Liberated Swingarm

OK! I guess I finally found a use for all of my big SAE wrenches! Following the suggestion to use them as spacers and slowly pull the shaft through until it came all the way out. Nice. It took a long while to do it. but in the end, all of the internal parts have been saved and the old heavy swingarm will be scrapped.

The frame has made it to the powder coater on schedule. This is the first time I've used this guy, he offered me a beer as soon as I walked up. I think I'll be going there again! I hope his wok is as good as his customer service. He said it'll be done in the next 5 days.

Now it's time to dig into the engine a bit more and start cleaning and polishing stuff for assembly to start in the next couple of weeks. Though I may need to take a holiday break and begn again after the new year commences.

Swingarm headache

Fingers crossed wasn't good enough. The stock swingarm is stuck tight! Since I'm putting on my alloy swingarm I really don't care about destroying the stock one. I just need to be careful not to damage the shaft and sleeve inside since I'll need to reuse them.

So I drilled a few holes and pulled the grease zirk. Now I have 4 holes open to the shaft inside. I filled the chamber with carb cleaner to loosen up all of the 32 year old grease and rust. I'll let it sit for the afternoon and try again with the mallet later.

Engine Removal

Got the engine out tonight without the help of the stupid Sears piece of shit bike lift. It's still leaking hydraulic fluid in the trunk of my car. But the engine is on the bench ready for tear down and blueprinting.

Next on the menu is removing the swingarm. Can be simple, but also can be a complete ball ache if the bits are frozen up inside. (fingers crossed!)

CRAP.

Just started to work today and my bike lift died. It started oozing hydro fluid and the bike came gently to the garage floor. I went to Sears to get it replaced and they won't do it. Apparently the warrantee changed from lifetime to 1 year. So now I have no lift and I'm mid build.

New SR500 teardown

Back from the weekend at my sisters place. I got into the garage only for a few minutes to work on the SR. It's pretty much ready to grind off the extra brackets and clean up the frame. then I guess I'll either rent a welder or take it to a local shop to get a few tabs put on. I'm chasing down a powder coater here since I'm kinda new to this area. I'm missing the awesome shops in and around Motown for car and bike custom work.

I plan on draining the oil and pulling the engine out tomorrow if I have time, but I do have some other chores and appointments on my shedule. It's always a strange thing to open up an SR engine. So many people have suped 'em up over the years that it could be a gold mine of race goodies inside or it's bone stock and worn out ...or...it's a fucking mess that a ham fisted kid with good intentions but poor skills has destroyed.

New SR500

OK, I Bought another SR500 this week. I'm really looking forward to building this! I got it in Traverse City, MI. When I drove 5 hours to get it I was - well... disappointed. When I got there. It was a lump of SHIT! The owner had exaggerated the condition to say the least. Last time I bought a lump of shit like this, at least it had some good internal parts. This one is just an old tired 28,000 mile thumper. So I'll have my work cut out for me on this project.

So far, I've completed the initial break down and component removal. I'm now in the process of dry fitting all of the cafe bits to it, grinding off the unnecessary brackets and welding on some new ones.

I drove out to my storage space and pulled out all of my SR spares and the alloy tanks to see what will look best.

I'll still need to get new clip-ons, lights, fork tubes, tachometer and speedo set, etc...etc. I know how these things evolve.