Little details and a little history

So all the little bits are trickling in.

Things like new springs for the footpegs.
$25 for a pair... good investment huh?

Lost count of what's been spent on fasteners, gaskets, and rubber bits. At least it's almost like a brand new bike.

Sorry to bore you. 

I'm waiting for replacement valve guides. I'll use that as an excuse for not doing the other hundred things I could be doing. The custom exhaust guides were 1/4" too short. Zach over at R/D is going to fix it up and get them here ASAP. 

Later this week, we might put the bottom end together... or wait and do the engine mounts first, before it gets too heavy to lift in and out.

It'll start to go faster soon...

In the meantime, here's a couple of shots of my other XS from oh so long ago. I think I built it for less than the engine in the 650.

Made almost everything. Had no money so had little choice.

Could have used some money for things like heat treating the 6061 T6 frame after welding. Despite the lack of funds, it turned out to be pretty unique. Not too many chain drive XS1100's around. The ones that are are pretty goofy because they just extended the output shaft, which means you have to run a teeny tiny front sprocket to fit. I made a gearbox that had 3 gears in it so I could move the countershaft back. This was before 3D modeling was around. Made designing things a bit more challenging.

Overall, it was pretty cool, but oh so much work. Everything was machined by hand, had no CNC access then either. Things like sleeving the oil pump, machining bigger spigots on the carbs so they'd fit the stock intake boots, lengthening the Gixer fork, all incredibly time consuming and could have been solved so much easier with a little cash.

Note the broken tach needle, thing used to buzz a little at 9k.

It's still sittng in the garage, hasn't been fired up for 6 years.

Maybe when the 650's done ... na been there done that.

Anyways, again sorry to bore you, we'll get back to the XS650 shortly, promise.

Pipes

Anyone got any other ideas on pipes for this thing?
I like some of these. There's that x pipe thing too. (see bottom)

How about this pipe work, there's some extreme dedication. Now that's a well fit pipe.

I've assumed that I'll be buying some 1 3/4" stainless and be building something on my own. It'd be great to find something off the shelf.

And of course, one of the coolest pipes ever. I still remember the first time I ever saw this bike, burned an indelible image on my brain.

A tip of the hat to this one as well. Whats most remarkable about this pipe, is which side of the engine the intakes on.    

That was a lot of welding and rework to get that intake out of there to show off this pipe. Guy's got some skills.

More mocking

So here are some snaps of the latest mock up.
Still thinking about forward lighting. The 7" in the picture is the most tolerable so far. Got an 8" and a couple of projector beams and a KTM triangle light thingy. I like the 7" because I can put the HID bulb I bought in there. It'll be stupid bright, good for my old eyes.

Almost time to start thinking about colours or colors. Kinda like the red and white livery that Yamaha used for DT's and MotoGP for a little while. Actually I think maybe YZ's were red and white for awhile? I also just like the bare steel, a lot. Problem is the seat section is glass. I guess I could attempt to replicate it from steel, but I'd like to maybe ride it this summer!

Now we need all new engine mounts. If we use the stock mounts we end up with a super short intake tract. According to Limey Bikes, he couldn't even use the gaskets under the intake manifolds with his RS's on the hornet bike. Therefore the thought is to have a nice long intake, that firstly allows me to unbolt the carbs without pulling the engine out of the frame, secondly long enough to make some low end grunt, cause its more fun. By tipping the engine forward around the main bottom mount, it also shifts a bit of the weight forward as well. So if we tip it forward like in the pictures, we have the appropriate location. But it means the other 4 mounts don't work. Anyways that's my problem, not yours.

As you can see the carb linkage wants to share the same space as the left petcock. This won't do either. Once again this is my problem, not yours. Pretty sure with a f--king day or so of work, i can move all that crap over to the inside of the other carb. Then the throttle cables can route down the backbone and right into the linkage. The accelerator pump will reside right beside it on the inside of the other carb. Looks like a good plan with my eyeballs. So much for my prepped in Germany Mikuni RS bolt on solution. Whatever. Come this far might as well... you know.

Looking at these pics also painfully reminds me we want to blast off that old floor paint and get a new coat of shiny epoxy down there at some point soon. Oh yeah and all those other chores that need to be done! F--k, almost forgot have to work as well to so I can feed my family... I digress.

Back to my highly honed procrastination/denial skills. Heard today somewhere that denial is now labeled as an addiction WTF? Its also time to get some 1 3/4" stainless bends in here so we can figure out what we're going to do for a pipe. Thinking left side high pipes or maybe a double wrap, both sides, over the cases under the carbs into a single can under the seat, not much else going in there yet. Like to buy  a pipe, but they all suck. At least the ones I've found. If someone knows better, enlighten me please.