Half baked plans

I got the re-bored cylinder head back.  Unfortunately - we had a miscommunication.  I thought I had asked for the cylinder to be cleaned, painted and bored.  The shop that did the work heard "bored".  So - the good news is that a freshly bored cylinder is at my house.  The bad news is that it looked all mungy/ugly on the outside.

I started with Orange degreaser, and did the big spots with my nylon brush.  But that wasn't getting between all of the fins.  So, I put it in a small bucket with the rest of my degreaser and let it soak all day.  It looked like I had most of the grease off, so I rinsed it off and blew the remaining water I could see off with my air compressor.

Let it dry for a little bit, and I sprayed it with VHT (very high temperature) exhaust header paint (black).  Now - if you read the instructions for this paint, in order for  it to be completely impervious to everything (and good to 2000 degrees F), you have to cure it.  I didn't even read the directions for "if part is on vehicle" - since that is moot.  But here they are for "if part is not on vehicle":

Place object in 250 degree F Oven for 30 minutes.
Let cool for 30 minutes.
Place object in 400 degree F Oven for 30 minutes.
Let cool for 30 minutes.
Place object in 600 degree F Oven for 30 minutes.
Let cool.  Paint is now cured.

Wow - my oven doesn't even go to 600F.  But, I'm not going to let that stop me.

Got out one of the old pizza pans that my wife bought years ago, and put the cylinder head in the 250 F oven.

That seemed to go OK.  Next the 400 F oven.  Hmmm - lots of smoke.  Didn't get all the grease off, did we?

Next - cranked the oven as high as it would go (somewhere north of 500 F).  Yikes - that's not a good smell.  Vent fan on.  Window open!  Puffs of blue/white smoke coming out of the oven.

That was a long 30 minutes.  My wife came in the kitchen once while this was going on and said "Ewwww - what's that smell?".  I opened the oven and showed her - she didn't say anything and just left (the kitchen, not forever).

Once it was done - I took it immediately out to the garage to cool.  Luckily - leaving the window open all night allowed the smell to dissipate.

So - there are some blotches of grease around the bottom flange, where I missed some spots with the degreaser.  But - overall - it looks pretty good.  Hopefully I'll find out someday how durable it is.

Exhausted

A big box came today, from Mobley's Bultaco.  I immediately knew what it was.  The exhaust is here.

So - I opened it up, and here's what it had:

Wow.  So - it's in 2 pieces - with two loose metal tabs.  I figured that the tabs were to be welded onto the exhaust, so that you could mount it to the frame.  The header has some springs and two washers on it.  Apparently, it's an expansion joint.  The two washers welded to it connect to more springs, which attach to the exhaust nut on the head.  

This will probably be the last item installed on the bike, but it looks pretty neat.  Way better than the stock exhaust.

Lacing

Now that my hubs and spokes are in my garage, I decided to take on lacing a wheel today.  I picked the front, since it looks less intimidating than the rear wheel.

It didn't start well.

I tried to follow the spoke pattern that I took a picture of.  That went poor.  Then, I tried to lace one side - inner and outer, before starting the other.  That went very bad.

Well - I say that.  I was able to figure out the pattern - every spoke is 4 holes apart.  That is - on the inner spokes - start one, count 4 holes, and that's where the next inner spoke goes.

So I decided to start over.  Took all of the outer spokes off, and left the inner ones on.  Laced the right side inner spokes.  So far, so good.  Laced the left side (going the opposite direction as the right side ones.  Better.  Laced the outers on the right side (it's easy to thread them with the wheel partially laced).  No problem.  And finally - the remaining spokes matched up to the empty holes.

And I ended up with this:

Which may not seem like 3 or 4 hours of work, but it is.

I'll try to true it, but not today.

Still - pretty happy with my first wheel.

Still Waiting for parts to come back

Not much progress on the Bultaco lately.  It seems like I'm waiting for a lot of parts to come back before I can start re-assembly.  But - here's a status update anyway.

The triple tree and kickstand came back from Barry in North Carolina.   The powder coating came out great.

I cheated and took the frame, triple tree spacers and headlight bucket down the street to Atlas.  For $50, Don drilled holes and tapped them where the rear pegs were (this is where the reflectors are going), and drilled out the spacers and headlight bucket to accept the turn signals.  Pretty cool stuff, and way easier than  I could have done it.  I told Don that I was still struggling with bushings in the swing arm - he said "Bring it to me - I'll get it".  I might.  Let me try the slide hammer/bushing puller I just bought first.  Don's only words of wisdom "Don't mess it up and make it harder for me".  Great - my reputation now proceeds me.

I got a call today from Atlas Chrome Plating.  All of my chrome bits are done.  I'll head up there tomorrow and pick it all up.  While I'm there, I'm going to drop off the headlight bracket/spacers for the triple tree for polishing.

The biggest news - the brakes came back today from Matt at Speed and Sport.  I can't adequately describe how well these came out, so I'll just post a picture.

Wow, huh.  Since I have my hubs back, I'm going to start lacing wheels this weekend.  Matt is great to deal with, and does great work.  www.speedandsport.com

Finally - I was surfing e-bay for Bultaco parts, and came across this Mercurio for sale.  I think it's a great looking bike.  Sold in 1 day for $2600.  I contacted the owner (Doug) and we've e-mailed back and forth.  Doug got the bike mostly like it is - did a light restoration and has now sold it. 

There are two things non-stock about this bike.  The first is the 40 spoke Honda front brake.  Wow, that's a big brake.  Second is - the Bultaco Kit America exhaust.  THAT is cool.  In e-mails with Doug, he offered that I should contact Mobley's Bultaco in Nevada to see if they had one.

So - I e-mailed and they said that I should call Lynn, and he might be able to fix me up.

I called Lynn on Wednesday at lunch.  Apparently, years ago, a guy in Houston had an actual Kit America exhaust from Bultaco.  He shipped it to Lynn in Nevada, and Lynn had about 8 copies made - downpipe, exhaust, mounting bracket, silencer.  This was years and years ago (Lynn might have told me, but I've forgotten).  Now - he has one left.

I was almost afraid to ask how much.  I found a Kit America exhaust on e-bay that is in Spain for $545 (without shipping).  But I asked.

The answer:  "$245".

Done.  Lynn was laughing - "It started in Houston, and the last one is going back there".

Serendipity.

Powder coating - Part 2

Spring covers came back from Barry in North Carolina yesterday.  Took them out of the box this morning - beautiful.

Here's some powder coated eye candy:

Now he has the upper and lower triple clamps that are getting the powder coated treatment, as well as the kickstand.  Hard to believe that the front fork will probably be the first part of the bike that is completely done.

I'm going to send the frame out for coating as soon as I drill and tap the old rear peg locations for reflectors.    

This is going to look great.

I'm calling Atlas Plating tomorrow to see what's up with the rest of the bits.  If they can't save my headlight trim, I was able to find one on e-bay that I paid way too much for.

Love it.

Powder coating - Part 1

I've been going back and forth on what to do with different painted parts on the Bul.  Paint (as in rattle can) or powder coat?  Painting is cheap.  Powder coating is durable.  Paint I can do.  Powder coating has to be sent out.

The latest debate centered around the spring covers on my fork tubes.  They are basic black.  I could paint them with gloss black krylon (which - honestly, a lot of parts are going to end up), or - powder coat.  But who could do the powder coating?

About a year ago - I had some wheel locks for my Porsche project powder coated by another Porsche enthusiast in North Carolina.  He posts to a porsche bulletin board that I frequent.  We agreed on a price, and I sent the wheel locks.  After getting them, he said:

You know - this is the price I charge for all 20 lug nuts.  You only sent me 4.  If you want to send me the rest - I'll do them for free.

Well - I had already bought all new lug nuts on e-bay, so I didn't need it.  Opportunity lost?

Nope.  I sent him a note to see if he would remember me.  He actually didn't, but his wife remembered the conversation.  And wouldn't you know - he powder coated the spring tops (black) for nothing.

Nice.  They are back in the mail.  I hope to have them next week.  Very excited.

 Thanks again Barry.

Boomarang

Parts left, parts are returning.

Got a call today from Buchanan's.  Turns out, I have 6 different spokes on the Bultaco - Front Inner, Front Outer, Rear short Inner, Rear short Outer, Rear long Inner, Rear long Outer.  So - that's how they are going to custom bend them for me.  Plus - they are going to send me some more assembly oil and a wrench.

The bigger news - I got home from work today, and there was a long box from Frank's Maintenance and Engineering Inc, with this on the side:

How exciting.

I opened it up, and there was my rotten old fork tube, with two new ones sitting right next to it:

Pretty.

Fork re-assembly needs to follow soon.