wow I can finally post in this section! hey joe, I got a new project myself!

well my friend loves bikes and his entire family rides, but they never taught him how beucase they thought he was too young, hes 17, im 20. So i started teaching him a little and he showed promise, he got the hang of it really fast and now rides with me almost every single day, he is on my harley, which is a bit quick for him but he got used to it.

well we managed to prove to his family that he is capable, so they asked me to look around for a rebel 250 for him, thats all they would consider.

here is the only one under $800 in Los Angeles that runs, a 1985 250. its mostly stock and falling apart, but it runs well enough and im going to customize it for him this weekend while hes away.





thats my ducati next to it so you know im not lying


well we are going to pretty much restore it. it has 4 broken spokes in the back rim so I am going to replace those indvidually than have it balanced and trued.

the front brake master cylinder is gone, but its a really standard 7/8ths bar and I already found many good ones from random japanese bikes that I will graft onto this.

then it just comes to a paintjob, he wants everything blacked out except the pipes and rear shocks and front top forks, the sliders will be black

also the tank will have two white racing stripes down the back and the flying tiger graphics on the side of the tank, which will be hand painted by my father, whos been painting for 40 years.

also we are going to ditch the passenger seat and custom build a solo seat, and chop the rear fender and give it a nice cafe look, we are also going to put some clubman or drag bars on it.

thats pretty much it, im starting tomorrow and I'll post the updates then

 

i got a set of 7/8 apes man! hell i am sure i have alot of parts! that sucker is alot like my girls ride! hell ya man way to start a thread and post em up! i am stoked to see what you do wiht this fella! I hightly recomend getting some suzuki savage shocks they are 9.8 from eye to eye and will really slam that sucke down! hell another way to do it is to move the top shock mount to the upper sturt support and make a spacer... will really work and cheap!
cool build bud!
i am going to start on my girls 250 after i am done with the cafe! i alreayd have all the parts just have to put it all togehter now!

 

the guy riding this is 6'2" and im trying to raise it and stretch it out for him. he looks like a pretzel riding it.

its so low already that on bumps the tire scrapes the fender. also its really ackward that when you flat foot it, your knees are still higher than the tank.


heres a small pic of the teardown

 

Awesome! I'll be watching.

 

ok updates!

i didnt really take pictures of the process... which i regret... but here is the semi finished product.

painted it all black save for some chrome accents like he wanted. bought a new tail light and relocated it, added drag bars, most of the real work you cant see though, like replacing all the seals in the carb, which was a real BITCH to do, I had to buy a whole box of assorted metric O-rings for it...

pics







it still needs a front fender, turn signals, and new rear spokes and the wheel needs to be trued. then the spokes get painted black and its basically done until he decides to turn it into something else..

not too crazy but in the next week we are going to flip the bars upside down, get taller shocks, and chop the rear fender for a more cafe look

 

It is a nice project you have there.

 

Definately looks a lot better with the few cosmetic things... Sure it runs a lot better too. Keep us posted on the mods.

 

nice joe!

 

the person who had this bike before had it stolen and then recovered by police with the ignition and many wiring harnesses ripped out... so somebody tried to rebuild the factory harnesses with stuff from autozone and although it might have worked well enough for him, he didnt realize that one day someone other than himself would be working on the bike...

I spent all day trying to get the brake light to work, the bulb was running backwards, the bright filament was on all the time and dim was flashing (yea! i know!!!) so now I know which wire is the rear left turn signal, but the right wire is missing and the front harness is missing!

the high and low beam were backwards and the kill switch didnt work

the biggest problem is that since the ignition switch was gone, they did not want to replace the gas cap and other parts of the bike that used the same key, so they wired in a flip toggle switch in place of the old ignition switch, and its hidden well out of sight under the bike, but it means you dont need a key to start it and anyone can drive it if I dont have the fork lock on. good thing the switch is hidden, but its still not safe

replaced the headlight bulb with the stock one from my ducati after i replaced the ducati with a silverstar. SO much difference than the old 30W. electrical system handles it well, no adverse effects and if there is then ill reluctantly put the old one back.

by the way guys replace your stock bulb with the brightest halogen you can its so much safer and there is a lot more visibility. as soon as I can afford a HID kit for my harley and duc im going to do it, I do a lot of night riding myself, but its good for anyone. bright, quality headlights should come stock.......




oh the handlebars are from a bicycle, pretty much all steel bicycle handlebars will bolt into most japanese cruisers with 7/8 inch bars. cheap way to get interesting bar shapes and styles that arent available strictly for motorcycles. If I wanted to turn this thing into a chopper the bike shop near me has 18 inch apes for 12 bucks.

no pics today but tomorrow its getting a final de-rusting, a polishing, and some turn sigs