Appreciate the offer! Although all big things are already ordered and eBay has become quite a good friend of mine over the process Some parts I have, have come from USA but the best selection of Daytona parts seem to be in (surprise) England.

The new rearsets sould come tomorrow, I expected them to come today but apparently I paid VAT so late yesterday they missed the night line transport.

Another new little cool thing that will solve a few problems like the busted ignition lock and the possible vibration of the gauge cluster: A keyless ignition kit!

This one guy at a Triumph forum is making them from a universal keyless entry kit for cars, but fitted with a custom PCB to fit any motorcycle, the original ignition lock, as well as it`s place will be completely removed from the top triple, the gauge cluster moved back and the headlight up. After the mod all I have to do is approach the bike with the remote in my pocket and the system will arm itself, mount the bike and press the clutch lever, and the power will come on. And the same for parking, as soon as I walk far enough the bike will automatically shut down (and possibly arm an alarm)

 

Not exaxtly an update, rather a reminder for myself. I've been looking for that perfect color and have found many that's almost there but not quite, until today.

Ford deep impact blue. Just hoping there is a blend recipe available so I don't have to order the paint from ford cause then I might aswell go and buy a new bike with the money...

 

...but this is:



Went to pick up the box from the post office after work, apart from a few little machining marks the workmanship seems pretty good. Daym well should be for that price too!



For once when something looks like carbon fiber, it actually IS that



The baseplate fits perfectly to the ears in the frame, but I ran into a bit of a speed bump with the brake pedal: unlike what it seems the pivot point of the pedal is not on the bolt that keeps it in place but in the bolt that keeps the footpeg, this makes the pedal move in a fairly wide arch and even though the pedal assembly is bolted to the most forward top holes it still hits the pipe. Gotta try tomorrow if the spacer washers provided would bring the whole rearset out enough for the pedal to clear the exhaust.

I got a bit of spare time so I decided to try how well the new coolant hoses fit in place:




TASSSTYYYYYY!!! They still need a bit of tweaking though, I already cut a bit from here and another there to get them to fit better cause the set is for the `04-> model, and the crankcase breather hose doesn`t come with the set at all and is made from ready bends, still need one 22,5` bend to get it nice and clean, they are now joined with a straight bit which pulls them a bit. Ohh that custom stainless steel T looks gooood with the blue hoses, just gotta grind the shoulders down a bit cause they bulge out a bit too much.

 

Oh my, those are some puuuuuuurrty rearsets... tasty indeed!!

 

Time to get that triple tree nut open. Figured I`d just sacrifice one of the 21mm spark plug sockets I got like five of, but guess what: all of them is still in the old garage 50km away so I decided to spend all 5,40 to get a new one from the local hardware shop. I also had a length of 5mm stainless steel axle I got from one company at work, cut some sticks out of it and rounded the ends a bit with a bench grinder. Didn`t bother to measure them before cutting cause it won`t matter none.



I taped over the nut with painter`s tape and pushed the pegs through it for a snug fit into the holes as well as spark protection. I know cardboard ain`t probably the best fireproofing material but id did catch the few stray sparks well. First I just tacked the pegs to the socket and figured I`d weld them on properly in a vice but when welding the pegs bend like a banana if not supported so I had to make the whole thing whilst on the bike.



Ain`t pretty but sure enough works!



Ignition lock mount. Now you see it...




...and now you don`t. Took a good two hours of angle grinding, filing, sanding and cursing to get it straight but eventually did.



Didn`t manage to finish it yet cause my thread tools seem to also be at the old place so I just put M6 bolts and nuts in the back to keep the gauge bracket in place for a mock up test, still gotta make M8 threads to the holes and another bend to the gauge bracket cause now it`s a tad TOO far back. IMO looks better now that I was able to lift the headlight a bit.

 

WOW! That top tree is beautiful. I've done that before - I know how tedious it is - you did a great job. It looks like it was machined that way. And I am really digging the dual projector lights stacked!

 

Thanks! The original idea with the lamps were that there would have been three but there's no way to stuff them in there and try to make it look decent, apparently there seems to be a minimum size of the lamp you can make as no one makes smaller than that other than some fog lamps, think it's either a heating or a lens issue... I still gotta tidy up that triple tree after I get that gauge bracket done as it probably will get scratched in the process, it's a tedious job trying to work aluminum as it clogs up all files, sand papers and tuff like that but the method I used to get it straight was to first remove the mount carefully with an an angle gri der making sure I don't dig too deep, and then first round the stump a little with a flap disc and then just rub the heck out of it against about 2' of sand paper stapled on a 2x4 following the curve in the process. Can tell you my arms hurt and my shirt got wet when I was done but I estimated saving about 50-100EUR worth of machining cost not to mention the wait cause those little projects tend to get done (if at all) when there's nothing else to do... I once had a frame and a tank of one of my previous projects (Cagiva Freccia c12r 125cc street fighter) gathering dust in one metal workshop for over eight months and got nothing done to them, fetched them out and saw the owner in a gas station the next summer, he said he 's been busy and haven't gotten to my parts yet, got a little amused when I told him the parts ha en't been there for about six months... so yes I'm a little allergic to those tiny metal shops and getting it done in a bigger one instantly multiplies the cost too.

Gonna go to the garage today so expect some updates tonight (9:45am here now)

 

Looking very good indeed Mattson!

Keep it up and it will all finish too soon

Cheers, SB

 

Today I meant to finish the gauge cluster area but got a huge inspiration from somewhere to make the tail instead. Not a whole lot of pictures cause there was a lot of grinding, welding and other dust in the air so I only photoed the key parts to protect the camera.



First I drilled a small pilot hole to the angle iron that acts as the anchor bit to the whole tail section, then broadened it to 6,5mm so the long drill bit of the hole saw had room to spin, this way I could saw the hole to the undertail and got it exactly right the first time (although further cleaning naturally was needed). I ran into a small hickup when fitting the tail fairing in place with the new tail light: the pipes hit the holes in the fairing cause the tail has to be lifted from the front to clear the fixing points in the middle so I had to do a little magic trick and drilled the holes of the two bolts under the lights with a countersink drill, and filed a bevel onto the bolt heads so they center themselves to the holes, this way I can loosen the nuts on the other side so the light can tilt backwards, slot into the holes in the fairing, and then be lifted in place by tightening the nuts with a socket and a long extension from inside.



A 3mm steel plate welded onto the end of a 50mm steel pipe, should be plenty sturdy to hold a license plate! I left a gap in the middle so any moisture and other crap can drain out of the pipe and not rust it from inside.



The whole thing put together. I`m getting the hang of this welding thing

The end of the pipe had to be left that long for a reason:



The hole had to be sawed so high "uphill" that if I had cut the pipe flush to the bracket it would not fill the hole.





Came out pretty much exactly as I had visioned it in my head. It still needs to be cleaned up before powdercoat but I had only one stone grind bit thingy to my Dremel and it was worn to the stem so have to go buy a few more to be able to finish cleaning the welds, and I`m going to drill and weld a piece of pipe crosswise through the main pipe behind the plate for the turning indicators to be fitted into the ends so I can wire them hidden through the pipes, but haven`t got around acquiring the right diameter pipe yet so the final cleaning will happen after I`m done welding that.

 

I don't know Mattson - I would think a stiff breeze will take that license plate bracket right off - let alone traveling around 45 mph!!!!!!! You need 5 more braces on it!


Just kidding.



It looks great. Your fab skills are VERY good. The tail is going to be very nice, it'll be one of those pieces that catches people's attention, and then they'll stop to really look at it and notice how much work you've put in. Great job.