The Work - SIX SCHNELL!

So we left off last time with the seat attached and the read lid with the hinges on it...Then it came time for what I like to call the "stare at it" phase where I tend to set up the bike and then stare at it for a while to think hard about the final outcome of the bike. I used to do this a lot with my art. It's real easy to get caught up on one aspect of the build and lose sight of the whole package. So, I moved the bike to an area that is more readily visible and proceeded to sit near it, take pictures of it, move around it, etc. to really get my eyes on it from all angles so I am not forgetting anything. I could tell from looking at it that the the tail section was going to need some more work before I cleared it off the list. It looked too much like it had a "full diaper" and that on a really hard bump, the tire nubs would catch the hard edge of the tail bottom and rip it and the tail light right off. This wasn't an easy task to complete, but thankfully, the fiberglass work I had done early on held up and made it necessary to just cut sections off of it, dry fit it, cut more, dry fit more, etc. until it sat in there nice. This all came later, but there was a week or two where I literally just looked at the rolling chassis for a while...although at this point, we still need a front end on the bike!

 Here it is with a mock headlight (just a cutout on a piece of paper)

 I really liked the stance at this point but I knew that the front forks weren't going to be that low...

 And here are the forks...forked by Frank...

And then, the headlight arrived so I could really know how it looked. Even though this picture and the one two before it are close together, it basically took an entire weekend of free time to rebuild the forks (by Frank) and put new oil in/paint them and get them mounted on the bike. Of course, a week later, I realized the triple tree was upside down (the most difficult part of the installation process) and needed to be flipped to fit everything correctly

 Anyway, here's the front end all together with the new headlight and the fork guards...

Then the handlebars came in...

And some of the handlebar components (switches and a rebuilt throttle, etc.)

Then I finally put the kick stand on the bike and set her down on her wheels for the first time in about 16 months. She's finally starting to come together...

What's left now is waiting on some parts to finish out the front end (gauges ((digital)), levers and master cylinder and brake lines), finish the rear brake rebuild/speedo pod rebuild and tie up the rear wheel for good. THEN, it will literally just be engine work remaining (and wiring) and then she'll be on the road. Pretty much all I have left is the hard parts...

The Work - the fifth part

Version 3 of the seat went like this:

I knew after doing the first two seats what the problems were and maybe how to get around them. The first problem was the fact that the seat, even when covered, was too squishy for me. I figured the solution would be to wrap the BBs in something thinner, like felt or some other fabric. This would cause there to be less give between the outermost fabric and the tubes of BBs. Next, the problem was the unions of the tubes. With all the tubes connected to a common base like they were in the first two versions, it was difficult to staple in between them. I figured the solution to this problem was to keep them all separate until they get the final cover on them. This way, the spaces between the tubes would be easy to staple down and look very clean when finished. SO, here is how that went...First I had to make the tubes. Like before, I had collected a number of toilet paper rolls and paper towel rolls in preparation for doing this. I took one roll and one flat piece of cardboard and wrapped the felt around it twice for added security. With the tubes having flat bottoms, they would be less inclined to move about and easier to affix to the seat base.

So, here are the tubes in position (started with 8 this time instead of 7):

 To make the ends tight and not let any BBs out, I made two of these shapes for each tube. I affixed one, filled the tube and then glued the other one on.

 Here's the difference in the tubes. One has two half inch thick pieces of foam between the BBs and the ass of the person riding it...

 Filling these suckers should have been easy but there were way more spills than there should have been

 Camo colored BBs seemed like the right choice for the project (they also happened to be the cheapest ones). In total, there are about 17,000 BBs in the 7 sections:

 With 5 of the tubes filled it was starting to become obvious that 8 would not fit...

 So I pared it down to 7...

 Time to get them on the seat base and put the covering (this time using a fake alligator skin):

 As you can see, it was much easier to staple in between the rolls when there wasn't another one in the way...

 Obviously, I cut the back end a little short (I actually started with too much overhang and finished with not enough) but this section will get covered by the end of the build so no worries...

 Double hospital corners really pulled it off. It isn't SUPER professional, but I think it looks pretty damn good...

 When I had finished the seat, it was time to start on the hinged tail section hinges. I came up with a pretty ingenious solution of double hinges and here is how it works:

Genius if I do say so myself...

Next up is the forks and trying to figure out all the pieces that will be going on the bike: handlebars, headlight, controls, bash plate, etc...

The Work - a la quattro

So after the last round with the seat, I wanted to give this try another go. I filled the whole seat and fit it to the seat pan and sat it on the bike to see how it looks...

 Then I cut the back piece off to have it be less of a burden...

And now, to start the covering of the second version of the seat...

 All the added hardware for mounting the seat...

 Adding the BB filled foam to the seat base...

 With the cover on the seat (hospital tucks towards the back). I still wasn't happy with this seat because it was too squishy. I wanted a hard seat so that it would always look good and time and pressure won't squish it down and deform it...

 It just didn't look good...

Next up will be version 3 of the seat...the one that finally worked out...