Is this too much rust damage??

[T6h6o6r]

Hey y'all! It's been a lil bit since I've posted anything here, life's been a little crazy! The Mrs. & the dog & Me moved out of our way-too-small apartment and put a down payment on our first HOUSE (side note- I finally have a WHOLE STAND-ALONE GARAGE to myself!!! Already started turning it into my shop, including a dedicated subpanel w/ a 240V circuit - SO excited! BUT that's for another post, at another time. When its closer to being "finished" and looking less like a tornado just blew thru the junkyard)

My question has to do with this roller I have the opportunity to score... I'd be getting an insanely good deal on it, so I REALLY don't want to turn down the offer, I'm just a tad bit concerned about the rust on the hardtail section in these pictures... do y'all think that it might be too much rust? that it might affect the integrity of it? Or am I tripping and I should just STFU, hit it with rust converter, clean it up and throw some paint on it?? I'd really hate to get it home, finish building it out, then as Im ripping around the gnarled old roads here in Oakland, it snaps in half... If i survived that catastrophic failure I would be fuckin' madder than a nest full of hornets that just got kicked.

So, please! Your thoughts, opinions? suggestions even? All greatly appreciated. I know that alot of you really know your shit, so I know I'll have the peace of mind that I've made a well informed decision.

 

[Jan_P]

Without more Info I would walk away
The quality of the tubing and welds
If someone welds and builds something in steel .It is unusual not having any paint at all or other rust protector. Sending signals of substandard job

 

[NP2650]

That lower tube looks to be suspect, especially the flattened area where it curves up. Seems like a serious weak point.

 

[GLJ]

I'd be getting an insanely good deal on it,

How insanely good of a deal?
To me there is a used motor that you probably won't know if it's any good until you do a lot of checking into it. A set of fork and a set of wheels. The frame looks very suspect. If it's cheap enough to make it a good deal for the parts go for it.

 

[T6h6o6r]

Well it feels good at least knowing that my gut instinct was on point... Basically the guy is offering to trade me straight across for an old 70cc Honda scooter that's been sitting in my driveway for 7, maybe 8 months after a friend dropped it off and said "can I leave this here for a week or 2, I'll come right back and grab it, I promise it won't be any trouble for you" and now he doesn't answer when I call. So I sent him a text that said

"Scooters been sitting the better part of a year, you said a week or 2?? I don't hear back from you I'm gonna sell it, call it payment for 7-8 months of storage...? If you've got any issue with that, you know where to find me and the bike!"

As far as I know I've never seen the thing running, but this guy specifically was asking for small displacement projects in the 50-125cc range, so I made the offer, half expecting him to ask for additional $ or something, instead he replied "yes"

So, you see I'm not coming out of pocket at all, which makes it a very attractive deal considering I've been wanting a hardtail frame for a long time but it hasn't been financially viable, what with moving into the house and all, priorities were obviously elsewhere.

I already have a 2nd bike with a good engine on it that I sometimes scavenge for parts and my thoughts were one day when I can afford it ill have a 2nd project bike to do something crazy with other than my daily rider. So the spare engine isn't too exciting because I already have a spare engine, lol. TBH I was thinking if I do make the trade I would probably figure out which of the 2 was a nicer engine and sell the other one somewhat cheap, make a few bucks to put towards the build...

Sorry this post got really long just wan
ted to explain where I'm at with all this

 

[GLJ]

Another question is does it have a title? If so definitely do the deal. If not then it's it's just parts. Still wouldn't be a bad deal.

 

[5twins]

Yes, it's a late model engine so it has lots of nice parts (oil sight glass side cover, 6 plate clutch w/ damper plate, BS34 carbs, electronic ignition). Plus you're getting two nice alloy wheels. Re-spoked and polished up, they're very nice .....

 

[halfmile]

I would not walk away from this deal. I would run as fast as I could. This is a money pit of insane proportions.

 

[mrtwowheel]

Looks like it may have started with a good brand hardtail. That weld around the footpeg area is strange, like some of the original frame is welded to the hardtail there. If the hardtail was put on right I'd give that a blasting and primer. Looks like a bad job at the brake pivot and footpeg mounting? cut it off?

 

[jaybar6]

hi T6, tap the frame with a spanner, if it makes a hole, it is toast. grind it all off and put a new hard tail on it.

 

[Jan_P]

That lower tube looks to be suspect, especially the flattened area where it curves up. Seems like a serious weak point.

I think You are on something there Besides the flat
looking at the front down tubes on the frame more or less in line
As the fork
But looking at the lower parts of the Hard tail it looks as if the far side is to high up
Or is it just me ?

 

[T6h6o6r]

Well, I'm gonna meet up with him, and check it out firsthand. Really glad I made this post, because now I'll be going into it with a better mindset. I'm not just letting myself get excited about what I see as a "good deal!" and throwing caution to the wind, as I have done in the past. (With varied amounts of success... )

NGL I feel like ill go into it now alot more confident in my gut instinct and give it a pretty thorough once-over.

"If it seems sketchy in person,"
I'm telling myself this now,
"Im gonna just walk. Including the paperwork."

BUT I'm not lost on the fact that if it does seem pretty legit, for $0 spent and 1 hour of time invested I'd be scoring:

● A fairly nice set of spoked wheels.
● An engine I could turn around and sell
(As-is for maybe a couple hundred?
. OR parted out and possibly a little more??)
● A decent looking Frisco tank (not that I'm particularly fond of Frisco-mount tanks, but eh..)
● A decent seat (?)
● AND possibly a hardtail frame, which is something I really wanted for a while now.

even if I do end up chopping off and chucking the hardtail in the recycle bin, it's still a fairly nice come-up. No?

-p.s.-
Real quick- Big thanks to everyone who provided different opinions and ways of thinking about it, I really enjoy hearing other people's perspective on things like this. It reminds me that there's many different ways to look at things and not to get too caught up in just one way of seeing or approaching things, which for someone like me with pretty wicked ADHD (can ya tell??) is important.

 

[T6h6o6r]

Halfmile, I'm curious about your response

I would not walk away from this deal. I would run as fast as I could. This is a money pit of insane proportions.

I'm not sure I follow.. care to explain a bit more? How does getting a bunch of free shit in trade for something you've spent literally $0 on become an insane money pit? Unless you mean like a pit in the ground that you reach into and pull money out? That would be pretty insane, insanely COOL as SHIT! Did you mean that kind of money pit? Ooh, and you said run away fast, is that so you can get far away from them quickly, before they can have a change of heart? Good idea. I think I see now what you meant. Wow.




I'm just fuckin around!!

But I I'm truly interested in hearing more if you dont mind expanding on it a little.

 

[T6h6o6r]

Looks like it may have started with a good brand hardtail. That weld around the footpeg area is strange, like some of the original frame is welded to the hardtail there. If the hardtail was put on right I'd give that a blasting and primer. Looks like a bad job at the brake pivot and footpeg mounting? cut it off?

So your talking about cutting out that weird little area and just replacing it? with some DOM tubing, whats the stock XS tubing size 1-1/8"?? So the idea would be to recreate the original hard tail chunk's dimensions, then re-attach the bottom section, properly this time? Am I missing anything, lol?

So, welding the frame is no problem, I went to welding school and all that so it would be no problem to weld in some new tubing. Suppose I just have to figure out the measurements for the missing bits and then hopefully undo whatever bone headed shit they did? Then as you said, "blast and primer" then paint that bitch.

 

[T6h6o6r]

So, the plot thickens, y'all. I was scanning thru some Google images of xs650 Hardtails, and came across this image. I know it's not the best shot, but if you look closely, you can see that the bike shown has the same feature on the bottom of the frame! But without the coat of rust, making it a little easier to discern whats going on. it appears to be, rather than a bend in the tube or it being attached in an odd way, that there is an additional rectangular crossmember that's welded at an angle on top of the tubes, and some kind of bracing to hold it in place. I feel like that was very poorly described... LOL, sorry. the bottom line- what I'm getting at is

I don't think it's as janky as we thought at first?

To me It looks like maybe it was a hardtail kit someone produced and sold at some point, and that section is completely intentional, and serves a legit purpose, instead of being some whack-a-doodle one-off that was hastily slapped together by a tweaker or 3 during a weekend binge session.

Anyone else see what I'm talking about In this picture and care to chime in? I'm REALLY curious about this now!!

-note- If it looks a little "fake" in this last image it's just cause i tried using the AI image cleanup tool, just to try and reduce the blurriness from being magnified so much. I did it to try and make it a little easier to see what's going on there. It was an actual photo before that, promise!

 

[T6h6o6r]

Almost forgot to add these, shots of the frame in question that are almost the same angle as the image above, so you can see they are in fact the same

 

[mrtwowheel]

Yeah, those hardtails look to be constructed and assembled very similar.

 

[T6h6o6r]

ANOTHER UPDATE

I figured it out!! It's called a David Bird hardtail. There's a number of threads on this very forum talking about them, actually. Seems a decade or so ago there were alot of people saying that it was a very well made, solid hardtail kit. Pretty cool! So due to schedule issues I can't meet with the guy until next week Thursday or Friday. But I'll come back and post an update about how it looked in person and what I ended up doing. Thanks again for everyone who offered up some advice. Y'all are the reason this forum is so fkin dope.

 

[JJames]

Halfmile, I'm curious about your response


I'm not sure I follow.. care to explain a bit more? How does getting a bunch of free shit in trade for something you've spent literally $0 on become an insane money pit? Unless you mean like a pit in the ground that you reach into and pull money out? That would be pretty insane, insanely COOL as SHIT! Did you mean that kind of money pit? Ooh, and you said run away fast, is that so you can get far away from them quickly, before they can have a change of heart? Good idea. I think I see now what you meant. Wow.




I'm just fuckin around!!

But I I'm truly interested in hearing more if you dont mind expanding on it a little.

Nothing more expensive than a free horse. On top of that you're trading something that doesn't belong to you. I would agree that if the guy gave a damn about the scooter, he could have at least returned your calls. More likely the type to show up a week after it's gone saying he tried to get ahold of you, the bike was worth x, he made a deal to sell it for x, wtf bro? Just my 2cents for free.

 

[5twins]

Take a cordless drill with a wire wheel in it with you and hit the hard tail in a few spots. It may just be surface rust and could clean right off. This will tell you how bad the rust is.