Someone Else's Problem: Anesthesia's 2-wheeler...take two(?)

Anesthesia said:
We started visioning some changes with a couple of friends. Now that I'm taking it apart the coming winter anyway - why not paint the tins in a different color? The front fended needs to be painted anyway since it has been painted by a monkey riding a barrel while being shot at by a baboon. Ok it's not THAT bad but bad enough for me to do something about it. :D

I was thinking of a darker shade of metallic green, possibly something from kawasaki's own models, or possibly a dark gray(gunmetal gray or something) with something copper accents. A single stripe across the tins or possibly an OEM style paintjob. Not sure yet but I would like to change it just slightly.
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Why not try one of the newer Vulcan color schemes?







 
I did quickly look in to OEM kawa colors in general. That gray with red didn't come up in the search though. Looks like an option. :)
I'm going to try and stay away from black since we're doing it in a DIY paint booth, black can be hard to get done well.
 
While I had the radiator cover off I figured I'd give it some of that black paint I used on the hatchback. It's still rattle can and far from good - but it's better than it was.

The cover when I took it off



First coat on, some sanding done before the second coat.



Second coat on.
 
I think it's safe to say I've had some horrible luck with this thing. About 3.5 weeks ago I the starter relay that I got in June failed. In the middle of the night on a saturday/sunday night. I got it home and eventually to the garage where I diagnosed that it was indeed the relay that failed and nothing else. Being a 160? part I had to look in to the possibility of a warranty replacement. And late last week after a mere 3-weeks of circle jerking between the dealer and the company that imports Kawasaki I have a new relay. For some odd reason they wanted to know how much power my battery had. Even though I measured that the power goes in, but doesn't go out of the relay. As did the dealer that sold me the part in the first place.

If anything good, I put that piece in I painted. Looks great!
I didn't want to put it back in untill I was certain I had gotten all the little gremlins out of the system.

I think the japanese copied HD way too well on this thing. :D
 
I did put it back together after my last post. It works like a charm now. For the moment anyway. :D
Before I put it away for the winter I do need to change my brake pads. The rear ones are just about done. Starting to get colder so I probably won't be riding it for as long as I did last season with the yamaha(2c to 4c today).

Here's a shot of the cover in place. I didn't bother to wash the dirt off it for the picture. In any case it looks a good deal better than it did before. Even if it is a rattle can job.



Sort of a group photo. The trailer in the backround has been modified to transport motorcycles.
 
Ok, so I was riding home from work when I heard a sound followed by a slight loss of braking power in the rear.
This is what I found. Cleaned everything up, put new pads in and we're good to go agian.
 
:blink:
 
I started to pull her apart. The things to sort out this winter are to get the electrics sorted out. They've been done by a blind man. The paint needs some work since the front fender had been painted by a monkey in a shed with squirrel. Then there's the usual things that need to be done. Cleaning up, tuning up you name it. I also planned on changing the rear fender and relocating the license plate and rear light.


Here we go. I pushed it in and started to take things off. The bags were already off and I didn't even wash it. :D



Some of the electric wizardry I found. This is the wiring for the headlight. One can only wonder what they were doing.



How it sits now. I've looked in to the wiring somewhat. The rear lighting part is already out. I still need to clean it all up. The fuel tank is still on because it's still full of fuel. Somewhat of a problem that neither one of my cars runs on 95oct that I've put in it.
 
A little update.

Been fixing the dodgy electrics, so far there have been a number of things I can't understand. Like when they eliminated the US spec parking lights they re-wired the parking light from the rear cluster? Anyway this is what we've been trying to get it to look like more or less:



The other things that need addressing are the carbs. They need a refurb and some new jets to go with the new mufflers.


The mufflers in question. With the inner silencers removed asap.


I also got an other fender I'm gonna use. the original one had a crack in it as well as some other issues that needed to be sorted out. In the pic it's just resting on the tire. Had to make a pipe to connect the upper muffler to the middlebox(that I don't want to remove) because the original one had a 90 degree pipe and entered in the side. These are straight through. They're not in their final places in the picture and they're still subject to changes.


We also got a proper welding machine in the garage to make life easier.
 
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Update time! Even though not much has happened in the past month due to not finding certain service parts, getting the wrong parts and just being too busy or otherwise not being able to get my ass over to the garage. At the moment the electrics are mostly done. I still need to wire the rear lights, the front lights are back in. The carbs are rebuilt, back in and all connected. The exhausts are done. The pics are slightly out of date, since then I've put in the seat and used the old fender to get the brakcets in place. As soon as The rest of the rear is done it's time to start sanding it down.


The front wiring cleaned up. Reference the pic in the post above to get the "before" situation. The turn signal is still crooked.


The previously crooked light now sits as it should. Though I may look in to replacing it with one from work at some point


The rear fender as it hangs on the bike. At the moment the seat is already in.


The rear light I'm going to use. It should have been a direct fit on to this fender but as I found out it's not exactly... we'll make it fit.
 
This thing had a bit of a break again. I was on sick leave for a month and the garage was more or less off limits. Then I had to take care of the car(s). Now this thing was up again. As it is now the dents have been dealt with and most of the little imperfections have been sorted. The fenders were the worst and they've had more work done on them. The tank had a few spots on both sides that needed to be sorted, other than that I've not done anything big to it yet.



When it comes to paint and such my experience is none existent so instead of judging - any tips anyone more experienced might have are welcome :)
 
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I had planned on using a shop next to our garage for the paint. However, being a busy shop it would be uncertain if I'd get the time or if I'd even get to do it myself. We figured out a better plan! My friends garage has a little spot in it that can be converted to a paint booth with little hassle.

Soon! ...I hope. :D
 
All right. When ever I've had the time I've been doing a lot of bodywork. A good deal of sanding has been involved. Oh god how much sanding! :cry:
It's like you keep finding spots that need fixing in one way or the other. After I took the pic I spent a couple of hours more and there's still more work to be done!
 
Right, I've been on vacation and I've been doing other projects. This one though is more than likely be getting color tomorrow.

Since my last update I've re-done all of the work three times.

First time the black primer was wrong for the color even though we had been let to believe otherwise. Thankfully we found out before we sprayed any color. The next time we put on a different primer that reacted with the color that was on the rear fender. Time to strip again. This time back to bare metal(as I should have done in the first place). After hours of redoing the rear fender and fixing mistakes on the other parts they were in final primer. Tomorrow I'll give them a once over and then it's time for color!
 
Right. We have color! Ended up going for a color I saw on a transit van! After my initial plan of kawasaki orange was shot down by the local paint shop. Considering it was my first time using proper equip, and our "paint booth" was lacking a few things the end result was damn good! Now the clear coat needs to cure for a day or two(if the times on the can are to be trusted).
 
I left the pictures out on purpose yesterday. :D
I took some shots today. The color is Ford mars red. It changes surprisingly much depending on the light conditions from a near brown orange to a fairly bright sort of red orange. The pictures do no justice.


Close up with some light hitting the paint.
 
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:cool:

Nice color!
 
Thanks! I can't wait to get it on and properly buff it out :)
 
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