posted September 1, 2009 11:55 AM PDT

Gearhead shit...

Thought I'd post this as a blog, because there aren't too many gearheads on the board, and if I'm going to talk to myself then I'm going to do it here.

Anyway, my bike is running pretty good, all things considered. The engine still needs a tune, but I think that, plus some new carb boots on the airbox side, are all it needs. I probably can't afford that shit until it's too cold to ride anyway... so we're just going to ride it a little bit out of tune for now.

But come winter, I've got a whole slew of bench projects to work on. For one thing, I'm tuning the damn engine. But I also have that other engine that I picked up for a steal. So my plan with that guy is to completely rebuild it, top to bottom. In spring, I'm going to swap out the engines. Assuming I don't fuck anything up, that rebuilt engine should be a reliable performer for me, and I can ride that bike almost every day without worrying about breaking down.

The old engine is coming out, and is going to be bored out to 836cc and then rebuilt. Then I'm going to use it in a build up for another bike that will be more of a show piece. My favorite genres of bikes are old early 20th century board track racers, mid century british cafe racers, and 60s/70s Japanese standards (which is what a CB750 is.)

So the bike I want to build up is going to meld all three of those styles by taking a japanese standard, and making it into a cafe board track racer. Plenty of CB750s have been turned into cafe racers before, but I don't think anybody's thrown some board track flavor in the mix. Cafes and board tracks actually have a lot in common in terms of functionality. Both have an agressive stance, short bars, and narrow tanks. In fact, an old glass Dunstall tank for a norton or bsa looks very similar to a board track tank.

So the plan is to take this:



and this:



plus one of these:



and fuse them all together somehow. I'm probably taking the seat, tank and rear fender style from the board track bike, the suspension and controls (bars, gauges, lights, etc) from the cafe, and throwing them onto a cb750 frame and motor. It's possible, I think.

last updated September 1, 2009 12:48 PM PDT