like busses- wait ages for one, then two come along at once ;D
I got this off si, B8D on here, who had already started chopping it up. it say it, actually it was two bikes. the cd200, which is the base, then a donor cd185, thats stood-seized. indeed, by the looks of it, and the strange corrosion inside the head, its spent quite bit of its time upside down in a ditch or something!! not tht it really matters, its only there to provide any bits that are missing or knackered on the '200.
id been looking for a small (sub 250cc) early-ish, kickstart, parallel twin for a while now, and a CD200 is pretty much all fits the bill, with the exception on a yamaha I cant remember the model of. it has to be a small bike, as a lot of the things I want to do wont work on a bigger bike. id more or less given up and started building a bantam bobber instead, when si put this up for sale!
so I'm breaking up/flogging off all the bantam stuff ive got, and will be doing the same with the 185, leaving me with only the 200 when its done.
now, si had already stripped most of the guff of it, seat, panels, battery, rear shocks, lights, all that curse word, and cut the rear half of the frame off, dropped it down low, and tack welded in some seatstays- it was basically done the same way as craigs frame. this gave a very slak head angle of about 50degrees.
heres a 'before' pic.
well, almost before, ive hacked off the bottom of the frame with the stand mounted to it there, as it was more or less touching the floor!!
ive got some very definate ideas for this bike- ive been planning this build for a long time.
what had already been done looked cool, but I wanted to do it differently- as much to differentiate my bike from craigs as anything, as I don't want it to look like I'm copying him- even though I really like the ideas hes put into his bike!!
indeed if I was building mine and he hadnt built his, id have done a lot of things the way he has, but now its been done, I'm gunna try doing some thing differently.
the biggest difference was I wanted to keep the steep head angle, not slacken it by tilting the whole bike back as had been done. not quite a digger, but heading that way. and I wanted the engine upright/tank level. I must like to make things difficult for myself, as doing it this way was going to be a ton more work!!
my plan was to get it on the frame jig id borrowed before, and chop it around til it sat how I wanted. the slight spanner in the works here was the frame jig was in use, the guy I borrowed it off is halfway through a trike frame, so it wasnt available. so, I had to be a bit more inventive.
my basic plan was to raise the bike back to stock height, correcting the headangle/engine angle/ tank position, then move the dropouts straight up 4" to drop it back down, then shorten the forks accordingly.
this would give me a straight 4" ground clearance, as it was a little low as it was, and should make the seatstay angle spot on so the line flows through the frame and straight up to the headtube.
so, first I blocked it up with the head angle back at stock angle-65degrees (measure from the 185 before I pulled it apart). I decided this was too steep, so laid it back a fraction, with it at 60degrees. this actually set the carb angle and seat 'tube' horizonal/vertical respectively, so I'm guessing the accounted for a bit of sag on the back end of these when they put them together.
whilst doing this, I also had to factor in the changes of tyre/wheel size I would also be doing I decided to go up to a 19" wheel on the front. I figured a 21" would be a touch big for this bike, but the 17" was obviously too small so I settled in the middle, plus they do the tyre I want in a 19"x3.00", which is handy, as I checked online and this makes the radius of the front wheel exactly 1" bigger as the stock size is 17"x3.00". I'm going to remove this by raking the front end approx 3degrees, as otherwise the tyre will be too close to the frame downtube, so for now, I don't have to account for anything- only get it sitting level by shortening the forks appropriately.
I will be fitting a 3.25" tyre on the back instead of the stock 3.00", so I needed to add a quarter of an inch on there, although when measure against the current 'shin hung golden boy' tyre (that to me sounds like a special term for a oriental woman with a penis) it was nearer 1/2".
anyway, enough talking, heres some pics showing how I did the traveller jigging of the back end!
first, block up to height under frame 4" drop + 4" ground clearance = 8" overall. these block paving thingys were conveniently exactly the right size
then I cut out the old/new seatstays to let the wheel drop back down til it hit the floor.
I got this off si, B8D on here, who had already started chopping it up. it say it, actually it was two bikes. the cd200, which is the base, then a donor cd185, thats stood-seized. indeed, by the looks of it, and the strange corrosion inside the head, its spent quite bit of its time upside down in a ditch or something!! not tht it really matters, its only there to provide any bits that are missing or knackered on the '200.
id been looking for a small (sub 250cc) early-ish, kickstart, parallel twin for a while now, and a CD200 is pretty much all fits the bill, with the exception on a yamaha I cant remember the model of. it has to be a small bike, as a lot of the things I want to do wont work on a bigger bike. id more or less given up and started building a bantam bobber instead, when si put this up for sale!
so I'm breaking up/flogging off all the bantam stuff ive got, and will be doing the same with the 185, leaving me with only the 200 when its done.
now, si had already stripped most of the guff of it, seat, panels, battery, rear shocks, lights, all that curse word, and cut the rear half of the frame off, dropped it down low, and tack welded in some seatstays- it was basically done the same way as craigs frame. this gave a very slak head angle of about 50degrees.
heres a 'before' pic.
well, almost before, ive hacked off the bottom of the frame with the stand mounted to it there, as it was more or less touching the floor!!
ive got some very definate ideas for this bike- ive been planning this build for a long time.
what had already been done looked cool, but I wanted to do it differently- as much to differentiate my bike from craigs as anything, as I don't want it to look like I'm copying him- even though I really like the ideas hes put into his bike!!
indeed if I was building mine and he hadnt built his, id have done a lot of things the way he has, but now its been done, I'm gunna try doing some thing differently.
the biggest difference was I wanted to keep the steep head angle, not slacken it by tilting the whole bike back as had been done. not quite a digger, but heading that way. and I wanted the engine upright/tank level. I must like to make things difficult for myself, as doing it this way was going to be a ton more work!!
my plan was to get it on the frame jig id borrowed before, and chop it around til it sat how I wanted. the slight spanner in the works here was the frame jig was in use, the guy I borrowed it off is halfway through a trike frame, so it wasnt available. so, I had to be a bit more inventive.
my basic plan was to raise the bike back to stock height, correcting the headangle/engine angle/ tank position, then move the dropouts straight up 4" to drop it back down, then shorten the forks accordingly.
this would give me a straight 4" ground clearance, as it was a little low as it was, and should make the seatstay angle spot on so the line flows through the frame and straight up to the headtube.
so, first I blocked it up with the head angle back at stock angle-65degrees (measure from the 185 before I pulled it apart). I decided this was too steep, so laid it back a fraction, with it at 60degrees. this actually set the carb angle and seat 'tube' horizonal/vertical respectively, so I'm guessing the accounted for a bit of sag on the back end of these when they put them together.
whilst doing this, I also had to factor in the changes of tyre/wheel size I would also be doing I decided to go up to a 19" wheel on the front. I figured a 21" would be a touch big for this bike, but the 17" was obviously too small so I settled in the middle, plus they do the tyre I want in a 19"x3.00", which is handy, as I checked online and this makes the radius of the front wheel exactly 1" bigger as the stock size is 17"x3.00". I'm going to remove this by raking the front end approx 3degrees, as otherwise the tyre will be too close to the frame downtube, so for now, I don't have to account for anything- only get it sitting level by shortening the forks appropriately.
I will be fitting a 3.25" tyre on the back instead of the stock 3.00", so I needed to add a quarter of an inch on there, although when measure against the current 'shin hung golden boy' tyre (that to me sounds like a special term for a oriental woman with a penis) it was nearer 1/2".
anyway, enough talking, heres some pics showing how I did the traveller jigging of the back end!
first, block up to height under frame 4" drop + 4" ground clearance = 8" overall. these block paving thingys were conveniently exactly the right size
then I cut out the old/new seatstays to let the wheel drop back down til it hit the floor.
