I managed to feel somewhat more human I'm certain I could have been more inspired and excited.
I'll post a few pics though as soon as I can see straight.....blah

Ariel Arrow 250cc Racer

I do love a weirdo bike! Found this on Bubblevisor, I will have to research this one, I have no idea what it is other than an Ariel 2-stroke racer of some kind. Anyone have any thoughts?

Ok just got the low-down on this one from Richard who goes by 'Teazer' online, who is a wealth of information. Chances are if you need to know something about bikes, be it chassis design points or in this case semi-obscure history he's your guy.

According to this sage source the above weirdobike is An Ariel Arrow 250cc racer, either from the TT or possibly a sprint bike from a fellow named George Brown. 

  

An oddly cute little bugger

A cafe racer version, street trim due to the road lights and license plate on the back.

And a more race oriented beastie. I like it!

George Brown:
http://www.myvincent.co.uk/people/george_brown.php


Some neat pics here:
http://flickrhivemind.net/Tags/arielarrow/Interesting

Loads more images to see here:
https://www.google.com/search?q=ariel+arrow+racer&hl=en&safe=off&client=firefox-a&hs=8aE&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=t1FDUYvZFomPqwGglYHoAQ&ved=0CDMQsAQ&biw=1114&bih=873

Comfort is for your couch, speed hurts.

When I was a kid I had an insanely fast Montessa 350cc something or other in a Rickman chassis. Low pipe, Ceriani forks and Hagon shocks.....like most kids, I didn't know what I had and I sold it cheap....I think I bought a necklace for a girl I liked with the meager money I got for it. I routinely smack myself in the face with a lamp for that. She wasn't worth it. Now I'm homely and didn't even get laid! 

I liked to strip everything off it, sit on a towel with a 1liter pop bottle full of gas taped to the spine so I could go out and drag race on the streets around Kearns Utah where I was stuck. Salt Lake City might as well be on another planet but when you're a kid you find ways to have fun. It was already terrifyingly quick, knobbies and all, take off 40 pounds of stuff and it was a missile for the 1/8 mile. I learned about speed wobbles on that bike. 

Good times......

This will do the trick!

Who steals from a lady?

Dear asshat, douchebag, moose-knuckle,
'we' will do everything we can to make your theft as fruitless as possible. You suck and deserve a curb stomping.
(Am I over protective of my friends? Could be....I guess..)

Remember Jada?

Well, she recently took a nice ride to a scenic spot lots of us know about, Bald Peak State Park and while wandering about taking in the beautiful view some shitheal stole the license plate off her bike. That's low, really low. 

Here's something that I'd appreciate all you good kats passing around, post it up on every forum and every classifieds you can. It's good karma.

From her post:

"On February 2nd I rode out to Bald Peak because it was a beautiful day, and a sketchy man that was there appeared to have taken off with my plate as I wandered down the hill. He may be riding around with it on his bike, or may be selling a bike with my license plate on it.
Ok, what pisses me off, is that he SAW me get off my bike (I am a female rider), and followed me down the hill for a little bit, then turned around. Once I got back up the hill, he was gone and so was my plate. Who steals from a lady?!
Here is a photo of the day that I registered my bike (about a month ago) before I had even put them on. If you see this plate, please report it.
Thanks guys!!"

(To be clear, the curb stomping part was mine....I think Jada may be too nice for that. I'm not.)