Project WR350X has begun!

I got the bracket for the front fender and lights built. I still have to add the bit for the Triumph flyscreen but I think it already looks pretty cool. I am not making anything super permanent yet until the bike is done and I know everything fits and meshes well together. At that point I am going to go back and weld the nuts to the brackets to clean things up and simplify them. For now though, the nuts and bots are still separate.







I also bought a bag of sand yesterday and turned it into fine Colombian powder!




And I filled my cradle tubes with said fine Colombian powder.




Then hastily welded some old Chevy C-10 carriage bolts to the tube. The carriage bolts perfectly fit into the end of the tube with just a bit of gap to weld and the underside is rounded to apply some constant back pressure to the sand in the tube. I then ground off the old threads just to make a quick cap.




So I am now ready to bend the tubes. I decided to do it this perhaps old school way for a few reasons. The welding shop I worked at in college bent tubing using a flat bar bender with the dies modified to accept tubing. I got quite comfortable at bending tubes that way. Plus I kind of like the idea of gently tweaking and modifying the bend for that perfect fit, slowly but surely. And the final reason, I don't have a mandrel bender.

We never used the sand trick at the shop and the tubes would maintain their shape so I hope with the sand trick my tubes will stay nice and pretty for that factory fresh look when finished.

Sorry for the fuzzy photos. I hate flash photography. I had the door open to the shop open since it was nice yesterday and thought I had enough natural light to take crisp photos with my point and shoot. I was wrong. :bash

Got a little bending action in today!







My dog is excited about this project too!

Slow day at the shop. Upper cradle mount had a few annoying issues. Now ready to bend the tube to hold the two parts together and run across the cylinder. Then I can cut down the rear of the fender and install a curved radiator. Hopefully!

Oh dear God thats sexy!

I got the flyscreen brackets made. The screen will be mostly Yamaha blue when the bike is done. I think it looks cool and thought you friends might want to see it.


Flyscreen 1


Flyscreen 2

this is by far the most interesting thread on here. Really like the way it's going! Keep us posted!

This thing is sooo bitchin!

The cradle is not 100% done but it is done enough to put the motor in the bike which I am super pumped about. Tomorrow I will start making the lower motor mount withe the torsion bars. Then once that is done I will start on my swingarm shaft rear motor mount. Right now the rear of the engine is held up by a temporary motor mount that goes up to the mount for the subframe. The front motor mounts are done and SOLID!

Another gusset is in order at the top front of the cradle. Sadly while nearing the end of my day today I dropped the cradle and bent the shit out of the upper bracket. So instead of finishing the last gusset, I lost patience and wanted to see the engine in the bike so I just used one of the upper mounting holes. Good enough for now. I promise not to use the words good enough in relation to this project ever again.

Still a long way to go but this feels good to get to wheel it around the shop and look at it from a different angle for a change!

Here are the pics to prove that there has indeed been real progress!

Here are some with the pipes on as a bit of a teaser.Just some grainy phone pics. The pipes will need to be cut/bent/dented/welded in a few places but all things considered they are not too bad. Looks mean.


Pipes


Pipes 2 by TurbStLCards


Pipes 3

Alright, the front motor mount remains done. I welded on the stock upper cradle mount with some gussets. Looks a lot better and fits perfectly. The rear motor mount is the big news. It is done, so the hardest part of getting the motor in the chassis is over with! Hell yeah! I had a sleeve nachined with some rear motor mount bushings from a '02 WR250F pressed in. I then slid that over the swingarm pivot shaft where the stock motor would be mounted. Then I cut, bent, and ground down some pieces of 1/4" steel to weld to the sleeve and go up to the rear motor mounts on the banshee engine. It looks pretty trick (IMO) and is incredibly solid. I put the subframe on and will be starting on the battery tray, ignition installation, etc. tomorrow. I should also be soon starting on cutting up my expansion chambers to make them fit the bike properly. I put the body on for pics so you guys can get some idea of where this is heading. Still though, please reserve final judgement as I feel the final color scheme will really make the bike properly pop!

What do you think so far? Sorry for the slow progress.

I made a little video to show the bike in the sunlight and discuss what is still to come.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHbdtGeZzsA

Very nice work. That kickstarter is going to be a challenge. I would reconsider painting the top of the flyscreen blue.

This is getting good.

Still completely stoked to see this build coming along... looks great! Hopefully a different profile kick and lowered pegs will solve the issue. If the curvature goes out far enough, could it avoid the peg altogether?

Carbomb wrote:

If the curvature goes out far enough, could it avoid the peg altogether?

Yep, that's exactly what I am hoping for when I mentioned getting a new arm machined. The stock arm hits about half an inch from the outside of the peg. Just 3/4" should be enough. It's damn close. I'm not too worried about it.

My brother was pretty excited about the pull start idea.

TurbStLCards wrote:

My brother was pretty excited about the pull start idea.

That'd definitely be interesting to see.

Carbomb wrote:

TurbStLCards wrote:

My brother was pretty excited about the pull start idea.

That'd definitely be interesting to see.

Since this bike is mostly going to be an around town show off bike, and a weekend warrior backroad barnstormer trailer queen, we discussed building a custom trailer, painted to match the bike with a MotoGP style bumpstarter installed. Now that would be trick!

I got the torsion bar mount tacked in place today. Please excuse the hardware. I'll get proper looking bits later. It worked fine for the mock up.


Torsion Bars

I also started on the exhaust by hacking it up!


Exhaust Hack

Might end up being a big waste of money and a good way to trash an exhaust. We shall see! Sorry the exhaust is grainy. I left the camera CF card at home. I'm so smart sometimes.

Just a quick phone update. I have the right side exhaust tacked back together and held in place. I'll be starting on the left side soon to make it match and look pretty.

No doubles.


RS Exhasut tacked

So how do you decide on the flow characteristics/tuning of the pipe for this application? It always sounded like a difficult guessing game to me.

Carbomb wrote:

So how do you decide on the flow characteristics/tuning of the pipe for this application? It always sounded like a difficult guessing game to me.

Reading, talking, and guessing.

That's about the best I can do. The pipes are for a bored and stroked RZ so they are pretty close to optimal for a banshee motor like mine. I'm mainly just cutting and twisting them to better fit my chassis.

Everything matters though. I've read alot of old two stroke books and I by chance found a local guy with a background in two strokes and have been bouncing things off him to consider. He was an aerospace engineer, now he builds V8 Miatas, and has an extensive histroy of building two stroke racers.

The best answer though is that it is just steel and if it doesn't work I can cut it off and start over.

I finished tacking both expansion chambers as well as making the proper rear mounting brackets for them. Now I will pull them off and weld them. Once the chambers are welded and solid I will cut and bend the muffler mounts on each side so that the mufflers are not longer flaring out and stay in perfect alignment with one another.

The only major item left is getting a radiator or radiators made. After that everything left to do is tedious and small. Most of the visual progress is now in the rearview mirror. The plumbing will change the look a little bit as will the colors but for all intensive purposes this is what the bike will look like when it is ready to ride.

I'm certainly getting more and more excited. I really want to ride this thing! I am a couple of weeks away from the one year anniversary of when the rolling chassis arrived at my house. I hoped to be done by now and am behind schedule but I think it will be worth it very soon. I've not only been building a bike, I've been building a shop as well. You think you have all the tools but inevitably you find something else or some other item slows progress. Oh well.

Here are some pics with the pipes. Let me know what you think.

Thanks.

Looks amazing! 2T FTW

You sir are a true craftsmen!!!

I have been following your build since you first posted on this site. I check the site almost every day to see how your progress has been going.

Your work is top notch!

I do have a question for you...where did you buy your wheels? Are you running a stock wr250r mastercylinder or X model???

Keep posting this awesome build.