72 XS650 Sport Bike / Cafe - Project "Land Shark"

[RockingThePartyDJ]

Knock Knock..... (Whose There?) "Candy Gram"..... (Whose There?) "Special Delivery"..... (Oh OK) "Land Shark"
If you remember any that skit, Man your old. But here's my -

Project "Land Shark"

Hi Everyone, I'm Dave and I'm starting a thread for my titled 72 XS650 Frame & Basket Case Engine I Picked up last October from Forum Member "Miller0613" for an incredible deal of $200, to whom I am grateful and thank The frame was already stripped of all non essential tabs so basically the way you see it is how I got it., although I plan on adding bracing to firm up this frame, I can see what guys on here talk about when they say it can be an issue, i was comparing to my 78 frame and its like wow in comparison, so any ideas/suggestions on the best methods to put brackets n braces would be appreciated " pleasing to the eye" mods would be best, I've seen a few with different builds but am open to more, thanks

The Engine is in a couple boxes and a milk crate under my bench, where it will probably be until the evil snow comes this winter when I plan on rebuilding up to 6 engines

My Plan for this Build is to Make what I'm gonna call a Sport Bike , or Custom although some would call it a Cafe and some may call it a Tracker but either way I plan on using some Suzuki parts Hence the temporary Name "Project Yamazuki" until I get a feel for the ol girl

My Inspiration for this build is from an odd place "Ebay" where I saw this for sale for $539 with shipping. Too rich for my blood!


So in light of the lack of deep pockets I am gonna try do this bike on the cheap!
in that spirit I fortunately scored a GS550 tank for $10.50 on Ebay just last week, it was changed out on a new bike years ago and never used its basically NOS.


It has the shape and size I'm looking for and I plan on cutting Knee Indents into it I've never modified anything that holds gas between my legs and i'm concerned about leaks but I'm gonna do it anyways , and I also plan on making my own seat pan tail section out of fiberglass similar to the inspiration I saw on Ebay however I want the tail end to possibly have more of an what I'll call an "Angry" look similar to the Mirror's I just bought for 15.95 on the ol E of Bay.


I have seen some great videos on the youtube on how to Make my own Fiberglass seatpan Tail section I want to make mine flow together like the one I saw on Ebay, it will be my first ever Fiberglassing of anything, But I'm not scared!

Also on this same Bike I'm gonna use the Omar's kit I picked up for an awesome deal of $160 shipped from Forum Member "MRMAS" and the 19" Front Mag I picked up $45 shipped from "Racerdave" BTW Thank You so much guys these are gonna work sweet together on this build Oh yes also thanks Racerdave for including the Instructions for the Omars kit which it was missing.


I picked up a Triple tree for this frame but when I got it and tried fitting it to the Frame I found out the top clamp didn't match the bottom so if anyone has a top Tree clamp to go with this bottom 34mm tree I would be glad to buy it from you and take it off your hands.

Another view


Well thats all there is for a start, once I get the tank I'll test fit for the look and go from there.

 

[RockingThePartyDJ]

Awesome my new $10.50 Tank just got here, I'm gonna set it on the frame to see how it looks. We've had some hot weather here lately so i'm using the Dining room table, the AC feels great

I will be sliding it forward more once I modify the back tab on the tank.But I'm loving the size.

I thought this might give a good look at the width of the tank, I love it and I can't believe the great deal I got, sometimes Ebay rocks

It already has some slight Knee dishes in the tank but i'm thinking I may want to make them deeper and longer, what do you all think?

I think I'm going to eliminate the indent around the fill opening and mount holes for the flip up locking cover this tank would normally have, I don't really like how that looks. So i will probably weld in a plate to fill in the recessed area and extend it forward on tank to make the frame opening smaller once I figure out the permanent location of the tank.


Well have a great day all

 

[RockingThePartyDJ]

Hey all, I luckily got my hands on the upper Clamp for the Triple tree Yay, so I thought I would mount the forks i've had laying around from a 73 i had won on Ebay for .99 cents (they were known as the home of the 99 cent auction lol, because they started all of their auctions low with no reserve), actually I won alot of that 73 bike and picked up the stuff in Appleton about 70 miles away from me which saved me a ton of cash on shipping. I put them on and one was shorter than the other and I found out why, because it's frozen and won't move, so just great, I can't seem to push or pull it, any Suggestions?


Also today my Muffler I ordered from a GSX-R600 came in today.

and my GSX-R600 header should be here soon too, which i'm gonna cut up and reweld to make work as a 2 into one under bike and have it swoop up into this muffler at about a 45 degree angle on the right rear side of the bike, like you see on sport bikes, it should look like a pretty "Mean Machine" I think I just came up with a name for her. The Mean Machine, If I remember correctly that was the name of the team in the movie the longest yard, that was a pretty good movie and should work good as a name my sporty cafe.

 

[RockingThePartyDJ]

Question to all.

Where is the best place with the best price to pickup Fiberglass Supplies?

I'm going to design and fabricate a mold for the seat and rear fender combination and i'm going to do it up in Gelcoat/Fiberglass, which will be my first time ever with Fiberglass but i've watched a lot of informational Youtube clips on how to DIY and I think I can do it. Also I think my youngest brother knows how to do the whole process, I think he made some boat models before, ones like 2 and 3 feet long (oops he built a Canoe LOL) when he was in school if i remember correctly (Damn Meory LOL).

 

[plattey]

Try pouring automatic trans fluid inside the fork and fill it high enough that it exposes enough of inside of the fork to the fluid. Also, gently pry back the dust seal and pour some more atf underneath the dust seal. Let it soak for s couple days and try budging it again. If you force it too much, whatever is locked up could scuff/scrape the fork tubes and that will eat fork seals in a hurry. Good luck!

 

[ANLAF]

I am thinking of making a fibreglass seat pan - can you post the YouTube video links you found. That would be very helpful.

Anlaf

 

[RockingThePartyDJ]

I'm gonna go pick some Tranny fluid up and give that a try. Thanks Plattey

And Anlaf I gotta find the Youtube vid's again oops and I will link them

 

[plane_ben]

Really cool idea on a seat pan I used. It was for a friend and he took all the pictures, so I don't have any to show. But essentially we cut the back of a Yamaha XS650 special tank off to use as the tail cone on his café/street fighter bike he was working on. It worked out really great. You could tack weld it to the stock seat pan, or make your own seat pan. Either way it is a time saver over the fiberglass method. Lot les messy too.

On another subject. You are building a Yamasuzi, I built a Yamkawhonsu a few years ago now.

Rims are Kawasaki, tank is Honda, rear fender is Suzuki, and engine of course is Yamaha.

 

[RockingThePartyDJ]

Awesome Bike Ben and thanks for the suggestion. That Girder Front chop is awesome long man no tight corners in town for that baby LOL

 

[plane_ben]

It actually corners quite well. I love it in sweepers. Tighter corners are not bad either.

 

[RockingThePartyDJ]

So I went over to the local building supply and bought $14 in wood and i'm going to start on my Form that will be used to make a mold from to make my fiberglass seat and tail section. Here's a pic of my template i made using a Hula hoop for the Arc I wanted and what I call the Angry looking Mirror that I was using for inspiration.



I marked the other 11 boards and started cuttin and after clamped them together and after looking at it I may rename her "Land Shark" Like used in some early Saturday Night Live Skits. Maybe as this progresses I can get some votes for either "Mean Machine" Land Shark" or maybe "Mean Bitch"




I plan on cutting the bottom to an angle to tilt the fin back at a lesser angle. But i'll have to wait til tomorrow as not to wake the neighbors with my loud table saw. I also marked a rough angle I will probably use to cut the sides down with my neighbors Mike's band saw., so i'll have less shaping/sanding to do.




He's got alot of tools that I don't and has told me I can borrow or use any of them, and Mike is a great guy, he likes to restore tractors to keep himself busy in his retirement. He's got a rocking Conversion he did, with a Lawn Tractor where somehow he shoe horned in a Ford Flathead V8 it's awesome, he definitely has some killer skillz!

 

[RockingThePartyDJ]

So I got to cut them down to the slightly modified template and realized i needed one more for a lucky 13 LOL to make it wide enough, so now i glued and clamped and need to wait til tomorrow to start the next cutting it down to the rough final shape for sanding.



Next I Need to work on cutting the seat pan form to attach this to.

Stay tuned.....

 

[Square Circle]

Hey rock! Cool build so far. Using the wood for your seat cowl..?? Dang man, just use the wood instead of fiberglass. That's a TON of work..next time use $15.00 worth of flower foam from hobby shop. Its way easier to shape. I have found out that fibre glass is messy, fumey, and heavy once you bondo the imperfections. I was inspired to do my own from this video...

 

[RockingThePartyDJ]

Hey Square, I seen the same video's 1 & 2 (Hey Anlaf those are 2 of the multiple video's I mentioned earlier) and I get where your coming from, but this form will last a long time and if it turns out the way I hope it will I should be able to make multiple Mold's from this form to make the fiberglass final product from, and I'm hoping if I use the Gel coating properly I shouldn't have to use much bondo, and if I was real lucky maybe none (dreams, we all have to have them LOL) I don't mind the work to get to the end desired result, and the wood will not be in my cowl, I just like wood as a medium to work with, although if I make a mistake it will be more work for me to do over again, than it would be to just use the flower foam like in the video. Also I'm contemplating using Carbon Fiber versus Fiberglass, it's much stonger and lighter with less layers. So we'll see....... Thanks for the Props on the direction of my build I do appreciate it.

 

[Dieselchanic]

If you are still looking for suppliers check out Mertons Fiberglass. They have a website with online catalog but you have to call to order. Very knowledgable people and easy to work with. Fast shipping too.

http://www.mertons.com/

 

[RockingThePartyDJ]

Thanks Diesel I'll check that out.

Well a little more work on the form today since the glue is dry.
I decided to bring the sides in at a 15 degree angle and cut a rough seat pan form, i'll need to double up the thickness of the seat pan so when i make the mold and then the final fiberglass or carbon fiber seat/tail section, it will cover the frame rails when it's all said and done. Here are some quick shots i took to get an idea of how it will look, I gotta borrow my bro's Tabletop belt sander so i can clean this fin up with a nice gentle slope over the top from side to side and tapering to less and less of a slope as you get toward tip of the fin where the last 4 or so inches will have virtually no or a minimal curve over the top from side to side. Check it out!





It's looking damn close to what I'm seeing in my head.

 

[RockingThePartyDJ]

Sort of an update, I've been sanding the tail section to get the shape of the Form I'm looking for before I make the Mold from it. It's getting closer and I also made the form for the seat pan and started sanding that too. Now i'm trying to figure out where i want to cut the Knee Dishes I think I have it where I want it.



But I am gonna look at it for a while to make sure before I do my first cut i'll also make a template for the opposite side before i cut so they match.

We'll see what happens when I break out my handy cutter LOL

Wow they relisted and dropped the price of my ispiration on Ebay

only $380 now with $40 shipping, so for $420 I could save alot of time and effort LOL, wish I had the cash i'd buy it for another bike and still finish what I started.