750 cafe project

[Mike_H]

Is there enough screw sticking out of the motor to cut a slot in it? Most of the seized screws I have run across have been treated to the dremel tool. I put a cutting wheel in, and make a screwdriver slot in the bastard. I use really big screwdriver, and pop them out. I've had pretty good luck with this, I've only had to drill a couple screws out. I got really lucky with my exhaust...no broken screws.

 

[Bopi]

Bolt extractors hmmm, are we talking easy-outs. Be careful to center the drill.

I skimmed your best buys post but I would have to disagree.

I went looking for a lawnmower not too long ago. A smaller M&P shop tried to tell me that their prices were marked up on a Husquavarna because Briggs and Stratton made special engines for them (the husquavarna).I explained that Sears had a craftsman tractor with the exact same engine as his and that there was no difference. I then explained that i had been to the B&S web site that morning and could quote the various engines that B&S makes. I then proceded to tell him he was full of it ( well actually i stopped short )
he wasn't to happy and showed me the door.

Perhaps there's too much emphasis on customer service. Personally , i hate to be sold. I'd rather do my own research and get a deal instead.

Best buys employees are way underpaid.... besides I've got a wal-mart 2 miles away

Now i don't know about you but I've always found "john" down at the local hard ware store to mark up his prices and its not by 15 cents.

The only thing i found interesting about " johns" was his individual drawers of nuts, washers, grommets and other assorted odds and ends. Lowes now carries that kind of thing and much more.

 

[Mike_H]

WALMART SUX!!!! That is all.

 

[beergood]

I did try slotting the bolt, all that ended up doing was shredding half of what was exposed. A noble effort none the less.

As for local stores, there is definitely a possibility that the owner can be an a-hole. Most likely a good possibility, since the world has no shortage of them. However, when you find a business owner (any business) that is reputable and you take the time to develope a relationship, I think that is far more rewarding.

I spent my college years working in a deli/meat market. You could definitely find a better price on meats at a chain store. Some of them even do some decent cutting, however, most of the time you get middle grade product. Can anyone feel remotely good about grilling a steak that is less than an inch thick?

We had mostly repeat local customers (when I graduated, some of them gave me gifts). I can assure you that we went to great lengths to make sure that they were well taken care of and satisfied.

I also prefer to do as much research as possible before making a purchase, and I would submit that most of the people on this forum are the same way. There is a reason that we are all here, sharing knowledge and advice. Most likely we are all do-it-yourselfers to some extant. My point about a good small local business is that they aren't selling you product, but service. If you don't need something, a good store owner should tell you, because they want you to return when you do need something.

And I would also agree that most of those employees aren't paid much, but then again, most of those employees view what they do as a 'job'. I would doubt that very many of them honestly give a second thought to the advice they give the moment you walk away. They probably aren't bad people. Hell, I had my share of crap jobs, and customers can be a huge pain. But I doubt the kid at Best Buy pushing surround sound actually cares about how I am going to use my product as he does what his sales numbers are going to look like.

I think part of it is the chain of command. The farther you are away from the person that is going to end up with your money, the less the person you are going to deal with is going to care about you.

I have a friend that is a VP at Ford. He started out as an engineer, and got his MBA. He once told me about a corporate seminar he attended when he was a junior level exec. It was the kind of thing with a hired motivational speaker, an overhead projector and a conference room full of employees forced to be there.

The first question he threw out to the audience was:

"What do we do here at Ford?"

Everyone sat around looking at each other. After some cajoling a few people tried to answer.

"Make cars?"
"Provide jobs?"
"Automotive researchand development?"

Things like that. They were all wrong. The speaker revealed the correct answer: "We make money"

"The way we do that is we sell cars". Appearently this went on for over an hour, complete with a bunch of slides. One was of a meat grinder with a car going in the top and dollar bills coming out the bottom. My friend said the whole thing was pretty funny, but it did drive a point home.

Behind big corporate doors, the culture is about separating you from your money. How it is done isn't terribly important. Now no good parasite should kill its host, so your well being is thought about. It's just not the most important thing.

And I know how this might read, and let me say, I am not anti-business. I'm not even a democrat. But I also don't kid myself. Best buy and other stores don't care about me, they want my disposable income. And they know that they don't have to give me the best service in the world. It just has to be about as good as all the other big box electronic stores.

(I fell like I am picking on Best Buy, but I am just using them as an example)

When I was a kid, there was a corner market named Bob's. Bob was always there, and with every purchase Bob yould give you a hearty "God Bless Yah". He was often seen having a "Miller Time" with a couple neighborhood dads behind the counter. One particularly hot summer, I think I was about 10 or 11, Bob bought a soft serve ice cream machine. I think he sold the cones for a buck each. Often when we were playing around the area (street hockey was big) Bob would come out and give us free cones, saying that it was too hot not to have some ice cream.

Eventually he retired and closed his store. Thinking back to the days of going in there and getting an ice cream cone, or a bottle of pop (remember when they were in bottles?) I feel a little disappointed that I don't have a place like that that I go to now. I know that there are some still out there, it is my own laziness that stops me from looking too hard. And that is just one of the many ways that I disappoint myself.

 

[Bopi]

i'd have to agree 100% on your reasons for supporting the M$P's. no doubt that once upon a time they played a substantial role in the overall scheme of things. Then again back when , cruising on main street was the national past-time of young America and you could get a burger from a girl on rollerskates.

These days things are a little different.

NAFTA apparently has now opened the border to trucks from Mexico. While most people complain about jobs going south what they don't realize is that we get 30% of our oil from them. Another 30% from Canada. Free trade means the price of oil stays lower. Its unfortunate but true and necessary.

Wal-mart is just a symptom.

Funny but its easier for Craftsman to offer a better waranty than to actually make better tools. That goes for Cobalt and a number of other off brand tools. They realize that the returns on broken tools will not exceed the increase in sales from offering a better return policy.

Now perhaps its a pride in ownership issue or even a get what you pay for issue but the end result is that most consumers are willing to make the trade-off. I've actually rebuilt motors using one of those cheesy Taiwan tool kits with the only decent tool being a torque wrench. It worked fine and the job got done. Now If I did that professionally , I might have to invest in a better set of wrenches but that wasn't the case.

Ford ironically sold out when they bought controlling shares in mazda. If you can't beat the comp, you might as well own them. We live in a market driven economy that knows no national boundaries.

So i would suggest that rebuilding an old bike is just an attempt to recapture your soul. Simpler Days. i wonder how ritchie and potsie are doing.

By the way, if the broken screw proves to be too stubborn , and you haven't hacked at too much of it, and you can still get an easy-out(extractor) into a pre-drilled hole or a screw driver into a slot (run on sentence) you might try a propane torch. Since the aluminum block expands under heat at a much faster rate than the steel bolt, it may free it up . Careful how hot though and be aware of your gaskets and other less durable parts.

 

[beergood]

Hah! Should have followed my gut, which told me that an extractor wouldn't do it.

Of course everything I read about them warned me multiple times about them breaking off. And of course that was all that was going through my head, right up to and including the moment that I broke the extractor. On the plus side, it didn't break off too far into the bolt, so there isn't a whole lot of tool in there, but there is still enough to make this job do what it has continued to do since day one, which is get harder and harder.

It is killing me that all this is over an exhaust bolt. I cant even begin to tell you about the many times that I have boyscouted an exhaust on vehicles in the past, and this is happening now.

Considering the time that I have put into this, I could have bought a new head, or a whole new bike. And this is holding me up from making any progress elsewhere. So guess what, my number two header is being held on with one bolt. Am I happy with this? No. Can I live with this? Yes.

I am planning on doing some major engine overhauling in the future, and this will get handled then.

Damn!

Moving on, I think there is something wrong with my starter relay. I checked the wire coming from the starter button, and that is hot. And I was able to turn the starter by bypassing the relay, so on to the next problem.

I miss when I was just doing fabbing.

 

[beergood]

On the plus side, I wired up the LEDs in my dash, and they worked!

And it took some finagling to get the exhaust to fit, but it did and it's solid.

 

[mortation]

On the plus side, I wired up the LEDs in my dash, and they worked!

Got a picture?

 

[Bopi]

Now naturally your broken extractor is hardened tool steel as opposed to the bolt which is a mild carbon steel. you'll need a carbide drill unless you can pick out the extractor pieces. The problem with an exhaust manifold leak is that the valve could burn prematurely but check with the other forum guys on that one as I know it does apply with cars

 

[beergood]

The piece left in is pretty small, and I think if I grind around it with a dremel I might be able to get it out fairly easy, then again, I thought a lot of things centering around this bolt should be easy.

As for the exhaust leaking, it's in there pretty snug. And I don't think you need a ton of back pressure, these aren't high compression engines. I will definitely check to severity of he leak, if it is too unacceptable then I will find a way to fix it quickly. But if it isn't too bad, the I will accept it for the time being. There are other things that I am working on right now. My main worry with running one nut/stud is that nut working it's way out. I put locktite on it, so I should be okay.

I just hate leaving a job half done, but sometimes you need to pick your battles. I shall live to fight this one again.

 

[beergood]

It Started!!!!

More pics and the whole story to follow soon.

 

[beergood]

Okey Dokey.

I mentioned that the starter relay seemed to be acting up, well now I tihnk there may be a combination of starter relay/battery. I stored the battery in my house this winter, in the hopes that it would still be good this spring. I instaled it in the bike last week, and have had a tender/charger on it since. It seems to power the lights and everything just fine, but when I bridged the relay it still wouldn't start. So I attached it to a car with some jumper cables. The engine still wouldn't turn over. I was listening pretty closely, and the relay was making the nice 'clicking' noise that it is supposed to. I checked, and the wire coming from the starter button is hot (maybe it's not grounded properly, which would explain it), so I bridged the relays again, this time with the jumper cables still attached.

And KABOOM, it started! Coughed a little bit, and took a while to heat up (it was below 30 F). The number two exhaust didn't leak up front, or at least not much. No oil shot out of anything There where a few backfires, but that's to be somewhat expected. I haven't done anything to tune it yet, and I did put a new 4-1 on it. By the way, the new exhaust sounds great. Throaty, but not too loud. I tried to make a recording with my phone, but the quality sucked. I might try again tomorrow.

After I unhooked the cables I was able to start it pretty easily with the kick start, which has me completely thrilled.

So I have a few little issues I want to address:

SS brake lines (hopefully) and bleeding
Turn signals
General Tune-up
That damn broken bolt (I'm going Heli-coil)
Redoing some of the bolts with locktite

After removing and reinstalling the airbox, I can understand wanting to go to pods and rejetting, besides debatable pefomance gains. That thing is a pain to get in and out. So maybe I'll go that way.

I may also get one of the smaller sealed batteries and move all the electricals to behind the seat, then I could open up the side panels. If I do that, then I gotta go pods and rejet.

But hey, IT STARTED! That is a huge relief after having it in so many pieces over the last 4 months. The rest will be gravy, that I can take my time with.

 

[beergood]

What do you guys think the chances are for a cafe conversion being the bike of the month? Should I go for it? I feel a little boastful asking, but every parent thinks their kid is the cutest one in the world.

Like I said, this thing is far from perfect up close, but if you've ever been near a utilitarian racer it is actually pretty close. I kinda like the rawer look, although this thing will hopefully get more and more refined over the years.

 

[beergood]

mortation, these are closer pics of the LEDs. I only put in the oil and neutral (I currently don't have turn signals).

They wired in real easy and work great right out of the package, and were 2 bucks each.

I may make a different dash panel that incorporates the signal LEDs and the gear indicator, or maybe a small tach.

 

[UncleMike]

Definitely go for BOM.

 

[Mike_H]

Congrats on the starting. That always feels good. I remember when I got mine going for the first time...coaxing her along, little less choke, try a little throttle, then it catches and runs a couple revs. Try again, and finally, it runs. Its a cool feeling. I think you should try for BOM. I'm going to when mine is done, so let me know what month you do, so I don't have to run against yours

 

[Bopi]

Leave the chrome on the front fender and you've got my vote.

The Scud looked pretty good though...............

 

[beergood]

Leave the chrome on the front fender and you've got my vote.

The Scud looked pretty good though...............

In my current vision, the chrome fender flows into the exhaust.

If I ever have to black my exhaust or engine, then it becomes a different story.

Thanks for the votes of confidence guys.

 

[Dragonfly]

Absolutly beautiful bike!!! A+++++++ Definelty a BOM contender!

Side note, where did you get the tail section and seat? How difficult was it to make work???
I should probobly just take a peak through your thread.... But im feeling impatient and am asking anyway :lol

 

[Billyboy]

I'd vote for ya! Sweet bike. I got all excited when I read that it started!:-D