The making of and transformation of "Murphy"

[dritzman]

Nice saddle. Not really a King and Queen, more of a Joker and Queen.

Its nice to see that someone is feeling better!

[Fred Camper]

Nice saddle. Not really a King and Queen, more of a Joker and Queen.

[dritzman]

Reason 1 for the transformation: I was on my way to a dude's place to get my dyna installed and had a minor incident with some oil in the middle of the intersection at low speed. My idiot fault cuz I was paying more attention to the moron in front of me. Along with the clutch cable breaking later that night, this is the cosmetic damage. And as you can see the fork seals were leaking and fluid was whisking on the shelter covers.

[ericheath]

You're taking pics and writing about it. That's good, that's very, very good. Easily replaced.

[Fred Camper]

If there is less damage on you than on Murphy, they go ahead an buy one lottery ticket today. Looks like the engine guard did what you put it on there for. Hope you are as good as you write. Good to see that she was still able to take you home.

[dritzman]

Yeah that little incident was at maybe 15mph. I basically was able to hop off on my feet before going down. I did learn a valuable lesson. It was really hot that day and I was considering about taking my gloves off while sitting and waiting for the light at said intersection. Had I done that, I would have messed my hands up pretty good. I will never get on a bike without gloves on.

[dritzman]

Reason #2 for the transformation... A little after phase one of the build I was getting a bit of white smoke coming out of my rotten stock exhaust. A little coolant and water mix along with dripping out of the weep hole led me to having to change the water pump. Here she is in all of her glory!

[dritzman]

Reason #3 for the transformation: Well this is sort of a 2 part reason.

First, when I was bringing her back to life I was on a very tight budget and could only afford to buy a part here and buy a part there. I was very limited in making her pretty. I guess I did the best I could with what I had. I was more excited to get her running and ride her than making it pretty.

Second, in September I was riding down to see my mom and dad who live down on the bottom tip of Texas (about 250 miles south of San Antonio). I was about 45 minutes away from their house when it happened. I was riding in the right lane and passing slower traffic when needed. I came up on a Cadillac who was going slow and I moved to the left lane to pass. When I was even with their rear left door they swerved into my lane. I'm not sure how this happened but when I leaned to the left and hammered the throttle to get past them, I was rudely made aware that my kickstand had come down. (I'm not sure if I accidentally kicked it down when I was moving my feet around or what?) Well when the kickstand came in contact with the pavement it shot me right towards the right ditch. I was going about 80 when this happened. I narrowly missed the car and was getting closer to the loose stuff on the side of the road. I leaned again to the left and lightly applied brakes and I again went to the right. My tires hit the loose gravel at about 50 -60mph and I went down on my left side. Most of the impact was on my left thigh and hip. I had my lighter in that pocket of my jeans and it hit my leg so hard it broke the top off. My leather jacket has elbow pads so my arm was not hurt. I slid for quite a ways tumbling. A semi missed my head by about 2 feet. (I wasnt aware of that until the truck driver pulled over to help) Even though I was in a tremendous amount of pain I picked up the bike and fixed what was needed and finished my ride.
The ride back to San Antonio was worse because of the pain, but I had to. I will spare you all the pictures of my leg but I was bruised from my knee to my waist. Everything from yellow to green to blue to purple. I developed a collection of blood just below my hip that was kinda creepy. It also hurt my groin. I used to be able to do the splits with my legs out to the side. Jui Jitsu will help you do that. I'm still trying to get that back right.

So here is the 2 pics of the damage and then the start of the transformation.

[Roady]

Rode away from an accident like that ... you must be one tough son-of-a-_____!

Good work on the transformation.

[ericheath]

There are a few tutorials on equipping a bike with a side stand switch. I think the previous poster has one.

[Roady]

Not much of a tutorial ... but here it is.

For safety's sake I just mounted a tiny switch down by the kickstand and a bright like on the handlebar bracket. The switch is attached to the left rider's footpeg.

Kickstand up:



Light is off:



The light is mounted on the left handlebar mount. A simple, flat piece of aluminum is fitted to the top bolt.

Kickstand down (=DANGER!):



Light is on:



Gregforesi took it to a whole 'nuther level on his bike with ignition cutout and probably a nice warning with a female voiceover. See his writeup here.

[dritzman]

Doing the water pump was a real treat but comes with great rewards.

[dritzman]

I sanded the shelter covers all the way down and did the body work. Then 4 coats of filler primer with sanding in between finished off with 6 coats of Dupilicolor silver metallic.

[dritzman]

All the while I was doing the mechanical work and painting I had stripped off all the aluminum and shipped it to Sunnbobb so he could perform his wizardry. Amazing stuff here!

** A couple of the parts had to be replaced because of such deep scratches

[sunnbobb]

That valve cover is now hanging in the wall of shame here at Bradshaw.. lol