Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Only a few people have CB's

Here's the bike with the new seat. It was made to fit the stock pan so it is a 30 second swap back to the 2-up seat and it offers a decent amount of padding. With the pan and powder coating, foam and upholstery I'm in it just under $200 and the bike is starting to look like a little cafe racer.

We are still considering paint. The old school gold is getting cooler by the day. I have an extra tank and side covers that could go red or even flat black. Right now I have a set of rims with new spokes and newly polished hubs that are out being powder coated red. We are going to put those on and then decide where to go with color.

In the mean time Scooters been riding all over town and when we are out riding together he gets a lot more attention then me. He told me "Dad everyone has a chopper, only a few people have CB's"

The New Seat

Its hard to believe we've had Christmas (December), the Super Bowl (January), Valentines Day (February), Final Four (March) and Spring Break (April) since my last post. But... the seat is done. The first rusty pan was too far gone. When the edges are gone there is no way to attach the upholstery trim. So it was back to Ebay.

I had to wait a few months but another seat finally turned up. This one had less rust and was only $20, so we went again. When the seat & pan came in I stripped it down to inspect it. This one had one rust through spot but was salvageable.

We considered a bunch of options. One weekend I messed around with some scrap sheet metal to make a cowl but I wasn't happy with the boat tail look. I've seen guys who will weld the back end of a tank on as a seat cowl, but I didn't want to cut up my spare CB tank and wasn't in the mood to spend $$$ to experiment. Then one day my Ebay spider found this... a CB200 cover and foam:
I liked the look of the uphosltered speed bump and the fact that it was shaped to follow the front lip of the pan to meet up with the tank. So I sent my $97+40. And waited a month for it to arrive from Vietnam.

While I waited I had the pan powder coated and I sanded and spray painted the seat trim. The pan was stripped and powder coated by a friend and it looks great! I reattached the rubber and latches and we were ready to build a seat.