Chopping a Honda GL1000 Goldwing #40

I am back at work in the garage, now I have to see if I can stay at it for a while.
I am still not back 100% but I think I need to doing something, even if it's wrong.

During my absence from the garage I got to see a great movie that I would like to recommend to anyone who gets a little depressed about getting old, or anyone who rides a bike.

It's called "worlds fastest Indian" and it is about Burt Munro who back in the 1960's at age 67 went from his home in New Zealand to the USA salt flats to try to set a record on his 1920 Indian Motorcycle.

I worked today on some of the small boring things that needed to get done on the frame.

I cut, drilled and welded the mounts for the rear of the seat, and cut off the front seat mount and moved it up a little from where I had originally mounted it.

I made two different battery hold downs to go on the box because the first one hit the fender.

I am just hoping I have not made the seat too high, I really want to be able to touch flat footed on this bike when it is done. I may have to lower the height of the seat springs to get it down a little.

I still have a lot of grinding to do on this frame an also the touch-up welding.

Chopping a Honda GL1000 Goldwing #39

Not much today in the way of new stuff.

I made the gussets for the right side of the frame and welded them in.
I still have to weld the back sides and touch up the places I couldn't get to before.

Left side

Right side

I think after I weld the back sides I will start on the front of the rear fender mount and battery box.

Chopping a Honda GL1000 Goldwing #38

Visually there won't be much to see today.

Most of today was taken up by re-welding areas of the frame as I saw them when I turned the frame on different angles.

Then I ran out of welding wire and had to change the spool.
When I started to weld again I had problems with the wire bird nesting inside the machine.
I pulled it apart and then cut the wire and tried again only to have the same problem after welding a short time.

This went on for an hour or so with me cleaning and changing the tension, tip, and resetting everything I could think of.
I finally think that the beginning of the wire on the spool was not wound right, because it only started with the new spool of wire and it stopped after running some of the wire off the spool.

All is well now, and the welder is working fine now.

I did cut a piece of tubing to fit the lower bottom joint of the right side of the frame.
This is similar to the piece I cut for the left side except I had to make two pieces to cover the bends in the frame. I also had to notch out for the foot peg and a cross piece in the original frame.

This is the bottom section with the piece partially welded in.

I did finish welding that piece in and went on to weld some of the gussets on inside on the left side.

For the next few days I will be going over the joints on the tail section so it may seem to be moving slower that in the past, but progress is being made.

In the future.

I want to shoot the back section with primer as soon as I can, hopefully in the next few days.

I also have to mount the battery box and remount the rear fender near the battery box.

I have to figure out where all the electrics will go now that I don't have the false tank, and change the wiring to go to them.

I want to build covers for the sides in the rear, and I think also for between the tank and the frame.

I have to get an engine in it again to check on clearance for the air filter, and assist in placing the electrics, and wiring.

I then have to decide which engine is best, and get it cleaned up and painted, and get the wheels I want to use cleaned and maybe new spokes.

Rebuild the brake masters and calipers and put new pads on, also new seals for the fork tubes.

Lots of work still to go, I hope I make it.

Chopping a Honda GL1000 Goldwing #37

Well, today was the day to get my frame all gussied up, at least on one side.

I started by making a support by taking a slightly larger piece of tube and slotting it to fit around the frame. This goes where the old and new frame are joined on the bottom left side frame.

See Yellow arrow.

I then started to make the gussets.
see red arrow.

I spent the day cutting and grinding the pieces to fit on the rest of the new left side.

If I can work tomorrow I will flip the frame and do the right side.

I had to Quit early to get ready to go watch my Grandson Chuck play indoor football, tonight are the play-off games.

Chopping a Honda GL1000 Goldwing #36

I got thinking today, if a grease fitting is good for the brake pedal it would also be good for the back stand which never gets lubricated the same as the brake pedal.

I welded a piece of round stock to the stand, drilled it, and tapped it for a fitting.

I also cut off the shaft for the stand so it wasn't too long.

The rest of the day was spent cleaning and arranging the garage. it had gotten to be such a mess in the last few weeks I couldn't stand it.

I also removed the front forks, and took them apart.
I think I will use another set of forks because it looks like they might have gotten too hot near the fire.

Chopping a Honda GL1000 Goldwing #35

First I have to tell you about the weather here in NY.
what normally is deep snow and cold here this year is
an occasional good day with the sun out.

The sunset through the garage window was bright red
so I had to go out and get a picture of it.

After going to Herb's and getting my washers I ground
down the rear fender bracket on top, and I think it looks
a lot better this way.

I next ground the old bracket for the back stand and
clamped a washer to it then welded it.

I did both sides of the bracket because I didn't like Honda's
design any way.

I have no idea why they thought they needed to put clamps
on the ends of the bracket instead of just having holes.

I did have to make a longer shaft and drill it for the pin.
I welded a washer to the left side of the shaft where the spring is
I had to grind a small groove on the washer to fit around the spring pin.
I also had to grind off the left end of the stand to make clearance for
the extra washer.

The cotter pin on the end of the shaft will keep it from coming
apart so I think the clamps are over kill.

My bike will have the cotter key only.

Speaking of cotter keys, I see so many things with the cotter
pins bent wrong.
My high school shop teacher taught me to bend only the longer
end of the pin, and leave the other end straight.
You may cut the other end off a little if it hits anything if you want.

In a pinch this makes the pin useable again if you have to.
Also the pin comes out so much easier.

While I was working on the bottom end of the bike I decided to
change another item that I think Honda got wrong.

In order to lube the brake pedal you must remove it.
Why not put a grease fitting on it and lube it when ever you want.

I drilled the bottom of the pedal and tapped it to 1/4 X 28 threads.
When you do this the fitting will be slightly too long, so you will have
to grind the nipple off the threaded end.

Wire brush the end after you grind it and be careful when you first
thread it in to make sure you don't cross thread it.

Also look in the shaft hole to make sure it is clear and that you have
taken enough off of it.

It is a fairly simple job that will save you tons in the future.

Chopping a Honda GL1000 Goldwing #34

I will start out with the fix for the fender & tail light bracket.

I cut two pieces of one inch flat stock on an angle to fit the top bar of the bracket. I clamped it with a pair of vise grips just a bit lower than the top of the bracket.

The bottom of this then sits lower than the bottom of the top rail, that had the places that were ground out.

Aren't pictures great, what I can't explain become clear when you see the photos.

I then welded the sides and clamped the other side and did the same procedure to that.

My next objective is to grind the pieces to match the original top and side bars, so again it looks like one piece. May be tomorrow I will get to that.

Something I never noticed on this bike was that someone along the line had destroyed the Back stand bracket. They must not have been able to get the bolts loose or they didn't realize that the shaft holding it on had a cotter pin through one end. They cut the right side
and bent the left side something terrible.

I came to the conclusion this needed to be fixed some how. I went out to the shed and grabbed a frame from a 1978 that didn't have a good title and brought it into the garage. I was going to scrap one of the frames anyway to make an engine stand that I can use to check out the motors, so this will also be that frame.

I tipped the frame upside down and removed the stand from it. I was also going to remove the bracket from the frame but after thinking about it I believe I will fix it a different way.

This brings us to a trick I learned some where,I will show you it here.

If you have to ever remove a spring from pins like that on a side or back stand stretch it out by moving the stand to the position that pulls the spring to the maximum. Then insert a screwdriver into one of the gaps in the spring. Then push a penny into the gap you've created with the screwdriver. now skip one coil and do the same again.

It should look like this.

When you move the stand to the relaxed position the spring will basically falloff. No hard prying or broken knuckles.

My hat is off to who ever came up with this, it wasn't me, it is so useful in the shop.

After removing the spring the stand came of very easy.

My fix on the hard tail frame is going to be to eliminate the clamps, weld large washers where the clamps were, then make a new shaft that is slightly longer and hold it with a cotter pin.

Today I am off to "Herbs" a local bolt supplier that always has what ever I need in the way of fasteners.
What a great place seeing that Lowe's, Chase Pitkin, and Home depot have put all of our hardware stores out of business,
then they don't stock anything in the hardware department.
I might add that neither Lowe's, and Home depot has a good web site for searching, and Chase Pitkin is out of business.
I need to pick up some washers with a 3/4 inch inside hole to weld to the bracket. I also need some 8mm washers for other bolts on the bike.

Chopping a Honda GL1000 Goldwing #33

I am not real happy with today's work, But I haven't figured out how to fix it yet.

I ground the welds down smooth on the rear fender tail light bracket and it looks OK except for the top rail.
It needs some fine sanding to get rid of the grain.

The spot on the top rail where the Honda logo goes was a little thin near the bolt holes and it kind of wore through at the bottom where I had drilled to countersink the heads of the Allen bolts that hold the logo on.

I haven't tried but it may look better if I bolt the logo on, worse come to worse I could cut it off and make a new top. I am still thinking.

After I messed up with the fender bracket I decided to go to something different.

I cut another 3 1/4 inch long piece of 1 1/4 inch channel iron to make the bottom fender bracket the same as I made for the top fender and tail light mounting.

I drilled and tapped it out to 8 X 1.25 mm and welded it at the front bottom of the rear fender.

I still have to finish grinding it.

Then I sat down and thought about the fender bracket and listened to some old time country music, George Jones always makes me feel better when I hear about some guy who got drunk, lost his job, his wife left him, and his pick-up won't run.

Golly I'm not so bad off after all, in fact I'm doing great.