Build Status Update 2

The fairings are painted. Which is to say that they have several coats of paint and several coats of clear coat. Painting was not easy nor did it go as planned. As I may have noted earlier, I had constructed a paint booth to contain the paint and to keep dust and debris off the paint. The final result looks OK until you get up close and several defects in the paint can be seen. Here are a few notes:

1) Don't use Krylon. The clear coat in can 2, for example, spit some kind of debris that basically ruined the paint job on the entire upper section. Use the best paint you can get and can afford.

2) Make sure that clean gloves are used every time you touch the work. Even a small amount of debris or dirt will mess up days of labor.

The Woodcraft alternator cover is installed. This required removing the old alternator cover (damaged by the original crash), removing the stator and wiring connected to the stator. The oil must be drained before attempting this operation, since the alternator is bathed in oil. The stator must be removed from the old cover and placed in the new one. Instructions were provided by Woodcraft and the new cover seems to be a pretty good part. Watch out for the magnet when you reinstall the cover. It will grab pretty hard and smashed a perfectly good finger on my left hand. Also, after reinstalling the new cover make sure you start the motor and check the voltage on the battery. It should be over 14V if the alternator is working properly.

I partially completed the safety wiring and will talk about that in the next post.

I have started fitting the fairings. The shark skinz are decently made, but they didn't put in any provision on the tail section for the exhaust! The tail piece interferes badly with the exhaust meaning that I will have to remove it and cut out a chunk of the back underside, which won't do much for the paint. Word to the wise, when installing shark skins, fit them to the bike first before painting. Fiberglass is hard to modify cleanly after paint has been applied. However, you would think that they would have checked the fit on the exhaust by now. Also, there's a part, it looks like a regulator or something similar, that doesn't seem to fit anywhere. The Haynes manual doesn't even acknowledge that it exists. The manual lists the regulator as being located near the rear suspension, but there isn't anything regulator-like located there. This is where the cheap manual may not gave been a great value. There's plenty of room in the front of the fairing, given that the headlight assembly is no longer there, but it would have been nice to know where it was originally located.

Finally, I replaced the clutch lever and left side clip-on. At this point, the majority of the work is done. Left to do is to get a new exhaust, get the power commander and quick shifter installed, get the bike on the dyno and let the tuners work their magic.

Soon, I'll have to learn how to ride...

Build status update 1

Status Update 1 on the bike build

Over the last three weeks I've learned again that the best plans generally go to hell when complex mechanical assemblies are involved. I found out that the forums have a great deal of useful information, but it's also very helpful to have backup from a trustworthy local shop. For example, the forums were very insistent that a Power Commander module to adjust tuning wasn't necessary, but further investigation at the local level indicated that better tuning range was available from the Power Commander, allowing easier tuning with a USB port that will produce much better maps, especially when race fuel, new exhauts and removal of emissions gear come into play. I also found out, painfully, that it's very important to have a shop that is responsive and responsible. Per my last post, getting the cooling system checked cost me a battery due to inattentive technicians that clearly aren't taking me seriously.

In the mean time, all the parts finally came in. Shark Skinz fairings, Woodcut covers, new clutch lever, new left side clip-on, new front sub frame, shark fin (chain guard), integrated tail light assembly, safety wire, and other miscellaneous parts.

Next, all the points that had to be safety wired have been drilled. This process will get it's own post. It started off well, but degraded into a bit of a nightmare as I came close to completing all the drill points. Safety wire has not been installed yet since I'm waiting for final tuning before I wire up systems that may have to be adjusted prior to wiring up the bike.

Also, get familiar with your torque wrench. Everything I removed and several other key fasteners have all been torqued to specification. I found, to my dissappointment, that several key areas including wheel mounting locations and brake calipers had torque readings on removal that were far below spec. Prior to racing, it's critical to check these points. A good rule of thumb is to check anything that will be safety wired and anything connected to the steering including top clamp bolts and steering head nut. Note that you will probably need to buy some pretty big, off size sockets, such as the ever hard to find 38mm!

Paint has been applied in initial coats to the fairings. This process has required me to construct a paint booth, which wasn't so bad, except that my initial design sucks. I will provide pictures and a post at some point about this process. All I can say is that you simply can't be in any kind of a hurry to properly paint your fairings, unless you want it to look really bad. I have some graphics lined up for the fairings using vinyl wrapping, but it's turning out to be much more expensive that I originally thought. For now, I may be stuck with all white fairings.

Items completed to date include safety wire drilling, replacement of the front sub fairing, removal of the side stand and subsequent shorting of the side stand kill switch, installation of the frame sliders, installation of the rear spools for the stand, replacement of the air filter (K&N), removal of the clutch lever and installation of a new battery.

Items remaining include replacement of the clutch lever and left clip-on handle bar, finish paint and clearcoat of the fairings, build headlight inserts for front fairing, installation and tuning of the power commander and quick shifter, installation of the Woodcut side cover, removal of various "street legal" emmissions and noise control components, fit and installation of fairings (NIGHTMARE), tuning and dyno. Also, I got a used and slightly more dinged up than advertised replacement gas tank that will be a next winter painting project, assuming I survive this first season.

RETAIL THERAPY ALERT: I ordered some boots. That turned out to be a good deal as I was able to use my customer appreciation points at the dealer to pick up some new Sidi Cobras. Very Nice.

Anyway, I'm getting closer to the deadline and panic is setting in. Money is definitely tight since my wife is demanding furniture and new bathrooms as compensation for excesive garage time and expense wooing my Triumph, not to mention the truly foul lacing of invectives that come streaming out with every broken drill bit and paint imperfection.

With any luck, I might actually ride this thing one day.