The Little KLR 250 that...always was?

B.C.  - So I know it's late in the evening (make that early in the morning, if you want to be technical about it) but this was just too funny to pass up.  I've really been lazy when it comes to updating this blog, so I figured I'd make a valiant attempt to get back in the game.  A little while ago, I purchased a 2001 Kawasaki Ninja 250 for $400 that was in decent condition.  Having sold the '85 Honda Elite 250 (fantastic scooter) I needed to find myself a motorcycle that was cheap, but at the same time, something that was learner-friendly.  I wouldn't call myself an experienced rider, however I do think I'm hovering around the intermediate level now.  I still wanted to play it safe, however, and get something that would be forgiving towards new rider's mistakes.  The Ninja 250 is a well-renowned motorcycle which has been in production since 1986, and is still being made today.  It's probably one of the all-time best beginner motorcycles due mainly to it's smooth power delivery, forgiving clutch and overall light weight.  Needless to say, I was completely thrilled upon discovering that a battery charge was all it needed to be up and running.  It was one of the most smooth, comfortable and forgiving motorcycles I have ever ridden.  The only issue was that the valves were making their presence known quite audibly, which really started to bother me after riding it for a few minutes.  I took it over to the local motorcycle shop, they looked it over and agreed that it was a little loud, but was nothing to be concerned about.  But this is me we're talking about, and I can't ever seem to leave anything alone.  So naturally, I took it upon myself to adjust the valves, but as I was attempting to loosen one of the #1 cylinder side exhaust valves, the rocker arm sheared off, leaving me stunned.  Oh, hell, that didn't just happen, did it?  Yep, it did, and unfortunately it meant having to drop the engine due to the fact that a microscopic piece of the rocker arm had fallen into the deep, dark chasm that was the engine head.  Sounds daunting, huh? It was terrible, however, as a random stroke of luck would have it, I found the broken piece and was able to remove it with no damage to the engine.  I bought a new rocker arm, adjusted the rest of the valves, and installed the engine back in the bike.  I expected to hear an engine happily purring away, but alas, my ears were not greeted with the symphony which I was expecting.  Instead, I got a snare drum solo.  What the hell is that tapping?? Another inspection and some research later, and I discovered that is was the cam chain rattling against the cam chain grooves.  The cam chains have a tendency to stretch over time, and although this would not be too difficult to replace, I decided to sell the bike as it was.

It was tough to do, I really loved that Ninja, but it went to a good home, and is now used daily as a learner bike by the new owner.  Glad as I was that I could help a new rider out with a good deal, this did beg the question of what I was going to do for transport now.  Time to scour craigslist.com! As blind luck would have it, I happened to stumble across a posting for a 1986 Kawasaki KLR600.  For $500.  I really couldn't believe what I was seeing, but for $500 it seemed like a complete steal.  The only problem was, I really wanted to stick in the 250cc category for a while, as I am still learning, but I needed something to hold me over for the time being.  I have to admit, a 600cc single was daunting, and not at ALL what I had in mind, but after a quick phone call, I found out that it had current registration, and had been ridden up to a year ago, when the owner had bought himself a new Suzuki DRZ400 and had decided to garage the KLR.  After a short drive to Fullerton, I found the bike exactly as described, complete and waiting for a new home.  600cc or not, this would make one hell of a flip, so I offered $400 which was accepted, and arranged to have the bike delivered.

Upon seeing the bike at the owner's house, I was initially struck by a few things.  First off, I had read that the Kawasaki KLR 600 shares almost nothing with the KLR 650, yet has much in common with the popular KLR 250, so it wasn't a big deal that the seat said '250' on it, I figured that it had just been replaced at some point in time with one from a KLR 250.  The engine was quite easy to kick over for a 600cc, but I read that the Kawasaki's have a decompression system much like the Honda XL 500's which makes it much easier to kick start, so I thought nothing of it.  The seat height was actually much shorter than I had initially expected, as I wasn't even able to climb up onto the 2010 KLR 650 at the Long Beach Motorcycle Show this past year.

Now here's where it gets interesting.

I was quite intimidated after buying the KLR 600, after all, it wasn't really going to work for me in my situation.  Sure, it's a great bike, but I want something smaller, with better fuel economy.  After returning home from a run up to Apple Valley for a Yamaha DT, I found the KLR in my garage, as the owner had delivered it while I was gone.  I got my first look at it in proper light, as it stood there in all its glory.  And then...I began to notice things.  Not bad things, per say, but...little things.  That's funny, I said to myself.  I could have sworn that the KLR 600's radiator ducts extended a little more than that...and that engine, it just doesn't look right.  I've seen my fair share of engines, and I know enough to know that something's amiss.  Either that's the most space-efficient 600cc I've ever seen, or it's something smaller.  It just didn't seem to add up.  The front plastic, the side plastics, the ducts, the passenger peg location...why did it look so..different?  I went inside to check the pink slip, and found the service manual on my place mat.  It read, "KLR 250 SERVICE MANUAL."  Well, that is to be expected, they were essentially the same bike.  Then I looked at the picture of the bike on the front.  Do you know what I realized?  It had a striking resemblance to what now stood before me in the garage.  The plastics matched, the seat matched.  One thing left to do.  I checked the VIN against what was in the manual.

What do you know, turns out I'm the proud (and surprised) owner of a 1986 Kawasaki KLR 250.

This was fantastic news.  Better fuel economy, a smaller engine which was essentially a single cylinder of the engine in the Ninja 250, and cheaper insurance.  Boy, I'll tell you, what a nice surprise.

It's kind of interesting how things work out sometimes :)

Brody out!

1985 VF500F Interceptor (Part 4)

J.A.:  So apparently I'm very bad at this whole blogging thing, because I never seem to update it.  Oh well.  Anyways, this will be, probably the final part of the Interceptor series, so if you missed the other parts, check them out here:

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

When I last left off, the entire bike was down to the frame, and ready to get painted, while the engine was waiting to receive its rear head and then be reunited with the frame.

Let's begin with the frame.  I would recommend when painting something yourself, that you spend the extra time prepping the piece you're painting so to avoid the headaches and wasted time that ensues if you do not prep the piece correctly.  This means strip as much paint off the piece as you can and wet-sand the piece to a smooth matte finish before you primer it.  If you do those parts correctly, the paint should go on smooth and glossy (assuming you're using a glossy finish, of course) and there should be much less finish work needed to make it look pretty.  When painting in a garage or other multi-use area, be sure to cover things that you dont want paint on, because it gets EVERYWHERE.  I didn't do this the first time I painted, and my bike, that was all the way accross the garage, was coated in a red dust.  I also recommend when doing a frame or something like that that is going to have parts bolted on and is under heavy stress that you put some coats of wax on it before reassembling all the parts.  This will help preserve the paint coat by adding some layers of protection against rubbing and scraping.  

I used Rustoleum Universal Gloss Cardinal Red for my frame, and having a can of paint thinner is always nice to wash the pain off your hands when you're finished if you're like me and never wear gloves.

Once the painting is done, the fun begins.  Take your time putting the bike back together, and clean each part as you go.  If you put in a couple of hours each day, this is a great way to relax and take your mind off work and the other aggravating things in your life.  Piece the bike back together reverse of how you took it apart, and things will just fit in; it's like a huge, motorized puzzle!

When returning the nervous system (wiring harness) to the skeleton, lay it out next to the bike and see where everything goes and figure out the best course of action to put it in the bike.  This may take a couple of tries before you realize how its supposed to go in.

 
Just slowly work on piecing things in, remembering to grease the parts that are constantly moving like suspension components and bearings.

The bike begins to take shape.

And all of a sudden, it's ready for an engine!

For this bike, the rear exhaust pipes need to be installed before the engine is installed into the frame.  So i decided this was a good time to clean them. They look so nice after a little bit of steel wool and simple green!

After a little bit of fanagling, the motor just pops right in.  This really helps with a second person though.

No matter how much you look at the motor before it goes in the bike, leaks always show their ugly head when you're about to fire it.

Once everything was bolted up and all leaks were fixed, the thing fired right up. And purred.  Aside from a high idle due to a carb maladjustment, it ran great.

Time to paint the panels!  First I stripped the tank as much as I could, and all the panels down to bare plastic. Then I spent a lot of time wet-sanding the panels for smoothness.  The white primer coat then went on.  More wet-sanding, and then the base coat, white again.  Then time for plenty of clear coats.

Here's the final product.

Jack's 1977 Yamaha RD400 Restoration

Part 1

B.C. - Beginning a whole new segment in the J&B Motorcycle Restoration blog is the 1977 Yamaha RD400 belonging to a good friend of ours, Jack.  He initially approached me with the idea of completely restoring his RD, which he purchased new off the showroom floor back in the day.  As you can see from the pictures, it will take quite a lot of work, but hey, that's what we do.  No complaints here!

The RD400 is a bike which will undoubtedly turn heads wherever it goes.  Many make frequent appearances at the local vintage motorcycle meet, and many people are familiar with it, and can recall memories of riding one that either once belonged to them, or to a family member.  The one point that all conversations regarding the bike seem to gravitate towards is the fact that the bike is pure torque.  There's no escaping the pull of the twin-cylinder two stroke, especially with a displacement of 400cc's.  

So follows all the restoration process of this incredible bike.  

After the long but entertaining drive back, we carefully unloaded the bike, as well as various additional parts and such, including the engine, which had since been removed from the bike.  The parts were all set out in order as we discussed our intended order of operations. 

Our first order of business was to determine what was needed for the bike's initial reassembly, prior to separate modifications.  We decided first off that the engine would be sent to Joey's for teardown, inspection, cleaning and reassembly.  He figured it best off if we went ahead and replaced the engine gaskets, or seals, which is common practice whenever engine disassembly  is in order.  A new chain was also ordered, as the old chain had far to much flex to be regarded as safe.  In congruence, new front and rear sprockets were ordered, the latter of which came from Japan.  

It was around this time when I learned that my girlfriend's father was, at one time, a professional racer who was very well learned in the ways of the RD.  He offered his help and his knowledge, both of which came in handy.  His knowledge and understanding of the ins and outs of the bike were simply incredible, and we learned a great deal of things about the bike that we would not have known otherwise.  He offered to supervise the disassembly process and offered many suggestions as to what should be fixed and/or altered to make the bike better overall.  

Initial dissasembly then began, first with the rear wheel/hub assembly, then the rear fender and swingarm.

Here's Mr. M describing the proper way to disassemble the rear hub.

Pictures were taken of every step of the entire process, so as not to forget the way any one piece fits together in accordance with the rest.  It's a very long and arduous process, but it's the joy of doing what we love mixed with the experience and knowledge gained that makes it all worth it.  

A $40 jack from craigslist greatly aids in the whole process.  It's a whole heck of a lot easier to work on a bike when it is raised to a level where you're not constantly bending over the bike, as well as being able to reach under the frame, and remove wheels without having the bike fall over due to it balancing precariously on its front forks.

Oil was drained from the reserve.

Do yourself a favor and organize all the small parts when disassembling a bike.  It will make the re-assembly process so, so much simpler.

Joey stopped by to eat all my food.  Oh, and to work on the bike.  Only because I offered him pizza.

                                     

Down to the forks and triple tree assembly, removal is somewhat difficult...

...but has since been completed.

And this is what we're down to, just the frame.  Now it's time to begin researching powdercoating, and to clean each and every single part, down to the last nut and bolt.  Once we have everything squared away, we can begin re-assembly.  The engine will be finished up and installed, tested and tuned to perfection.  

Then we begin the process of modifying the bike to Jack's specifications.  We already have designs for rearsets in the works, and much, much more.  Stay tuned (haha, get it? Tuned? Like an engine?) for the next installment.  Until next time...

My Parts Came!!!!

J.A.  Random update:As I walked downstairs today, I saw, sitting on the steps, a box.  And in this box contained my path to true happiness. 'Twas a box o' parts i ordered of ebay!  I was so happy, actually i was taken aback.  I did not expect it to come so soon.  It only shipped on Friday.  But now I have to wait for my head gasket to arrive before i can put the engine back together.