Thursday, February 25, 2010

Tin

Doing some final work to the tin before Graham gets his shot to make it all sparkly and beautiful. Above is a patch where there was once a rough little mystery hole on the headlight shell.


Some boogertime tac welds to fill in that disgusting, heartbreaking void....

It took a lot of grinding, more tacs and grinding to get it to a happy (not ecstatic) place.

I had to restore part of the lip where the rubber knee pads meet Austrian Steel. They were rusted away in some places. Again, I approached the situation with one nerve-racking little baby tac after another. Then, I used a cutting wheel on the new MAKITA grinder (which is the best purchase I've made in a long time) to grind from above and below to thin the bulbous welding formations.



In the end, it looked decent, and the old kneepad fit well. This was all a mightily enjoyable challenge. Although the result wasn't fit for the Discovery Channel, Shinya, even hidden things are perfect classification - I'm a novice, and feel good about ceding that territory to the masters. I mean, if I did perfect work on the first try, masters would be chumps, right? I have a lot of years ahead of me with this stuff...

Monday, February 8, 2010

Strip it!

Been stripping the bodywork for the last week. Spray, scrape. Spray, scrape. Whatever they coated these thing with in Austria in the last 60's is a stoic and stubborn blend. I shall not be conquered.

Want to take it down to bare metal to address some of the surface rust. It's worse where the knee pads met metal, but nothing near fatal.

Also spent a lot of time meditating on the pipes. I have an idea, which might finally set the tone for where the rest of the bike it going. It will be a different, unique look foy! the Puch, but I think she'll be happy!