Step 11 - ah HA!

It's been a little while since I've posted. I haven't made a hell of a lot of progress since I've had guests in town and have been really busy with work. I need to find a block of a few days in order to build the spray booth, build the racks, and then get it all rigged up and ready to go. I won't have time this weekend either since I'll be out of town.

Anyway... the coolest thing is that I figured out how to set up the locking mechanism. As I looked at it more with the two pieces of the tail together, I figured out a way to rig the old holding piece on to the back of the tool bag holder. I clamped it all in to test it and it actually works better than the original way. And I only really need a small block of wood and 2 screws, and no cutting of the cable either. So I'm stoked to have that out of the way. I could have also manufactured a piece of metal to do the trick but the wood is easier and doesn't make any difference where it is. I've actually already started on rewriting the installation instructions with lots of photos so I can post that for other people to use.

I've picked up all the paint. I watched the video that the paint guy told me to watch but it didn't teach me anything. I think he ordered the wrong one. My Oracle Demon/Halo lights came in from Advanced Automotive Concepts and I've read the instructions for them about 5 times now. That's gonna be another interesting installation, but totally kick ass looking. As far as lighting goes, this is probably the coolest upgrade you can make. I actually called the large local motorcycle dealer's service department and asked them if they could do it. After hearing them sorta wonder what I was talking about, I decided that I was probably best to just do it myself.

I also got the wheel strips. I got reflective white 7mm pin stripes to put around the outside edge of the rims. And they look really cool.



So the next step is really the painting and the headlights. I plan to start that Monday night and try to get the thing painted and squared away by Saturday if that's at all possible. The first track day of the year is Saturday and I'd love to make that with the new custom ride.

Step 10 - the Under Friggin Tail

So tonight I start by sandblasting the undertail, and then I hand sand all of the pieces over again at 120 grit and then 220 grit so they are nice and smooth and ready for cleaning and paint.

Since the paint's not in, I decide to start messing with the stock fender and trying to get that all set.

I totally forgot to mention the paint purchase. I'll back up to Saturday for a second. I went to the second paint shop to get some paint and some advice. I went to Bond Paint Co. in Albuquerque. I met Syl the General Manager, who helped me a lot. Once I got him sorta wrapped around my project he helped me with some alternatives to what I had thought I wanted. And it actually turned out better... at least in theory, we'll see how it looks.

Instead of the Hot Hues Hot Rod Flat Black and white, which had a very quick time allowance for you to paint. When you start to paint those, you have 24 hours to get the coats finished and the clear coat on to seal it up, or it flakes. Then he showed me the other company's paint which was called Waterford or water-something. With that paint, I didn't need to thin it, I didn't need to sand it in between coats, I could take as long as I wanted once the first base coat was on, it dried in minutes and could be taped on top of 90 seconds after it was dry to the touch. And it was about 1/3 the cost of Hot Hues.

'nuff said, Doc. I'll take 'er.

So I got a pearlized black which is like the child of flat black and gun metal and a pearlized white, which will be coated over with a clear matte finish. And I can take longer than 24 hours to do the whole job, which I might need. Maybe not, I'd like to just stay up non stop from here on out until its done but I actually have to work during the day which si totally cutting into my bike mod time. But it's also funding it as well so its gotta keep rolling. Especially if I keep fucking shit up like yesterday.

So I still spent $300 on supplied for paint with the paints, the clear coat, the primer, actuator and hardener, etc. So that was a pretty healthy chunk of cash.

Ok back to today. Let me just say, or reiterate what others have said which is that the undertail instructions are a laughable joke at best. I'm not even sure they are talking about the same piece of equipment that I have. They are so vague and unclear that they are pretty much useless. In fact, so far, I've figured out most of it on my own after reading them over and over again wondering what the fuck they are talking about. Remember in grade school when you had to write instructions on how to get out of a paper bag or tie your shoe, shit like that? Well this writer totally failed that assignment. I'm totally rewriting the instructions with photos so other people can get a clear idea. These are, bar none, the worst instructions I've ever seen.

So I proceed to determine where the fender needs to be cut, because you still need to keep as much of it as possible. And we cut it off right here...


Which was just behind the two bolt holes where it attaches to the rear of the frame, that's required in order to hold it up, but it has to be as close as you can get with out chopping it off or the undertail wont fit either. You actually have to cut around them and let them stick out a little, and then shave them at an angle so you can make room or the LED' strips or they will never go in there.

Here's a close up.


Next I decide to see how it all fits together to see what kind of rigging job I'm going to have to do. For starters, only 3 of the 4 holes actually line up and the fouth is a good 1/4" off. The #3 hole has less than an 1/8" of plastic on the outside of it. Gonna have to be real damn careful with that one.

So I go put the stock undertail back on, and situate the new undertail in the place it's supposed to go to see how it looks.

It looks friggin awesome.. if I can figure it out... and I will. So I go grab the lock for the "trunk" to see how that is gonna work because from what Im looking at, its not making any sense, knowing how the lock mechanism works and how much cable there is. Sure enough, there is no way that works without some new engineering. And the instructions.. ha ha ha ... oh man, this part is great, it tells you to pull off the L plate from the lock and straighten the metal piece. It does not tell you what the L plate is, nor show you, and that's the last they mention it. So you have no idea why you remove it or why you straighten it. Then it says to install the lock seat into the new undertail. THAT'S IT. That's the extent of the instructions. No mention of how the cable is supposed to go from a horizontal entry to pull a horizontal lock to a vertical pulling a horizontal. Then the best is the shot of the back of the bike and the locking mechanism. its showing the lock and the cable isn't connected at all. It's just sticking up in the middle of no where. I'm not sure the company ever thought that oen through.

I'm going to email Rumble concepts and see if they have anything, even a picture of the inside of the tail finished and working would be enough to get me rolling. I'm sitting here thinking I need to actually cut the cable 2 inches shorter and try to rig my own holder some how. And don't even get me started on the fact that you still need to some how rig a mechanism to hold the end of the cable in place while it actuates to create tension, but you can't twist it too much or the friction keeps it from locking again.

I'm gonna post a message in the cbrforum and see if any of them have done this before. And I might resort to chasing down someone with one if I see one on the street.

Ok, I'm off to post.

Step 9 - Set Back.

The undertail. This undertail is gonna be a serious challenge. I should have expected that the most expensive piece and the coolest feature, aside from the paint job, would be the part to get screwed up.

So it started with the initial order. I shoulda known. I ordered it from 1tail.com and they called to tell me that they didn't have any more black ones left, nor unpainted ones, only red ones. So I asked if the lights were easy enough to remove so I could sand it down, repaint it, and install the lights again. I believe my exact words were, "The lights aren't glued in are they? are they easy enough to just pop right out?"

After a brief hold while they went and checked, I was told that they were easy enough to pop out and were not glued in.

I got the undertail in yesterday. I opened up the package like a 5 year old at Christmas. the clouds parted, a ray of sunlight shown down upon me, trumpets sounded and angels sang. It was beautiful.

Queue record scratch.

What? the lights are all hot glued in. damnit. So alright, no big deal, right, minor set back, I'll just gently heat it with a heat gun and melt the glue and slide the LED's out. If anyone reading this has ever tried this you are probably laughing your ass off right now.

So I start on it right away, I grab the heat gun and I start heating it up. The glue starts to turn clear and I am able to slide the LED's out. They are gooey and I'm wondering how the hell I'm gonna get the glue off of the LED's without trashing the LED string. Then the worst thing happens. Right before my eyes the plastic of the tail starts to buckle and curl. I watch in horror and try to hold it in place but its no use its curling. My heart sinks. Im thinking, " Fucking great, I just fucked up $209 in a matter of 5 minutes."


So now, it looks like that after reheating it a few times and trying to push it back into shape. I'm ready to throw it through the shop wall and suck up the fact that I'm gonna have to spend another 2 bills..totally pissed. Then my Dad talks me into messing with it as much as possible, which I agree to since its already screwed, might as well try, huh? So after about 2 hours of heating and pushing, and my Dad actually widdling out a mold out of a block of wood, we get it back to about 90% of the way its supposed to look. And...I think...what I'm hoping... is that when its painted flat and the lights are back in, you won't even be able to tell unless you have read this, of course and already know to look for it.

It was a long frustrating night of trying to get back to where I started. I ended up cutting out the other lights by taking and exacto blade and slicing the glue and then pulling the lights out and then shaving the remaining glue off of the plastic pieces.

Now, back to that gunked up LED string. It now had this hot glue melted all over it. which looked like shit and I'm sure would have made the light look really weird.

Here's where I made another mistake.. well several actually.

1. I did not test the lights before I started messing with it. If you do this, test them right away to make sure they even work.

2. attempting to remove the lights with heat (obviously we went over that already)

3. next I tried to heat the LED's to see if I could melt off the glue gunked on. No Luck, heating wiping, heating wiping over and over again, nothing.

Next I tried rubbing it, as if to polish it on a piece of cloth which seemed to start to polish off the glue gunk. That's when my dad brought out the fine scrub pad, like a scotch pad, only finer. And I rubbed in on that and that seemed ot be working. So he shows me a rougher one, like a real scotch pad. And that's where the next mistake happens.

4. why go to a rougher pad when the finer grit one was working just fine? I have no idea. frustration build up and patience deficit were acting against me. So I use the green scotch pad and proceed to scratch the bulbs DULL! UGH! are you fucking kidding me? So I start to polish them with the finer grit pad and the cloth again to see if I could buff it out. yeah, there's no buffing out LED's. when they're done, they're done.

So at this point I decide to see if the dull surface even matters? maybe you won't be able to see that when its lit anyway. So I test it, the dull strip has a section of 4 of the bulbs in the middle of 12 that do not work. So at some point, either the buffing, the heating or the pulling it out (or possibly from the beginning) this was shot anyway. Had I tested them first I would have known.

So now, I have to order another string of LED's OR possibly 2 new strings if I can't get a matching one, I will likely have to buy 2 of them so the intensity matches.

So here's how the tail section looked by the end of the night.


The very edge of it that you can mostly see rippled will actually be under the other layer and not seen. And the gunk of course is sanded off now. So hopefully this will work.

Step 8 - More Prep work

So its been a while since the last post. I've been super busy with everything, a trip out of town, tons of work, and I've still been working on the bike. I just haven't been posting like I wanted to. So I'll catch up tonight.

I had to get more Aluminum Oxide to finish the last few pieces. The windshield and I also decided to take a few pieces off of the broken down ZX-6 that Patrick and I were planning to make a stunt bike and sand them down as well to practice painting on.

Oh that's right, almost forgot about Danny Bally. I dropped in there one day and chatted with him for a second. He' seemed a little stand offish at first when I asked to pick his brain, but very quickly warmed up to me and shared some info. I suspect he was kind of internally laughing at me for attempting to do this. I asked a few questions, he answered. Mostly was warning me that it was really hard and I should be prepared to fuck shit up and start over. He said sport bikes are the hardest because of the angles in the body panels and that flat black was also one of the hardest colors to deal with since it couldn't be sanded down and covered again and then clear coated on top of that.

So, duly noted. I'll be careful. ya gotta start somewhere, why not with the hardest task? =)

I've done more research, I'll probably do a little more. I think I want to get a book as well just to see if there are any tips&tricks that I can pick up before I get into it. I went to a paint shop this weekend where Danny had told me he buys his paint, but they don't carry the flat black, at least not any more. So I have to go back tomorrow and try to grab the paint supplies. I'll be able to kick into the painting this week

Since last time I posted I have spent a shitload of time researching parts and trying to find the right parts. I think I've got everything purchased that I need for the mods. The lighting stuff was the hardest to put together, because there's a lot of stuff out there and it takes a little bit to find the right stuff that's decent quality and that fits the bike, and that matches in color.

I'm anxious to get the new undertail in so I can start to see what I need to do to get that installed. That's gonna need to be sanded and painted as well. I took the existing undertail off and in the process realized that I need to keep half of it. So that's gonna be a tricky install. The instructions on installing that are horrible. Vague at best. It's almost comical how poorly the instructions are written. I will probably rewrite the instructions with photographs and post them somewhere so other people won't have to guess at shit like I will have to do. I hope the Angel Eyes for the headlights have better instructions than that because that requires actually sticking the headlight section in the oven for a few minutes to loosen the glue and remove the faceplate from the headlights and install some electrical shit and then glue it back. I think the electrical shit is gonna be kinda tedious. But its gonna look bad ass once its done, if it comes out like I am envisioning.

I've been teetering on the idea of making the white a gray or light gray as was suggested by a few people. I keep going back to that white though and I still really dig the contrast. I've seen a few other bikes with white and black on them and I really dig it. I do think though, that I might try to get a reflective white so its not just flat white. It would be nice if it could look flat normally and then at night when lights hit it, it reflects. I'll have to see what's out there. I have learned that paint for this gig is friggin expensive. I was told to expect the cost of paint and paint materials (like thinner and primer, etc) to be in the $300 range. I'm already at around $600 in parts. If I screw up the paint that could get expensive. All in all, not too bad to get this kind of custom job done for less than a grand. Custom paint alone is typically a few grand. So I'm still doing WAY better by doing it myself and I have complete control over it and I'm doing something creative that I love so its way better than turning it over to someone and paying and getting it back. And its just cooler to have done it by myself.

I took a bunch of pics of the headlight assembly and the undertail set up because there were so many wires connected to everything. I might just need a reference on how to get hat back together. That's another reason why I want to work on it constantly, I have a bad memory and I don't want to forget how somthing has to go back together and have to go back and study the damn technical manual.

So anyway, I think that's pretty much catching me up to date. Can't wait to get started on the painting. We'll probably end up making a paint booth in the main garage of the house instead of the shop because the shop doesn't really have the spread out room and I'd have to paint one piece at a time. and when you consider that it takes a good 4-5 hours to dry, and there's 8 pieces to paint, and each pieces gets about 5 coats, maybe 6. that could take for EVER to do one piece at a time. I'm gonna need to do one coat on all pieces in one sitting and that's still gonna take a week or two.

OK, more soon.

Step 7 - Design

I've been procrastinating on actually sitting down and drawing shit out because I haven't had one solid full bike idea yet.

I knew I wanted it mostly flat black, I was going to paint the windshield flat black too and have some sort of skull on it with flat white, and then some sort of flat white accent in other places. That's all I had. Until yesterday riding the ski loft up on my second or third run. I looked down and saw a kid with a flat black helmet on with those racing stripes that have one thick and one thin one.

Then it hit me.. that's it, that's the way to tie in the white. racing stripe that goes up the front, I'll still keep that V white and then have ti wrap around to a skull that's got a thin and thick side, very graphic and vector, simple to mask but still bad ass looking.

then have the stripes follow down the center of the bike. Flow over the gas tank and go around the gas cap like the skull.

Oh yeah, since I have the cool spiked bar ends and windshield bolts, I thought I'd throw a few spikes on the skull too, for extra bad-assed-ness.

So I started messin' with the front shot in photoshop for a quick down and dirty conceptual sketch. I even busted out the wacom, which took me a minute to get used to again. I don't think I've touched that in over a year.

So anyway, here's what I have in mind...



So imagine that thin stripe going around the left side of the gas cap, and the thick side jstu straight through (or under, sorta is how it will look) and the stripes continuing down the bike right to the tail.

Then I thought, "more spikes!!" So I added this...




And I liked it, so I thought, " how about MORE SPIKES!!"

And now Im just spike happy all over the place. I actually took a pencil to the bike pieces to draw on them because I need a closer representation of what it will look like especially when I start going nuts like that. So I sketched the thin stripe going around the left side of the seat and around the back seat and off the tail. And I quickly realized that that's WAY too many spikes.

So think I'm going to just leave a few on the front fender, a few around the gas cap, let the thin stripe go "under" both seats and throw a couple spikes on the tail and that's it.

I don't think I'm even gonna have any white on the direct sides of the bike, either.

So anyway, that's the concept for the design.

I welcome your comments or thoughts on the design.

Step 6 - The best tool yet...

So Dad bought a gallon (or so) of this 60 Grit Aluminum Oxide Blast Media for the little sandblaster and that shit worked like a charm. It took me maybe an hour to do the whole head fairing. I ran out of media but at least we know it works. So I'm getting a couple more containers to finish up the rest of the sanding with that stuff. I should have all the parts sanded and ready for primer by the end of the day. I'd drop a picture in here of the head fairing but its really just still white only more dull.

Sand blasting is definitely the way to go for hard to reach places and for all the joints, edges and holes.