April 12, 2008 Day 3 (The Master Mechanic Arrives) & We Make Progress

Day three started with the disassembly of the previous days work. After removal of the front tire and swapping the forks I was back to square one.

My son Sean (also my master mechanic) arrived and immediately began assessing the situation. I solicited his help to assemble the Ultima forward hand controls onto the drag style handle bars. Box open, parts unpackaged, and no directions, just a wiring diagram. Par for the course at this stage of the game.

I decide that we need to drill 4 holes into the bars to hide the wiring for the turn signals, push button start, high and low beams, and the horn. The whole idea is to hide all of this stuff as much as possible. Maybe next time I will up the ante and install internal throttle cables and an internal twist clutch?

Sean assisted me in drilling the holes by holding the bars on the bench. As you can imagine he has a million questions, but then again so do I.

We did ruin our safety record of 3 days today since Sean did not know about using your hand to brush metal shavings into the garbage. I removed the shavings from his hand, and another valuable lesson was learned.

With the bars 90% assembled Sean was able to mount them to the handle bar risers. We also slipped the seat pan in place to get a general idea of how it would sit. Important to note here that I order a seat pan and not a complete seat so I could have it upholstered to my specs. Maybe shark or stingray skin? We will see. I may post a vote and include human skin for a real unique touch.......

Next Sean and I installed the 7-1/2” stretched bullet headlight. I will be important to get all of the wires together to run through the final wire loom.

Next came the engine and transmittion installation. I asked my friend and Brittani’s dad Cary to give me a hand getting the heart of the beast installed. Although he was hungover he agreed to give me a hand and we had both the engine and tranny set in the frame in short order. None of the components are bolted in yet, since we have to get the swing arm completely installed before we bolt the drive train down. To top off the days progress we set the KraftTech 4-1/2” stretched gas tank on the backbone.

Time was running short since we were having company over to celebrate the first 70 degree day of the year. Off to Boston tomorrow for a week, but the project will continue when I get home on Friday 4/18.