New project bike.

Originally Posted by Blue_SV650S

+1 like the white and red tank ...

How come you did black side panels dude? Surely the same white&red would have looked the nuts?!!?

Do you actually ride the things or just do them up?

I use the SR daily as my commuter, it's pretty much my daily rider. I did about 3000 miles on it last year and about 2500 this year - I have a short commute and live just outside of town.

The sidepanels were left black on purpose. I did the usual paintshop thing on a photo to see what it would look like and everyone prefered it with them black. Besides, the right side one had just been professionally resprayed in black and looked gorgeous, so I was loath to repaint it. I'll be leaving the new bike's sidepanels in black too. I want the pair to look identical in colours.

Originally Posted by Lozzo

I use the SR daily as my commuter, it's pretty much my daily rider. I did about 3000 miles on it last year and about 2500 this year - I have a short commute and live just outside of town.

The sidepanels were left black on purpose. I did the usual paintshop thing on a photo to see what it would look like and everyone prefered it with them black. Besides, the right side one had just been professionally resprayed in black and looked gorgeous, so I was loath to repaint it. I'll be leaving the new bike's sidepanels in black too. I want the pair to look identical in colours.

How much did you pay for each donor bike? and how much did #1 bike cost to complete (if yo don't mind me asking).

Originally Posted by Blue_SV650S

How much did you pay for each donor bike? and how much did #1 bike cost to complete (if yo don't mind me asking).

Both bikes were given to me by friends, one of whom couldn't be bothered to repair it (needed a rebore and was rusty), the other by a friend who has a bone deformity in his wrist that makes riding painful.

Bike #1 cost me a total of 300 quid to get looking like that and road legal. That included the rebore, piston, gaskets etc. A close mate owed me a favour and painted the tank for 50 quid, absolutely everything else I did myself . The rest of the money went on paint and sundries, nuts and bolts from the hardware shop nearby, bars, rear light, decals, engine parts, oil/filter etc, MOT and tax. I'm a self taught car trimmer by trade, so I will be making a new seat cover; the one on there is just a piece of scrap vinyl slapped on as a temporary measure just to see how smooth the foam was, and I haven't got round to finishing it off yet. It was only meant to be on there a day, and it's been there 18 months.

[fizzwheel]

Your restore job looks nice on the Bike #1 I like that.

Originally Posted by fizzwheel

Your restore job looks nice on the Bike #1 I like that.

Thanks, the idea was to make it look as far removed from the cruiser that it was, as was humanly possible on as little budget as possible.

Back in the 80s Performance Bikes did a couple of bikes up, they called them Project Dole-Bike, and Project Dole-Racer. One was a Kawasaki KH250 2-stroke triple , the other was a Honda 400 Four. They did similar things with their bikes from complete wrecks and each one only owed them about 150 quid by the time they were finished.

Originally Posted by Lozzo

Both bikes were given to me by friends, one of whom couldn't be bothered to repair it (needed a rebore and was rusty), the other by a friend who has a bone deformity in his wrist that makes riding painful.

Bike #1 cost me a total of 300 quid to get looking like that and road legal. That included the rebore, piston, gaskets etc. A close mate owed me a favour and painted the tank for 50 quid, absolutely everything else I did myself . The rest of the money went on paint and sundries, nuts and bolts from the hardware shop nearby, bars, rear light, decals, engine parts, oil/filter etc, MOT and tax. I'm a self taught car trimmer by trade, so I will be making a new seat cover; the one on there is just a piece of scrap vinyl slapped on as a temporary measure just to see how smooth the foam was, and I haven't got round to finishing it off yet. It was only meant to be on there a day, and it's been there 18 months.

Cool, seat covering is expensive too get done and a new seat would set you back silly money ... so if you can DIY it'll save you a fortune ... its the kind of thing that seems disproportionate in cost for what it is ... many of my old bikes have been let down by horrid looking seats, but otherwise look perfectly reasonable!

You obviously put a lot of time, effort and money into the first one. I'm sure the next one will turn out just as good. Cafe racer idea sounds good.

Originally Posted by Blue_SV650S

Cool, seat covering is expensive too get done and a new seat would set you back silly money ... so if you can DIY it'll save you a fortune ... its the kind of thing that seems disproportionate in cost for what it is ... many of my old bikes have been let down by horrid looking seats, but otherwise look perfectly reasonable!

I had to recover that seat because I chopped so much of the foam out of the pillion end to make it flat. The old cover wouldn't have fitted. The new bike won't have that problem, I'm fitting a complete 60's cafe-race style seat with rounded bum-stop to that one and chopping off the pillion hangers. That means making a new bracket for the silencer to hang from, but that's nothing that's beyond my abilities.

great job! looking forward to seeing the cafe racer version!

The first one looks lovely. The SR looks like it will lend itself well to the cafe racer look, so I'm expecting that to look superb too. I guess that you'll post pics once it's done.