Sunday, November 30, 2008

1920 Daytona Board Track Racing

License Plate Brackets

Most people just run a simple axle mount similar to the first two. I kinda like look of the holes in the Fab Kevin one pictured below. Ultimately they look like an after thought, I think you're better off not to draw too much attention to them. The last one is a bracket made by Earl Kane for his personal bike. I saved this picture about 2 years ago because I thought it was a cool approach.







Friday, November 28, 2008

Battery Box and Strap Options






Here are some pictures showing the battery box so far, and the two options I can think of for the hold-down strap. Please let me know what you think so far...

If you like the belt better, we can get a nicer buckle; I just had that one laying around. We could also change the leather color. "Old school" would be that tan rawhide color I guess...

You can see that I also marked one potential location for the mounting holes, and also the battery that's in the photos is different than yours...

Thursday, November 27, 2008

Pre-Unit

Hey Rob, I think I've figured out what what to do with that pre-unit you found in Portland. My back kinda rules out motocross but I bet I could still do vintage flat track...

Happy Thanksgiving

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Nothing To See Here... Move Along

Rob is being so gracious as to take a crack at building a battery box. I took some photos and measurements so he'd have a better idea what the options are for mounting. These pics are kinda huge for detail.


I slipped an old license plate in here to better illustrate the offset.


Morris Mag

Morris Magneto is releasing a Unit Triumph specific model in about a week. It uses the tach drive so there's no need to do the usual case machining required for a Joe Hunt. I like it. $899. I'm pretty confident Santa knows I haven't been that good.

Rollin 2


Not as cool as the last photo but still sorta cool.

Sunday, November 23, 2008

Rollin


This is the all time coolest picture of a woman on a bike. In a drift at what appears to be a drag strip and she's making a matter-of-fact grab for the next gear...

Saturday, November 22, 2008

Battery Box 2.0

Your mock up looks nice in my opinion.
It could be clearer but here's the only picture I have of the battery box on Joe Zito's Triumph. I like the holes in his.

Battery box mock-up



Here are a couple of pictures of the idea I had for the battery box. It would have a strap to secure the battery. I would make it out of 16 gauge sheet metal. This is plenty heavy. What do you think?

Pre-Unit

Here's another pic of a bike built by Mike Davis, the guy that built black Triumph bobber with a Harley springer that I just love. His stuff is just awesome. He has great taste but he's also got a huge cache of super cool NOS after market parts. Ironically he is now really into period correct 60's/70's choppers, which don't do much for me.

He is a really colorful guy... check out his blog some time to see what I mean [WARNING! - NSFW].

Friday, November 14, 2008

Urn

Wow.

"This is the "urn" that my brother Tom Cerra, who died Monday, will go into after he is cremated. Paint by Bozi-photos can't do it justice. The paint is big-ass green and silver flake. The wood base is old-growth California Redwood."

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Stance




I'm prepared to get teased about sounding like "Joe Chopper" but something about the stance of my bike has been bothering me.

I came to the conclusion that the 2.5" drop in my hardtail makes my forks look overly long. I started crunching numbers a little and realized shortening the forks by 2" would put the steering geometry back to right about stock. I also think it makes a rather stunning improvement to the bike cosmetically.

This is a pretty common mod to make on Triumphs. For the later model Triumph/BSA forks you can fairly easily lower them by adding a spacer (really appealing because you don't have to cut them). I haven't been able to confirm that works on the earlier external spring forks though. There's also a company called Forking by Franks that's been cutting & re-threading them ($35 each tube) and making better than new replacement tubes in any length ($188 a set) for about 40 years.

The pictures above show the forks compressed 2". Compare them to some photos from a week ago.

I'm curious what everyone else thinks...

Saturday, November 8, 2008

Norton

This Norton is bitchin'.



Fender Mounts

I'm pondering fender mounts. Here's one approach. I really like this guys chain tensioner. Given the added chain length I think I'm gonna have to run one.

Pix

I finally got a chance (and a real photographer) to take some better pictures. I think I might like the fender about an shorter than what's shown here.




Monday, November 3, 2008

Norvin

If a Triumph motor in a Norton featherbed frame makes a "Triton", what does a Vincent motor in a featherbed make? I suspect the answer is furious Vincent purists... Still cool.


Sunday, November 2, 2008

Fender 2.0

I shaped and trimmed my fender this morning. Sorry the pictures are so shitty, I was really rushed to take them cuz we are prepping for Tyler's B-day bash.



















Saturday, November 1, 2008

Taillight

I forgot to post these earlier. I was screwing around a little with mounting options and placement for the tailight. A specially made bung the same diameter as the others I'm using might look alright. Obviously the tilt of the one in these photos is a little off. I also think it needs to be about 2" nearer the axle, about even with the rim maybe.

Fender



I may have posted these before but this bike is my favorite execution of the '36 spare tire cover fender. This is pretty much what I'm planning to do.

Parts

I polished the fins on my oil tank. My wife seems pretty convinced I shouldn't have. That bothers me a little, as a graphic artist she has a great sense of what "fits." I still think it looks pretty cool and patina'd (god I wish I hadn't just said that).




I now have some seat bungs, I've decided they'd look better if I cut them down about 1/2".




Here are some pix of my new fender. I may want to round the edges even a little more (something like the grinder marks on the left side) and it needs to be cut to length.


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