Budget Build?? Don`t save your receipts!!

[azman857]

Let's be honest about these bikes of ours. They are never "finished". There's always a tweek needed here, or a worn part needing replaced. A "gotta have "glitter part. Tires and chain & sprokets wearing out. It is never endig situation.

 

[mrtwowheel]

I cut corners where I could, rim liners made from the old tubes, air line petcocks, reworking the old wire harness, made my own bungs, doing my own welding, painting and powder coating, I had the tools, painted spokes instead of new, can't count the low priced Shinkos, Chinese rectifier and after market automotive regulator, copy of Briggs & Stratton starter solenoid, bicycle grips for foot peg covers, copied someone else's top motor mounts,foot pegs and foot controls, banggood brake hose and master cylinder.

Loose the receipts, keep the packaging and part numbers.

I'm so cheap those turn signals that didn't work out, and the stainless that I don't remember what I bought them for is what bothers me. Oh, and those three extra fenders that didn't work out.

Scott

Edit, My quiet, good looking, short exhaust, less than $30, I'm not ready to show the makings of that yet.

 

[59Tebo]

Yeah? Thirty nine years on the job, I inhale cigars, occasionally drink out of the bottle, and since I've already been almost dead two or three times (cancer, valve replacement), the only worries I have about looking at the grass from the bottom is whether or not I finish all the projects I have going on. I'm not some kind of tough guy, I don't have a death wish, I have a life wish. Besides, I'm just too damned busy! I can't wait to be retired so I have more time for the three basket cases I have in the garage. What with the plans I have just for the '75, I don't have any delusions about it being a "budget" build. The parts list reads like a "Who's Who" of Xs650 parts suppliers. I plan on doing as much as I can myself, within my skillset, farming out what I can't and you can be damned sure when I roll this puppy out, there won't be another one like it. Stand by, the build log is soon to begin....

 

[fredintoon]

Don't know why anybody would want a stinkin Vincent when they could have an XS650 Special.

Sez somebody who's never ridden one.
I rode Curly Forbes' Series C Black Shadow at 90 mph in 3rd gear up Filton Hill (30mph limit).
The trick was braking to a legal speed before you got in sight of the Police Station at the top.
I was 20 years old at the time and thought I was immortal.
But if one owned a Series C Vincent Black Shadow these days it could be sold at auction
for enough money to buy a container full of XS650 Specials.

 

[mrtwowheel]

Let's be honest about these bikes of ours. They are never "finished". There's always a tweek needed here, or a worn part needing replaced. A "gotta have "glitter part. Tires and chain & sprokets wearing out. It is never endig situation.

Same with my old Hondas, it never ends. Glitter parts? I can barely keep up with everything else. It's been a long time since I let those little insignificant "uglies" bother me. Not that I would ride a "rat bike", or at least, I wouldn't consider my bikes to be "rat bikes".

Scott

 

[TwoManyXS1Bs]

Back in '71 I bought a wore-out 20-year-old grunge of a bike. Put a lot of work and $$$ into it. It was good enuff to get stolen in '74. I claimed $3000 in theft loss on my tax return. Later, got audited.

"Sir, we have a problem with this $3000 loss claim on your old motorcycle that only shows a $300 NADA value. So, we must deny your claim, you must refile, and pay enormous penalties and interest."

"But, but, but, I spent a lot of time and money building it."

"Well, sir, if you can produce receipts (*smirk*), we can add that to the NADA value (more smirks)."

Fortunately, I had kept all the receipts, and provided them to the *inquisition* later that day. The examiner (with reduced smirk this time) removed the receipts from the shoebox and started adding them on his push-button, hand lever actuated adding machine. He knew this would take awhile, and wasn't happy about this.

Click, click, click, *ca-runch*, click, click, click, *ca-runch*, click, click, click, *ca-runch*, click, click, click, *ca-runch*, click, click, click, *ca-runch*, click, click, click, *ca-runch*, click, click, click, *ca-runch*, click, click, click, *ca-runch*...

He hadn't even gotten halfway thru the box, looked at the running subtotal, muttered something not suitable for a family environment, stuck all my receipts back in the shoebox, and told me to "Git outta here".

I've been meticulously saving ALL my financial records ever since.

That practice has pulled my a$$ out of the fire on more occasions...

 

[Meddy]

I keep a record of my build, but I do that on all my projects, just me I guess.
The cost doesn't really worry me though it's my hobby and the only thing I spend money on except for maybe a beer or two some nights.
And considering I used to smoke but quit along time ago I am still along way in front seeing as smokes now cost about $40.00 a packet.

 

[JRay77]

I wonder if I kept the bar receipts over the years what that'd add up to. First 15yrs after school, drinking, smoking, acting a fool was my hobby. A divorce, several failed relationships, legal problems and health issues, I finally called it quits. Ran into a collection of XS 650's and it has turned out to be the best thing that's happened to me. Healthy distraction. I bitch about money. I always will. The older I get, the more I sound like my dad. "How freakin much?! How do these people sleep at night!" I get it honest. Haha!

 

[CBJamie]

My next build will not be a budget build by a long shot, the motor work and paint alone will be around 10k not to mention the engraving on the motor cases, custom digger frame work, custom leather seat, one off custom tank. All that plus my time ( hundreds of hours) . My first over the top show and go build. I'm estimating 20 maybe 25K total. There will be no exspences spared on this one. And it all started with a $600 donor bike.

 

[gggGary]

Back in '71 I bought a wore-out 20-year-old grunge of a bike. Put a lot of work and $$$ into it. It was good enuff to get stolen in '74. I claimed $3000 in theft loss on my tax return. Later, got audited.

"Sir, we have a problem with this $3000 loss claim on your old motorcycle that only shows a $300 NADA value. So, we must deny your claim, you must refile, and pay enormous penalties and interest."

"But, but, but, I spent a lot of time and money building it."

"Well, sir, if you can produce receipts (*smirk*), we can add that to the NADA value (more smirks)."

Fortunately, I had kept all the receipts, and provided them to the *inquisition* later that day. The examiner (with reduced smirk this time) removed the receipts from the shoebox and started adding them on his push-button, hand lever actuated adding machine. He knew this would take awhile, and wasn't happy about this.

Click, click, click, *ca-runch*, click, click, click, *ca-runch*, click, click, click, *ca-runch*, click, click, click, *ca-runch*, click, click, click, *ca-runch*, click, click, click, *ca-runch*, click, click, click, *ca-runch*, click, click, click, *ca-runch*...

He hadn't even gotten halfway thru the box, looked at the running subtotal, muttered something not suitable for a family environment, stuck all my receipts back in the shoebox, and told me to "Git outta here".

I've been meticulously saving ALL my financial records ever since.

That practice has pulled my a$$ out of the fire on more occasions...

Pretty sure in that situation I would have pushed him to finish the box and THEN said you are right! that wasn't the correct deduction, we better do an amended return.... I've gone around it a time or two with the sales tax folks, but they ain't won yet.

 

[TwoManyXS1Bs]

... I would have pushed him to finish the box and THEN said you are right! that wasn't the correct deduction, we better do an amended return...

Oh, yeah, I meekly mentioned that, but that guy had the temperament and arrogance of a crusty drill sergeant, and I was an easily intimidated 23-year-old learning the ways of the world, long before the "kinder/gentler" IRS. Amended return? He wasn't having it. Much later, a friend of mine who used to do part-time work at the IRS told me that those guys got a cut, piece of the action, from audit recoveries. And, I ruined 6 hours of that guy's life...

 

[gggGary]

I ruined 6 hours of that guy's life...

WELL worth it then!