Four Wheel Forum

That's great. But I have to tell all (giving away my age)that I was there. By 1965 My family traveled to 16 Countries and 49 states and sailed the Atlantic three times. I lived in Brasil in the early sixties. By 64 I had traveled Europe and finally sailed the SS United States out of Southampton England. By the end of 65 I spent time behind the Iron Curtain in Communist Poland. I walked Auwschitz and the Warsaw getto. See this thread below
http://www.gringoes.com/articles.asp?ID_Noticia=1723

I could go on and on about the "been there done that trail" I am thankful everyday for such a fantastic journey....and I am still cruisin.

The real reason I like the little CA95 Benly's? They were my dream bike's at 13
in 1965.

"so saving the bike has a little of my inner self being healed."
Chip has eloquently stated what I think the 'core' is for many (or some) of us here.
Maybe we should call it "Hobbytherapy". From personal experience I can tell you this has been better than ANY office visit with the end product being a more sound "me" AND great bikes.

Larzfromarz wrote:"so saving the bike has a little of my inner self being healed."
Chip has eloquently stated what I think the 'core' is for many (or some) of us here.
Maybe we should call it "Hobbytherapy". From personal experience I can tell you this has been better than ANY office visit with the end product being a more sound "me" AND great bikes.

reminds me of a sign hanging on my garage wall ... "You never see a motorcycle parked outside a psychiatrist's office."

Larz & BTL: Thank you for your imput. It's great to know there is more than I out there who like to preserve a snap shop of the 60's & 70's through restorations and good ole' basic shop time.

This weekend is primer & inner paint.

Lovely SE Georgia forecast calls for mid to upper 70's. I normally shoot color on the inside's of the bike & parts 1st and allow the paint to set a week before working on the outer finish.
I have to confess that I am also doing something that is way out of the box thinking. Before I explain, I have done this several times before. Repair the mufflers.


This bikes mufflers were way gone. I took my dremmel and cut away all of the
weak metal, cleaned out the inside of the muffler where possible and applied fiberglass cloth and resin. Since there is no chance of chrome plating, I will have the mufflers sand blasted. Once blasted I will feather out the repairs and paint them with silver header paint. They will serve as temps until I finf suitable mufflers for the bike.
This was also a trick I learned from my past to get a few more weeks out of an exhaust system. As long as the repair is on the "coll" end (more or less) the repair will last quite a while.

Love the pic of the raw metal frame. Almost like a modern sculpture. As rough as that bike was, that front fender appears to be truly unmolested - so rare not to have the rear flare smashed and bent.

I've never seen a fiberglass repair on an exhaust part before, so this is new. When I was a youngster, I was guilty of using that adhesive metal exhaust wrap for temporary fixes, which got me a few weeks of silence out of my '62 Peugeot moped.

The fender was beat up and the flare was bent. A little metal working with my body hammers, small arbor press and dollies brought it back pretty close. It will need a little filler to make it perfect.

Several of my past builds have fiberglass patches at the tips. The closer to the engine locations, I use JB Weld for small cracks and holes. You would be suprised how well this works. Alas, it's not forever, so my technique is not a restoration, but a temp. patch until better pipes come along.

I took advantage of the warm snap to shoot primer & color. An old school technique is to shoot primer & color to see where the flaws are.

Yup I think they call it a "guide coat" Light misting of black helps to show the low spots once the saning begins. Signs of good prepwork...

That's already an amazing transformation compared to the way the frame started. Did the initial coats reveal any areas that needed rework?

Yes, but I already knew where they were, so the initial prime and paint was just to get started on the finish. Thanks

2nd coat of black on the frame. 1st coat on the tank, swing arm and forks. Once the frame is finished it will be time to reinstall the wiring harness and wire the turn signals. Lots of fine sanding ahead.

I like how you have your halogen lamp hanging safely away from where it could get bumped. I think I've gone through half a dozen halogen bulbs simply because I bumped my lamp over. I've switched to LED lights, which tolerate my clumsiness.

That's funny. I just raised up a couple tube lights as high as possible in my little garage shop because I kept smacking them. Nice little arrangement. I like the steel bench top you made too. Feels good to have some paint down finally eh!?

Spokes wrote:Here is a shot of the contents of the gas tank.


Below is a shot of the tank after being cleaned.


Somehow, with the oily dirt in the tank for 30yrs, the tank cleaned up nicely and can be returned to service.

Another wild find is the headlight...original 1964....still works, both high and low beam.

Your bike looks about like my black one does. lol
Yeah, that's the kind of junk that I shook out of my gas tank, too.

The tank was further derusted with Evapo-Rust. A super great product.