Monday, February 18, 2013

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!












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