spencermarkd's I had a 2nd gen (now 4G T4R) but mostly just spend all my money on motorcycles thread

Yeah, it’s a fun bunch. Mostly things I didn’t “need” but couldn’t pass up. The IT being the most recent...

Gasser is a 250, it’s a little rocket. That’s my Ducati Hypermotard 1100s, I chopped up the bodywork and cut the termi exhaust apart and rewelded it at a different angle (and shortened the carbon fiber can) Its pretty rowdy- velocity stacks and cams, race ecu, Barnett clutch, quick change rear sprocket. Sounds like a NASCAR engine... I’m a little scared of it. The Beta was by far my favorite and most used machine in the fleet. The 300 lugs like no other 2t motor and she’ll scoot in the upper revs too. Friggin scumbag meth heads got it... insurance just sent me the payoff today (didn’t do great)
The TR I got new and hated it till I figured out all of its quirks... now that I’ve gotten it running like it should and got the front end sorted out (stock fork is shit- I swapped in a Yamaha WR426 fork!) all I do is rack up miles... it’s my commuter and camping machine, 23,000 on the clock and averages 60mpg. It’s getting retired to the cabin when my Tenere 700 gets here (waiting for the hype to die down a little)

edit: forgot- the scooters... oh man, at one point I had like a dozen vintage Vespa and Lambretta scoots. Sold most- the silver one is a Stella (LML Star/Vespa PX150) That’s mostly stock besides tubeless wheels and a pipe and jetting. Just a fun cruiser, errand machine. It’ll do 65mph flat out but 45-50 is where it’s fun. The red one- that’s a 74’ Lambretta Jet 200. I’m building a motor for it currently I’ll post some pics if I’ve got any. Standard cast 200cc cylinder bored to 69mm with a Yamaha RD 250 rod (longer stroke) to get 250cc out of it. Runs a Wiseco piston from a Kawasaki JS440 jet ski with intake windows cut into it, cylinder has a boost port cut in, runs an RD250 reed block/cage. Custom machined cylinder head, o-ringed, old school expansion chamber with a Toomey silencer. I put a hydraulic disk brake and some fancy shocks (rear shock is a re-sprung Yamaha R6 piggyback unit) to keep it somewhat under control, as it’ll creep up on 100mph (feels dangerous as hell- probably cause it is!)

 

Can’t find any pics of the cylinder/piston machining. Too bad, it looks so cool!!

 

The hypermotard sounds pretty terrifying, that has a lot of power stock, but fuck that lambretta sounds like an amazing death trap. 100mph on those tiny ass wheels

Excellent work on the hypermotard though. Hopefully I'll have one in my fleet someday, they just seem like such fun. Didn't even recognize it with the work you've done on it.

 

It’s a sickness

 

that cb is awesome

 

Thanks!

I'm digging your truck and trailer combo. Those gold wheels are phenomenal

 

Lots of bike porn here. Very evident that you guys pour a lot of time and love into your bikes as well!!

 

thanks man! its either you love them or hate them kinda combo haha

ive been wanting a old cb to do a build like yours one day but maybe some gold in it somewhere lol

 

Engine should be here tuesday Conveniently that's my work from home day.

Other bits and pieces should be here starting today and I think the last piece is a battery on wednesday!

 

Started this weekend on the prep work for getting the new engine in. Handlebars are mostly sorted, new front brake has been adapted and is working. New throttle tube and grips are on. She looks so naked without a tank, engine, or skid plate.


Engine came in yesterday, unfortunately I had to leave to go to work as soon as I signed for it I work at a college union building and we were a polling place last night.

Unboxed and took stock of things this morning though!


So excited. I think the difficult parts are going to be adding lighting to the wiring harness (lighting output is AC, I'd prefer some rectified DC but think I can make it work, it's all LED anyway so I might just say yolo), adapting the stock CT90 exhaust over, making the engine mount brackets line up/size up, adapting the skid plate to work with it, and that's really about it. For now the plan is to run the starter battery on the tail rack, at least until I decide to buy or better yet make a LiFePo4 battery pack to shove in the stock location.

The goal is to be on the road by the end of Thanksgiving weekend. I should have some good time off then to finish things up.

Started working on a new switch plate/battery box cover tonight. Hopefully can get it printed after work tomorrow. I've never had a key on this thing before and I'm weirdly excited to put one on haha

 

I’m looking at a 750 gs just wondering how is this style of bmw going down the highway

 

Three beer ramble time

It’s phenomenal on highways and back roads, especially if you take the time to get the right wind screen up front and go up a tooth on the front sprocket. This bike lives for 55 or 60 mph roads.

It’s not going to feel the same as a bigger gs11xx or 12xx (those are mile chewing beasts) but I have zero complaints on how it handles itself. It’s narrower with a slightly higher center of gravity and taller seat. It’ll get blown around a little in high winds, but it’s not the heaviest nor most aerodynamic so that makes sense to me.

It does get a little buzzy on the freeway, being a high revving parallel twin, but I’ve done several hours across Montana at 90mph and it held together just fine, despite me feeling sorry for running it that hard for that long.

Comfort wise the seat can be hit or miss from what I’ve heard, depending on your own ass of course. I don’t have any issues with it though, done 10 hour/500 mile days in it with no saddle sores. A few times a year I’ll do 6 hour/360 mile days across WA on it to see my parents.

From what i’ve heard the 750 and 850 are an improvement in almost every way on the 700 and 800s. I’m guessing the 270 degree firing pattern helps with the buzzing some. Plus e-throttle, riding modes, etc etc etc.

Moral of the story: no regrets with this bike. It’ll do just about everything decently for me. Aside from replacing a stator and a cam chain tensioner, I’ve only had to do basic maintenance on it.

Sorry, definitely more info than you asked for haha

 

Thanks for the information about the bike

 

Big ol update on the CT90!

On the 6th I got the engine in:


The top engine mount lines up on the honda frame, but I did have to drill it out larger. Terrifying drilling through a brand new engine. For the bottom mount, I had bought a mount converter kit from dr atv, but I think it's meant to be used with their footpeg adapter kit, which I wasn't using, so one mount lined up, but I had to re-bend and hack away a lot of the other one. Eventually I got it to work, but it wasn't exactly plug n play as advertised.

The pegs ended up being a pain. I bought a spacer kit to clear the sides, which I'm glad I did 'cause I needed the space. The brake lever hit the engine cases and pegs real bad though, so I had to drill and tap a hole in the brake lever arm to put a bolt in to make it an adjustable stop, basically. Works well but it was just another thing on a long day.

The exhaust for the CT90 had a wider flange and a different mounting depth than the Piranha engine needed. Luckily I bought a $40 ebay exhaust that worked to throw on and get the thing running.

The carb couldn't have fit any better.


The new engine's front sprocket is a inch or two further forward, so I had to buy a new chain that was a few links longer. Hallelujah prime shipping. It's also laughable how cheap 428 chain is compared to full size bike chains.


Next up was wiring, on the 11th:


I used 90% of the harness that came with the engine, but had to make my own battery cables and the headlight/brakelight/tail light wiring. I guess the DC coming off the rectifier isn't the cleanest, according to the interwebz, so I floated the whole DC side of the system and wired all my grounds back to the battery. For the battery cables I cut up a set of harbor freight jumper cables. It was cheaper than buying bare 10 gauge cable, life hacks.

Also swapped out the crappy handlebar switch that came with the harness for a slightly less crappy Amazon switch. A couple molex connectors and some bullet terminals and all was sorted with that. The wiring is all straightforward, there just ends up being a lot of it.

Wrap the whole thing in fabric harness wrap and shove it all into the old battery box area behind a 3d printed cover. The 12v system is separate from the key, so if I need to turn on the lights or keep them off for whatever reason it's not tied to the engine being on.

Got it running that day and took it for a sprint around the neighborhood. Rowdy little bike but fuck was it loud. Backfired like a mo-fo too. That ended up being a two-fold problem, not a tight enough seal on the exhaust and bad jetting.


On the 19th, I put on a proper oiled filter and got the jetting sorted out. Went up a size on the pilot jet and down a notch on the needle but the main jet was spot on.


Today I wanted to get the old CT90 exhaust on and working.

First step was grinding away the extra material on the face of the pipe. I used an exhaust donut to mark the pipe and ground it away with a flappy disc. Then had to drill out the holes for narrower studs. The metal flange was harder than I expected and took forever. Didn't have the proper set of tools so ended up using a drill bit and a lot of patience to slowly open up the holes.


I needed to make a spacer to go between the mounting flange and the lip of the pipe. The face of the port to the bottom of the studs on the new head was much deeper than on the old engine's head, so the pipe wouldn't have sealed at all without some kind of spacer in there. Used some scrap metal I had laying around and it worked well.

The new head is slightly longer than the old, and the whole engine is a little lower than the old, so I had to make another small bracket for the rear exhaust mount. Flat piece of aluminum bar with a couple holes, couple bolts and nuts, and it was all sorted out.


Got it all mounted up and took it for a quick ride! So much quieter. I'm curious how much the power output is affected. It's a couple mm narrower of a pipe, and is definitely going to be more restrictive. I'm happy with how it looks though. Much more stock and way less hooligan-y.

Next up I think is going to be mounting an oil cooler, then maybe a different kick stand, followed by trying to get the old skid plate to work with the new peg mount pattern. That one might be kind of difficult..

 

Awesome job! Looks so much better with the stock exhaust

 

Short video of the bike ripping around and up and down a street near my house. I work for a university so I get about two weeks off around Christmas and I'm hoping to do a thorough build video and/or first ride on the bike.




(Also hoping to finally have time to do the giant backlog of maintenance/take care of the parts pile I have growing for BMW.)

 

Got the stock skid plate kind of back on last night. I'm happy it clears everywhere, that's a big win with how much longer the cylinder is on this compared to the stock engine and with the starter hanging out below the engine.

The plate mounts with 2 bolts per side up near the neck, then another 4 bolts where the footpegs attached on the old bike. Those, unfortunately, don't match the new footpeg mount pattern at all. I think I'm going to put a rivnut or two into the new footpeg mount, then drill a couple holes in the skid plate to bolt it into the riv nuts. I'm thinking that should work out OK. It's not like it's a stressed member or anything.

Currently it may or may not be held on on the bottom by two zip ties

 

I concur; albeit a good one to have lol

I have the same issue its seems....I'm constantly tinkering with some 2-or-4-wheeled contraption. I'm working towards the goal of one day owning/running a powersports shop; beein fixing bikes and quads for a number of years now. If I wasn't on my work computer, I'd have some cool pictures to share....but in the past few years, a buddy and I have restored/rebuilt a couple 1980 CB750's, a custom '74 CB360 Scrambler(with the hard-to-find CL360 side pipes!), a couple of older 2 stroke dirt bikes; a 2006 CRF250R, a Can Am Maverick Outlander 570 XMR, a Can Am X3, a couple artic cats, a couple Suzuki LTR 450's, a TRX450R and quite a few Honda 400EX's and LTZ400's(among a few others I know I'm forgetting). For some reason, there's something highly therapeutic about rebuilding and servicing small engines. I worked on cars and trucks for years, but always seem to enjoy this side of things more.

Anyway, super cool builds man! That CB750 you did up is super clean; that 90 is an awesome machine as well..... I dig your choice to use the LED bar in place of the headlight and shroud a lot.

 

Thanks! I'd love to someday make money at rebuilding things, but for now having a hobby is nice too. Next house I'm planning on a 2 car garage minimum to fit more projects. If I were to but any more now I'd have to start putting things outside, that wouldn't make for a happy fiance as her car would be the one out there

I agree with the part about small engines being nicer to work on. I think I've summed it up in the past as like, I can tear down and completely reassemble a motorcycle in a day, no way I could do that on a car or truck. It's just such a nice scale to work on.

 

Recorded a video of my riding around and talking about the CT90. It's definitely long, I can ramble like a mo-fo. Also sorry for the poor camera angle, it was mostly filmed on a gopro session and that doesn't have the screen to check what view you're filming, whoops. Live and learn.