Pablo's Next Project

I bought another bike yesterday. Here she is...



Not really my style, but I'm sure I'll grow to love her.

Another dual-sport Sportster project?

Sort of, but not really. Final plans will be announced Christmas day...

That is some class right there!!

So a question on the CB you sold to get this bike. I jsut finsihed reading the build and on the last page you jsut come out with the fancy yellow fairing and body panels. Did you have them all along? You mentioned that the previous woner was good with fiberglass, did he make that stuff and jsut could not get the mechanics/electronics sorted out?

NExt question. Did you even get that NX turbo project running? Or was that scrapped.

Love all your work.

Tell me about it. I wish I bought it a month ago so I could ride it around for Halloween.

Yes, and yes. The fairings where the only reason I bought the project. The PO owned Morse Racing (now defunct) which made race bike body kits. He really knew what he was doing when it came to fiberglass and paint, but he was no mechanic.

I always questioned the particular model turbo that I was using on that bike. I eventually realized that I was going to have so much time and money invested into that bike that I really needed to put the proper turbo on it, but I didn't have the money for it so I parked it on the back porch. Now I have the money, but I have so many other higher priority builds that it just sits there. I really want to finish it and I'm sure I will, I just hope it's sooner rather than later.

I find it satisfying that with all the awesome bikes you build, your DR350/250 is the bike you seem to ride the most.

You are an inspiration to us all.

Carry on!

By FAR, it gets the most seat time. And it has as much or more time into its build as any of my custom bikes, and it's as unique as any of my custom bikes, but when people look through my garage, no one ever asks about it because it looks completely stock. Only people who ride DR's and have read my build thread are interested in hearing about it.

When I ride with someone new and they ask me what model it is I say it's a DR250 (hey, that's what the VIN says it is and if I called it a DR440 they wouldn't know what I was talking about). I was on one ride a couple years ago where we had a lot of distance to cover on some wide open dirt roads. I was flat tracking around the corners at 50-60 MPH. At the end of the ride one of they guys looked surprised and said "you can really make the 250 move." It's a total sleeper bike.

That looks old enough to be a kick-starter chopper which makes it cool.
It could use a F Y F F F sticker somewhere.

It's a 1970 Ironhead which was the first year they were elec start only. It looks like it's not too hard to install a kickstart which is one of the things I intend to do with it.

The hardtail isn't as bad as I would have thought, except for washboards on dirt roads which are completely unbearable. Luckily the bike was never converted to forward controls and with the ape hangers I can stand up to take the bumps. I'm sure it looks odd when I ride this thing standing up. I'm also sure it looks odd with me wearing a full face helmet on it. :huh

I don't know what it is, I usually don't like this style of bike, but I actually would ride that one the way it sits. Well, maybe I'd paint over the airbrushing.

The bike seems PERFECT.
Perfect for that type of bike.
Other than installing a kick starter what are you going to be doing to it.

I would like to see a picture of you riding it offroad, while wearing a full face MX helmet, and a suit.

Yep, and I hate to deconstruct what someone else put together, but there's a reason this bike was a lot cheaper than it should have been and it's because of the way it looks and rides. My most memorable rides are typically 200+ miles per day off road. I don't want to be that guy bitching about 150 miles on asphalt. The tins will get clear coated (which they are not currently) and will get passed on to someone who will use them, as will the springer.

Full plans to be announced Christmas day. I'll give you a hint: the bike's a pre-1975 Sportster.

If I can take it out before it snows I'll try to get that photo for you.

At some point in the bike's history a bolt rubbed on the rear drum cover and put a giant gouge in it. I thought I should go ahead and take care of this.



Cleaned and welded:


And sanded back down (not perfect, but this bike's not going to be perfect)

I've also started to tear into the primary to try and stop an oil leak (pointless endeavor on an old Harley, I know) and see if anything else needs to be fixed.



I called the dealership to get new clutch seals. The guy took about 20 minutes to tell me most of the seals for this bike are discontinued. He can get one of them, but he would have to charge me for 10 of them because that's the minimum quantity he can order them in and he won't be able to sell the rest. I'm guessing I won't be relying on the dealership much for this project.

XR750 replica?

The bike's been starting well, but I haven't been taking it out on long rides, so I thought I wouldn't hurt to put it on a trickle charger. After two days the battery still wasn't at full charge and it sounded like the acid in the battery was boiling so I took the charger off. It was just a little battery tender like this:



Can anyone tell me what's going on with my battery?