XJ Bobber Hardtail Project - ('81 XJ650)

Hey Everyone! My brother and I have embarked on a bobber project with his '81 XJ650. He recently picked it up for free from a friend and did some basic maintenace to get it up and running. It's a great bike in stock form but we've both dreamed of a hardtail bobber and started researching the conversion with the help of google. We came across crath's thread and were hooked from the get go!! This site is a wealth of information and the pictures in that thread gave us the confidence to move forward. We started teardown and fabrication at 8:30 this morning (3/21) and made some great progress. Here are the pics from todays work hope you enjoy...

































Made some custom pieces on a CNC Plasma...

 

this is very inspiring! keep those pics coming of ever step.how much time have you put into it so far ??

 

I love everything but the handlebars, and please ditch the gauges!!!

 

thanks for the input guages will be changed in the future what is your idea for the handlebars just wondering ?

so far we have 8 hours in on this project with two of us working

 

Holy crap, you guys did all that in 8 hours?!?

 

it seems to me, that if you get 2 people working on a project who know what they are doing and are working in unison, you get 3 the work done

what do you guys do for a living that you get your own plasman cnc machine, thats awesome, i'd love to have a garage and setup like yours once i get out of highschool and college.

one idea for the brass knuckes, used the finder loops to house some switches, that way you can clean p your handle bars and have some switches in a neat area.
take the blinkers off too..

 

Looks good, I'm in the same spot on mine at the moment.

 

im a machanic and my brother works at a desk during the day but hes pretty crafty with a welder and grinder on his off time the cnc plasma is at his welding school he attends for fun

the switch idea is awsome ill consider that in the near future thanks for the welcome to the forums and all the compliments

 

ah, i wa goign to say, our local steel shop which is pretty big, just bought a plasma cnc machine within the last yearish.

and welcome to the forums, your biek is awesome

 

Good to see another chop inspired. It seems there has been a lot of guys chopping these up lately here. Keep up the good work. It's crazy how fast you can chop these up, eh?

That's awesome that you have access to a CNC plasma..... lucky!!!!

You guys ever do any other playing around with the plasma. I have some images for my company's logos if you'd like to give them a shot. ....not sure how easy it is for you to create programs from a JPEG file....?

Anyways, keep the pics/info/work coming

 

BTW, Chacal is your go to guy if you need any replacement parts. He has it all, new and used.

 

Looking great. I can't wait to see more progress.

 

thanks crath your bike is a great inspiration to us in this build ill have to talk to my brother about the logos for you well see what we can do

 

Clearanced the driveshaft, ordered a nice tan leather seat and some K&N style pod filters. I still need to make the plate bracket which will be a bolt on one mounted in the same place as the frame on the left side (lower shock mount) and pick up a tail light. I'm also still trying to decide what master cylinder setup to purchase for the front brakes. I'd like to find a maching clutch lever and brake assembly so it doesn't look too out of place...

Crath - got your email and I'll get back to you on Friday...

 

Niiiiceeee-
i am too jealous of the workshop you guys are playin with
i wouldnt mind seein a pic of the whole thing as it stands so far.. i cant judge the handle bars till i see it hahah

 

Looks like it's coming along nice. Where at in jersey are you? Would you be down for a ride this summer? It'd be friggin' cool to get a group of XJ's together on a ride. NJ, PA, DE STAND UP!

 

my brother lives in montville nj and i live in wilkes-barre pa this bike will be mine next is his build unsure if were going to build him a xj or xs650special

-Tony

 

If you haven't figured out already we both use this screenname so I'll make sure we put our respective names at the end of each post

-Nick

 

Maybe if Raceway Park gets off thier a$$e$ and puts together the yamaha festival this year. In '06 it was an awesome time. You could run down the track and everything.

 

I had no clue such a thing existed!! We're usually down at raceway park a few times a year for the VW shows. 8)

-Nick