Boardtracker-ish build

Looks to be a Special swing-arm, the bolt hole for the chain guard is the same. The axle plates have an extra piece welded on the side to take some kind of different adjuster
 
Skull I am having access problems also it's not just you. I'm afeared there's a balrog in the woodpile. Will try to reach trav.
 
Site seems to be functional now.

Finished up a few welds and did some planning this afternoon. May do a hand hammered seat pan tomorrow that'll get mounted on three rubber bushings over the triangle.

Without laying out the math, the 80 profile 19" rear tire circumference will spin .94" less/rev of the countershaft sprocket. So it's a tad lower, but i don't ride interstates... A 90 profile sidewall would have been identical to stock.
 

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Mocked up after most design issues solved. Time to make it pretty. Should be a roller soon.
 

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Well.......... long layoff on this project. Some real estate to rehab and also did an '89 FZR 1000 cafe build over the winter.

Beginning reassembly now. As mentioned, going with the classic Gulf paint scheme. Swapped out the tires, refurbished the Marzocchi Strada shocks, put bronze bushings in the swingarm and tapered bearings in the head tube. Axle spacers and custom brake mounting tasks next. Then drop the motor back in frame.
 

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Been sidetracked with other stuff and also making some refinements to the Hodaka tank XS build...

Did finish the various custom brake parts required. Made a stay rod, and master cylinder mount for the rear brake that interfaces with a length of bar stock welded to an OEM brake lever. That lever will be modded later when i build some lowered footpegs. Must put motor back in first.

Bracket for the front caliper was painstaking... close tolerances if you want it to work well.

Couldn't get the Marzocchis to stop leaking so ditched those and going with plan B, Chinese shocks that have worked well on previous builds. They're in the mail.
 

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Bars installed. Very snug but retains a bit of vibration damping. Will be lopping an inch or so off each end with final control setup.

Had to make some custom riser spacers to keep bars from hitting tank during U turns. Plus the look mimics the high rise fork tubes to drop the front end. I don't like to cut fork springs down- a shorter spring is a stiffer spring, and there are no real world roads where that's desirable.
 

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Thanks. Lotta work to do on the tank yet which will really complete the Gulf look.

Motor back in frame. 18T sprocket installed and chainline is all good. As expected had to grind away a bit of the rear hub bosses that were interfering with the chain seating properly on the minimum size 40T sprocket.

Considerable fussing with the Plan B shocks as my frame mods were not designed for them and i was not about to cut and weld my nice finish painted frame or swingarm. Anyhoo, got them safely and accurately assembled to frame and will trust them with whatever this thing can dish out.

Have a pair of chrome 1 1/2" performance headers on the way from Mike's. They look good online will see... mufflers TBD. Bummed that the stock headers ate too restrictive, have many...

I scored a great pair of snowmobile 36mm VM's (with chokes) a month ago off eBay for 50 bucks! Went all thru them and brass is all swapped out. More on that later. Must weld up a pair of aluminum intakes first.

Next up brake lines and controls... and like, a seat. It'll be a hand hammered tractor style piece...
 

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Made the intakes. They taper from 36mm to 34 and kick out 4 degrees for optimum clearance for the 36mm VMs .

The 1 1/2" pipes from Mikes are nice. Good fitment, nice chrome, one piece mandrel bends. Probably going to put Emgo short reverse cone mufflers on it which should put it in the 6/10 noise range...
 

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FWIW, i spoke a bit soon on the Mikes pipes being mandrel bends... they aren't. Not a big deal, just didn't study them closely enough with all the chrome...

The Emgo shorty reverse cones have a baffle plate that restricts flow spot welded in about 6" from the outlet end. Needless to say they had to come out. Easy to do with a good 1 9/16" hole saw and then touch up burrs with a half round file. The oil drain hole on my motor work stand held them perfectly for the surgery .

I usually modify the stock foot pegs for these builds but in this case I needed to make them custom. There was a hell of a lot of work involved to design the parts for function and clearances shown in the right side rear brake pic.

Made throttle cables again which is a painstaking process and described in detail in a previous build.

Gas tank is a Bondo special. Had to fill the emblem cavities as the 4" Gulf decals go there. Acid etched and Redkote internally...
 

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Where did you get the Gray throttle cable?? Looks great!
 
Not sure where the gray cable originated... they were NOS that was in a huge batch of bikes/parts bought 5 years ago. Also, kudos halfmile on your current monoshock build. Very clean.
 
Put the first 5 test miles on it today. Not registered yet.

This is the last of my 4 XS650 builds- or more accurately TX's all with early motors. They all ran great but this is the fastest of the lot. 36mm VM's into a ported head and performance exhaust. Can provide jetting if anyone is interested. Fantastic ergonomics and handling with lowered center of gravity and mass centralization. Could not be happier .

This is technically a hybrid given the custom battery tray and total loss setup. No charging system.

Still need to install the LED head and tail lights and make a few minor refinements. This one won't be for sale anytime soon, if ever...
 

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Jetting is surprisingly identical to 34mm VM's.

Slides 2.5, float tabs set dead flat, 6F9 needles on 2nd clip, 159-P6 needle jets, 190 mains, #25 pilots, air/idle screws out 1-1/2 turns, no air correction jets.

Very smooth power delivery and pulls hard through the entire range. Will report back if any tweaks required in further testing. Feel free to copy and paste this to the other thread.

I'm also really liking the 21"/19" MX wheels and dual sport rubber. Supple and super light.
 
Related to tuning of course is this is old school- with points at .014", a new mechanical advance unit with good springs, irridium plugs, and a Harley/Andrews knock off Chinese dual output coil, which was only 20 bucks on eBay... will see if that holds up. Not 100% confident...

It's being fed by the Headway lifepo 38120 4s1p pack which theoretically holds at around 13V til fairly sudden drop off. Must use a special charger.
 
In case anyone wonders what the inside of a brand new Emgo reverse cone muffler looks like after just 20 miles- behold. Jesus.

I wrapped the cores with aluminum screen which is wired on, then ordinary pink fiberglass insulation carefully applied. They're still louder than I'd hoped at about a 7.5/10.

Other than that i discovered that headway cells are not fond of the intense vibration these bikes produce. One had some minor seepage of noxious electrolyte. So a bed of soft foam seems to have cured that. Will see...
 

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