Project XTracker: Pics in the garage

I messed around with taking some pics of the bike in the garage this week. I was going for a dark look to show the bike in the garage where the project came together.
I'm no pro photographer that's for sure but its fun messing with camera settings...

Project XTracker: Toronto Motorcycle Super Show

The Toronto Motorcycle Show went down this past weekend. I dropped my bike off and setup my show space Thursday night then returned Sunday for the custom bike awards. 

Since there was no street tracker class I entered the cafe racer class. Project XTracker ended up placing 6th in the class 3 builder cafe racer class. 

I'm happy with this. It's interesting comparing against higher placing bikes but ultimately I didn't build this bike as a show bike. I did however shoot to have the build quality to be show level

Project XTracker: Finished!... for now

Following a big push the last couple weeks I've got Project XTracker physically back together. This weekend is the Toronto Motorcycle Super Show and I made a personal goal in the fall to get the bike all wrapped for the show to enter in the custom build show.
It has no oil. Wiring isn't done and it wont currently run but damn it looks good!

Project XTracker: Side panel refinishing

 One of the last items on the to do list of making Project XT look pretty was to freshen up the 40 year old plastic side panels. To do so I used a product called Plastic Renew from PC Racing (It may be discontinued now. It was hard to find). I had used it before on my old Honda XR200 offroad bike and it worked well. I got started by sanding down the plastics to remove the layer of old oxidized exterior plastic. 400, 600, 600, 1000 grit followed by steel wool and 00 fine steel wool. Then we applied the plastic renew to restore the shine. It essentially puts a thin layer of clear plastic on the surface. I did this while at my parent's place for Christmas.

 My Dad loves doing this type of fine detail work so he applied the multiple layers of plastic renew.

Everything went well until I applied the side panel decals. When the plastic flexed it caused the plastic renew to de-laminate from the side panel and the decal was not adhered to the side panel. This resulted in the look of bubbles. So I ripped off the decal and re-applied the plastic renew and proceeded without the side panel decals.

Joyride 150 BMX pump track pics

Last weekend Cam and I, along with some other buddies, headed over to Joyride 150 for a session on our BMX bikes. Our man Dave Levitt brought his camera gear and snapped some great pictures of us. I'm especially stoked about the one where he caught Cam and I in the same frame. Nothing better than sharing a passion with your offspring and them being as stoked on it as you are!

We rode for a solid 4-1/2 hours and Cam must have done 100 laps on the pump track. He progressed quite a bit in just 1 day and was ripping by the end of the day. I basically had to drag him away when it was time to go. Definitely need to get back for another session ASAP.

Project XTracker: Seat pad

I picked up my seat pad from Haversack Leather. I quickly threw the tank and seat pan on the frame to check how it fits up. It's perfect! Natalie @haversack_leather nailed the look I had in mind. The pleats give a nice vintage feel and matches up with the highlighted engine fins, wheel spokes and tank sticker. The black leather cover is feels really high quality. Give Haversack a social media follow, check out her other leather goods and keep her in mind for your next project. She's located in St. Mary's Ontario.

Finished

Project XTracker: Engine paint

Cleaning the 40 years of grime off the engine was a challenge to say the least. I think I spent 3+ hrs just cleaning the engine to prep for paint. The plan was to freshen up with new black paint and to sand the paint of the sides of the cooling fins. 

All cleaned up, masked off and hanging from the garage ceiling in the Dexter (TV show) killing room-esque DIY paint booth. 

Project XTracker: Wheels prep & paint

 The wheels got the wire wheel treatment too to remove the majority of the old paint to prep for paint. The plan was to go with the same paint scheme as stock: black with polished spoke faces and rim lips. i thought about going all black with only the spoke faces polished but I thought it would be too black and make the aluminum finish forks stand out too much.

Project XTracker: Tear down, frame paint prep & paint

The bike is now torn down and final weld out of added brackets done and shaving of the rest of the unused brackets like the exhaust hanger and steering lock below. Since I didn't have access to a big sand blast cabinet to fit the frame I went about cleaning it up with a wire wheel on a drill and a scotch brite type flap wheel on an angle grinder.

Project XTracker: Fiberglass seat base

This will be another lengthy post... 

I wanted to make a new seat to fill the gap between the seat and the tank that exists now. The seat pad shown is the same one my Dad used all those years ago. I decided to go the fiberglass route so that it will be formed to match the profile of the seat pan and tank exactly.