xbr500 cafe racer build

[carbonmoto]

I have just posted my into in the (believe it or not )introduction section, that will give you an idea why my lad & myself are building this bike.
This bike was to be built for a customer & the build was started at the end of july,the only stipulations we have are
1 to be road legal
2 be done to the given budget
3 to be done in 2 months completed with mot ( we still have to make the carbon parts & cafe racer seats so can only spare a couple - max hours a day at the moment)
so i can do what i really want with this little beauty.
before it came to us someone had tried to cafe it & failed miserably,
the original handlebars were put under the top yoke, had a custom stainless exhaust built
unfortunately its more like street fighter than cafe racer, & then lost the fuel tank, lucky we have a few in stock & moulds to make others
it had been left in a garage not running for a few years
started out looking like this

the first thing we did was to get it running, put fresh fuel in the small tank we use, connected a charged battery, pulled the choke on & stabbed the start button & expected nothing - it proved me wrong turning over & firing up first try & ticked over smoothly till warm then ran perfectly off the choke - hope the rest of the build goes like this
next had a play with some seats & tanks we have to get the look we want (roughly)

after a couple of hours today the bike was just a pile of bits

[carbonmoto]

soda blasted the frame added some gussets where the side panels fit, filled all the welds,finished flatting, filling & re priming the frame spent 4 hours doing that!!
Then managed to get the frame, swinging arm, side stand & torque arm in acid etch primer,bright base coat silver,then candy "fools gold" a finished with lots of coats of 2 pack lacquer.
The engine has been stripped of its covers to be polished, the whole lot has been degreased & wire brushed, the rocker cover has been cleaned & lightly polished. the rest inc crank cases have been painted in gloss black engine enamel. all the bolts nuts etc have been replaced with stainless allen bolts

[carbonmoto]

a couple of weeks into the build the owner came in to pay his parts bill, or thats what i thought he was going to do
instead we had the kleenex speech that goes like -
" i cant afford to do this bike anymore (even though we are well under budget so far)
lost my job girlfriend pregnant, car failed mot, etc, etc"
passed him the tissue - metaphorically speaking
& told him he couldnt take the bike until he had paid the parts & labour so far.
was this another project never to be finished?
nope i agreed to give him a small amount of cash (well i am a sympathetic yorkshire man)& let him off with what he owed us
15 mins later he came back with the log book.RESULT
Now the pressure is off to meet the deadline but will still try to keep it close
SOD THE BUDGET, its mine now - off to see the guy that does my chrome with loads of bits then ordered every other nut & bolt i dont already have in stainless,

so after the working day had finished i decided to spend a couple of hours building the engine up, putting the polished cases on & changing every bolt for a stainless allen bolt.
All looked good


Then just as i was tightening the genny cover down it all went pear shaped
IN A BIG WAY

I used an allen bolt & washer on the genny wire retaining clip bolt, which must have been touching the crank case, i wouldnt mind but i was hardly tightening it not swinging on it like a bloody monkey!
New casing ordered pretty quickly!!

[carbonmoto]

Had another look at the seat we were going to use for this bike & it looks too wide at the back & a bit bulky too, so i got my lad who is an ace plug maker(does all ours) to make a seat plug especially for this bike he only had 1 day as he was needed to make seats that have been sold.
Whilst he was doing that i prepped the tank for painting ready to make the moulds.
This is what we ended up with after a bit of black 2k paint. mould making started today.
I tried to get new swinging arm & wheel spindles from honda as these were a bit grotty,but they are no longer available so had a word with my chromer who plated the nut ends, not only that but he also plated the end that pokes through the nut just before the thread (i never asked him to - but thats one of the reason i use him)
The chrome engine mounts came back so in went the engine

By the 10th of August the new engine casing is back & on the bike.
the bike is back on its old wheels while the new spoked ones are being rebuilt,(did i forgot to mention i was changing the horrid comstars for spoked wheels. been tight & not prepared to spend £600 on gb500 wheels i had a look through all the bike data i have & chose a used front & rear wheel to fit) had to put it on the wheels so we could get the right level for the tank to fit.
The mould was made for the seat & tank,m out popped a carbon seat made especially for this bike just like the chain guard,
this is how it is looking at the moment

[carbonmoto]

By the end of August WHY DOES EVERYONE GOES ON HOLIDAY?
SOD ALL DONE ON THIS BLOODY PROJECT!!!
The guy that builds my wheels has gone away so cannot get my wheels done for at least 2 weeks & the chromer has gone away for a week whilst he still has a few bits from the bike that i need.
The 2 months is up looming & due to these spiteful people taking holidays just to slow this project down, i wont make it. but it doesnt matter s its my bike now not the customers.
had a few disasters this week
1 put the spoked rear hub in the parts washer to get all the solid grease off & a great chunk of e metal fell out around one of the bearing mounts & noticed one of the cush rubber mounts had been glued back on - into the scrap ally bin
2 couldnt find another of the same rear hub or wheel anywhere so ended up buying a another type of wheel from the early 80's honda
3 that cost me another £60
4 the front disc i had was warped (cost me another £22 for 2 mint ones delivered)
on the plus side the offsett on the rear wheel is perfect just need to make some spacers
2 found a small company that will make me a sprocket for the wheel in xbr pitch within 7-10 days for a good price
3 got the front hub spaced up & painted it in the same colour as the frame
4 bought new braided oil lines, my lad uses a place who is very good on price & fastens them to the original connector- looks clean & new but standard
5 finished tank, front mudguard rear & mudguard moulds & made a carbon chain guard
6 polished oil tank & breather fitted back in the frame
we are getting there slowly,
7 also shaved 2mm of the caliper carrier so everything is aligned & working on the front.
we are getting there slowly,
2 weeks into september f& everything slowed down we are very busy.I am in the process of getting 2 web sites sorted one for the ducati carbon & the other for the cafe racer parts, lots of photo taking & adding items to the data bases.
i decided that as everyone else was on holiday & i couldnt get my parts so i wouldnt get much done on the bike & business was quiet i might as well join them. So i had a few days off too
The body work is coming along nicely, the tank cover came out of the mould today, the seat unit, mudguards(front & rear), & chain guard are all made just need paint & lacquer.Polished wheel spacers made & hopefully collected the spoked front wheel along with the front mudguard brace from the chromer,

[carbonmoto]

The good news is
First week in october we have it on its own SPOKED WHEEL as a rolling bike
with all spacers are correctly sized, both mudguards have been lacquered as has the chain guard, the inner tank has started to be fabricated & i have even started to make the rear set plates (no pics yet as they still look a bit rough.My lad finished all this weeks jobs this morning so didnt have anything on for today, we have been trying to work out what to do with the exhaust as its a bit grotty even though it was a purpose made stainless system(probably about 10 years ago!we had a quote for the 2 downpipes from a so called mate (he is when he wants carbon bits making he is not when i want an exhaust making) the robbing git wanted £200 for the down pipes alone. anyway my lad decided to have a go at cleaning & polishing them up even if we ended up matt blacking them (they were very rough).See the picture below for what he did, managed to do both in an hour or so.
I was away at a trade show for 3 days so not much will be done on the bike


Last week the bike started coming together quite quickly, the bad news is i still havent done the wiring (still filling me with dread!!well actually fear)
Managed to get both mudguards lacquered & now fitted, fabricated a stainless collector box & my lad polished it up & got it all fitted up with the new mega on.Fitted the new braided oil pipes up to the tank & fitted them along with new o rings.
Started to cut the backing plates out for the rear sets, they should be done & fitted next week
Then i WILL do the electrics - honest

[carbonmoto]

THIS WEEK
I have been a brave lad this very brave indeed :shock:
FINALLY
I have spent most of Monday & Tuesday sorting the electrics probably 8 hours in total.Removing all the wiring not needed like indicator, rear & brake light warning system, side stand switch & clutch switch. Also removed all those dodgy taped & crimped Honda joints replacing them with proper soldered joints covered in heat shrink & extended the cdi, starter solenoid & rectifier wires so they fit in the seat hump, the rectifier sits under the carbon undertray, see pic 2.to keep nice & cool, everything works as it should, turns over on the button & i even get a spark. Did have a panic moment when i couldnt get the clock lights (illumination not warning) so ran a positive & negative straight to the wires & still nothing put test light across the feeds & we had light, nothing i had done wrong just 4 blown bulbs in both of the clocks.
Fitted the new gold o ring chain & carbon chain guard & made the carbon number plate & rear light bracket today, unfortunately i dropped the led rear light & it now does all sorts of strange things, 3 bulbs on all the time only half the bulbs come on for the brake light, some leds brighter than others, must have cracked the pcb (ordered another one today along with a new battery)
Wednesday i fitted the choke & throttle cables bled the oil system up.
The only jobs left to do are lacquer the tank & seat & do the graphics on them, chequers down the center of both in the same colour as the rest of the bike, finish the rear sets,make the mounting brackets to fasten the seat unit to the undertray which is secured to the frame, make & fit the starter to battery / solenoid lead, wire the new rear light & fit the number plate then its done just in time for winter!!



Now we are up to date i will post as work is done

[dungbug]

Great write up and shaping up to be a very impressive bike as well, looking forward to the next update.

[TerraRoot]

awesome colours, are those shocks a bit too short?

[carbonmoto]

thanks for the comments.
the shocks are the same length as standard, a couple of people on other forums have said the same, i think its the angle that the photo is taken at,
I even checked the length the honda specs to make sure the previous ones were correct.

[TerraRoot]

If the shocks are right them maybe the seat is down a bit too low on the frame then?
on the other hand maybe i've spoken too soon, finished in the flesh it may look quite different

[carbonmoto]

Not done a lot recently, i went on holiday for a couple of weeks, came back got whooping cough felt sh1t for 4 weeks & then spent the first week back at work catching up with the things that didnt get done whilst i wasnt up to much.
Anyway last week i had just about caught up so i did a bit on the xbr, here is what i managed to get done
Both side rear sets were roughly cut out of plate ally & fitted with the carbon heel guards,
& i got the first few coats of lacquer on the tank & seat unit, just need to flat it back & do the artwork silver base coat & the same fools gold as the frame,down the center of both, possibly on wed or thurs this week - then lots more lacquer over the lot
THIS PROJECT HAS TAKEN TOO LONG & WILL BE FINISHED BY THE END OF THIS YEAR (honest :oops: )

As i promised i will get this finished this year so did some more work on it today.
My favorite job of all painting with a bit of masking too (about an hour in total masking the tank & seat).
Before masking i flatted the body work back with 240 grit on the da & lacquered the carbon to fill in the imperfections in the resin,(which you always get in the form of tiny pin holes) repeat this a couple of times, this gives a nice perfect surface, flatted the 8 or so coats of clear back using various grades of wet & dry down to 800.
First pic are both units masked & ready to apply the silver base coat
Then the base coat applied
& lastly in fools gold.
tomorrow i will be removing the masking which will take hours, lightly flatting the new paint back to remove the ridges & then clear coat over the lot, probably 10 -15 coats so the checkers are laying flat & there is a depth to the finish

[carbonmoto]

Well i couldnt wait to get into work this morning to rip all the masking off, took me around 2 hours to unmask & then remove all the glue that the paint mask left behind.
I just had to try them on the bike! i always get this excited when doing paint work.

A quick flat with 800 wet & dry a good wipe with panel wipe, a rub over with the tack cloth & back in the booth for quite a few (read lots) of coats of 2 pack lacquer,I used 700ml on these 2 parts (can paint 1/2 a car with that)


In between the numerous coats of clear i decided the front disc looked bland so i decided to drill it in a similar pattern to the standard xbr disc - get this fitted tomorrow after counter sinking it

[dungbug]

Lovely job, cracking finish you've got there gent.

[carbonmoto]

Many thanks for the comment
really appreciate it
just the foot pegs & hangers to finish off then its done.Seat pad should be ready on monday.
Will get it mot'd come the better weather (around april)ready for the shows.
We will be building 3 x gs550's as soon as we get back in the new year & these should be finished by april (yes all 3 of them)