Another project, complements my youngest daughter.

[Lou Drozdowski]

dakazman...Small world!

First, the bike looks great. It just so happens that my older brother Dan is a bike resto wizzard too! and is finishing a 64 Ducati Diana 250 for his daughter. Between my younger brother Vic and myself we have always been into sports cars, but Dan was the two wheel dude. At present he has 10 vintage and classic rides in his collection,all reworked from the ground up.

They include: 3 Ducati's...250,450,750...2BSA...500,650...MV Agusta 750, BMW 750 touring...2 Triumph's and a special edition Steve McQueen T120...A Laverda 750 and Honda 750 are in progress.

It's good to see your hard work will finally be realized...Safe journeys! 

[BDA]

I hope Dan has gotten the opportunity to visit the museum at Barber Motorsports Park (https://www.barbermuseum.org/plan-a-visit/museum-hours/) which is the largest motorcycle museum in the world. The museum is mostly motorcycles but it also has "the world’s most extensive collection of Lotus cars." I've posted pictures of them in the LOG-37 section of the Gallery. It also has several other significant cars such as one of Dan Gurney's Indy cars (as well as Gurney's motorcycle, the Alligator).  I confess that I am not much of a motorcycle guy (but I am a big fan of the Britten V1000), but I enjoy looking at the motorcycles a lot more than I thought I would because you can see all of it. Speaking of the Britten, they have one of those too!

If you're similarly afflicted by the Britten and haven't heard the story, this video is about an hour you should really like: https://www.nzonscreen.com/title/britten-backyard-visionary-1993

[dakazman]

Hi Lou , Dan has quite a collection, I hope his daughter helps him as much as my daughter does. Running to the store and running down parts and tooling online takes time. My daughter now knows the difference between metric and standard helicoil inserts , studs , bolts , seals and most important elbow grease.
   Replacing the original tires this week so that’s the end of parts needed.

BDA, I started the video and fast forwarded a bit but will watch. Daytona has a few events going on now and next week , thinking of running up there to enter the pit area.
Dakazman

[BDA]

Don't take this the wrong way but I'm really warning up to your daughter! Knows about helicoils studs, and bolts ... you've taught her well! My congratulations to both of you!

[surfguitar58]

Stumbled upon this place in Carmel Valley CA a last summer. Great collection: http://www.mototalbott.com/

[surfguitar58]

I haven’t got much to offer in terms of custom bikes, but I did make a custom rider once. My former employer SRI International and Yamaha teamed up to build “Motobot”, a motorcycle riding robot. The challenge was to build a robot that would drive a non-customized, stock motorcycle, and beat Moto GP champion Valentino Rossi around a race track. We never beat Rossi (of course, he has supernatural bike pilot skills) but we broke a bunch of records and furthered the science of autonomous vehicles. The pic below is our unveiling at the Tokyo Motor Show 16 months ago. We had a fantastic team of robotics engineers working on this. My contribution was designing the robotic hands that actuate the throttle, clutch and front brake. At the start of the project we received 3 crates, each with a brand new Yamaha R1M inside. We could (and did) crash two, as long as one survived for TMS. More about the project here: https://global.yamaha-motor.com/showroom/motobot/index.html
Tom

[Certified Lotus]

Now that is a very cool project! I’m impressed Surfguitar58.  I watched all the videos, amazing technology. You just never know the skills of forum participants.

[dakazman]

   Ditto to what certified said . Amazing people and stories here at this site .

The tires came in from a friend of my daughter and I got the job to remove and replace them 🥴. Oh what fun. Yes, they have tubes also. 

Painted clear atop the decals on tank today and it turned out pretty nicely.
Dakazman

[dakazman]

Finishing up a few loose ends, working from some shoddy maintenance manuals written for dual cycles with some badly needed addendums for a 500 XL500R. Adding the new oil tomorrow and a few other tweaks to carb and decompression setup.  Maybe get a good initial start. It would be my first bike re-Build.

[dakazman]

Ready to start, Sunday when she has time to record the event.
Added the oil and kicked it to prime the oil pump. Hopefully all the new parts  will cooperate .
Still I’ll be holding my breath with both fingers crossed and a big smile when it starts.
Dakazman

[Certified Lotus]

Video of it running required! Then you can be everyone’s hero 

[surfguitar58]

Looks like it just came off the showroom floor D'man! Nice work!
Is artist daughter going to embellish the tank with an airbrush tattoo?

[dakazman]

Lol surf , I don’t know what she has planned for it . I suggested sell it and it something that she can get parts for.  If you have Instagram lookup “the_toracle” and against the grain ratios.

Certified, absolutely a video just the burn off of all the lube . I need to run it for 15 minutes and  then set the timing chain tensioner while running. Still I’m very  very nervous.
Dakazman

[dakazman]

Well what I thought was going to be a washout due to rain ,  it suddenly cleared up and we tried to start. Fuel - good, spark - good . Compression- good , choke out, playing with it it would not set and one item NLA. Charged up battery which was down to 10 %  . Once at 80% I jumped on with a set of  steel tip heavy work boots ,2nd kick ...success. Video on Instagram , Christine.Kaczmarek.71

Ordered a New battery . Why did it die , gas petcock turned off . 😐. So a Hero dad for now. 🤪
 Dakazman

[Certified Lotus]

Congrats hero Dad! Don’t have Instagram so can watch but I’m playing vroom vroom in my mind