What did you do to your Yamaha today?

I just put foam grips on my handlebars . Came off pretty easy. The left side went on nice. The throttle side I had to work with awhile but they are on and look and feel great ! Should help with the vibration. I also use a Throttle Rocker which helps a lot.



My grips. Around $8



Throttle Rocker or Cramp Buster. Bought at www.lockitt.com

 

I think I may soon attempt to polish my aluminum. The one's I've seen done look great.

 

had the clutch cover hole welded up over the weekend and started to grind it to finish profile...

polished the crank covers (the part that says yamaha). started with some 180g mesh, followed by 400g, 800g, 1500g and 2000g papers. they arent as shiny (chrom-ish) as i would like but MUCH better than the oxidized things that they were...

my wife is getting antsy for me to be finished. ill be sending out the mikunis soon and ill finish up the rest while they are gone. i hope...

d

 

Polishing is a whole lotta elbow grease. You ought to see if you can fine a electric D/A Sander (Dual-action).

The D-A cuts the work way down and really helps with the finish when you get to real extra-fine finishing papers.

>>>>>
I got my rear shocks cleaned and polished and I put a nice finish on the brake housing. I'll be pimping for a couple more days until it stops freakin' raining.

 

Short ride today (not counting my 50 mile round trip daily commute).
Something is rattling on the underside, I figure it's a heat shield.
Flying to SC on business in the morning. I'll have to check it out when I get back into town next week.

 

If you have "Beauty Pieces" welded to the outside of your collector ... those welds ain't the best you've ever seen.

See if you have a Rattlin' Chrome Cover.

 

Moved it to the side to work on the Kawasaki.

 

Rick,
What do you think about wet sanding ? I know years ago I had an old car that needed sanded and buffed and was told to wet sand with emery cloth. Would this be of any benefit with sanding the aluminum ?

 

Yes.

When you get to using paper 800 and up ... you can wet sand. Work your way up to 1200.

Then, buff with #-5 and #-6 Jewelers Rouge.

Mirrors. Pretty. Better than Chrome. Look at the parts I polished in my album.

 

What did I do today ...

Rode it and brought her home with 17,000 Miles showing on her.

17,000! If I take care of this bike I'll never need another bike for the rest of my days!

 

Bought a new fuse block from radio shack

Cleaned the carbs now i am polishing (MOTHERS)them to a mirror finish with a electric tooth brush

and thinking of clearcoat to preserve the shine any other ideas?

 

Fixed the timing chain issue, changed the oil, put 'er all back together, and rode her home. Zoom zoom!

Tomorrow I resume commuting the 10km each way to work. Yay!

 

Tire Pressure Checks ...

It's been in the 90's. Those tire heat-up and the air expands. If there's grunge around the inside of the rim ... they can expel some of their air.
Now that the "Cooler" (Hi-70's ~ Mid-80's) weather is back ... you might find a soft tire!

 

Removed back wheel and suspenion, swinging arm. Just to take off the center stand and then the fram will be ready to be taken to the powder coaters.

Had a good look at the tyres, both have plenty of tread but only the front one is cracked. The aliminum case of the final drive is corroded on the outside and I was going get that powder coated but that would mean stripping out the final drive unit and as it is not faulty, I think I will leave well alone. So that will be a rattle can job later.

 

Brass wire wheel.
Angle sander.
220, 280, 320, 400, 600, Finishing papers.

Want to go crazy? 800, 1000, 1200, 1500 -- Buff. Mirror!

 

What did I do today.

I recently discovered that my petcock was dribbling, even when on RUN or RES, so rather than deform the petcock so the O-ring could seat further in, I pulled the spring from my petcock and stopped by the local Ace Hardware. I found what appeared to be the closest match and went home. There, I snipped the new spring to a point a little longer than the existing spring, widened the spring end a bit (it was a wee bit smaller... and stronger than I thought, as it turned out) and installed. My concern was, would it open up to feed fuel?

Indeed it did! <insert Hallelujah Chorus here>

Oh, and while I was at the hardware store, I found they had some stainless M6 allen head bolts, so I grabbed some for my left crankshaft cover and put those on.

 

There are GREAT Deals on eBay for Stainless Kits that allow you to do-up all the Case Fasteners with Stainless.

There are also Stainless Carb Kits that let you replace every single fastener on your Carbs with Stainless; too.

Yes. I did.

 

I washed and waxed my bike. Cleaned the chrome and started experimenting with polishing the aluminum. I just used some 1500 wet/dry sandpaper on the round faces of the cases. Then I used Mother's Aluminum polish. Just with doing that minimal amount has shined the metal up very nicely.

 

pulled the pilot screws and realized the o-rings are shrapnel. Had to blow out the pilot passages with compressed air to get the rubber out of the pilot passage. Also sealed the valve cover so it won't seep oil anymore...I hope.

 

While experimenting with polishing the aluminum case round faces below is how much the face polished up just wet sanding with 1500 grit paper and Mother's Aluminum Polish-