Its Italian, but not Ducati... Guzzi content!

Managed to get it rolled out the garage today, the problem was that the new brake pads and rebuilt discs were a bit 'sticky', should be ok with some miles under its wheels. Also spaced out the billet alt cover as it seems the alternator on mine isn't that reliable and doesn't like to get too hot, hence the spacers to let the cooling air in.

Removed the sump, cleaned it up, bead blasted it and now got I'll probably paint it, same colour as the bevel box.

 

Wasn't me on the Guzzi, still got lots to do on mine. I do my own polishing, now I have the time. Even made a video about it here... The full build is setup as a playlist on youtube..




As for the colour scheme, the seat is red as that's how it arrived. I'm still pondering the paintjob, but the seat and tank will be painted, wont be leaving the tank as it is.

 

A few more parts arrived in the post this week... indicators, cables and a small LED rear light.. maybe a bit too small? It'll be getting a billet cover to bulk it up a bit and to match the rest of the bike. Also fitted the freshly painted sump and filled it with fluids, though had a brain fade and overfilled the transmission with the engine oil... duh! Oh well, helped flush it out I guess.

Here's the latest two vids showing some of the progress this week..

 

Finally decided to go for the obvious answer for the front indicators.. drilled the headlamp brackets, so it pretty much copies how Guzzi did it on the original bike. Next, turns out my newly bought throttle cable.. had to get a shorter one for the clip ons.. doesn't fit the Tommaselli throttle, so ordered a kit from Venhill and I'll diy. Got a similar problem with the choke, as the LH handlebar clamp/switch gear is damaged, which also holds the choke lever. The solution is to do away with said lever and cables / splinter and retro fit plunger chokes to the Carb tops. Those are £15 each, which isn't too bad in the scheme of things.

Yesterday the stainless LM silencers arrived from Keihan, went for the earlier LM1/2 style rather than the bulkier LM4/5 design. They look well made and fit ok, except for the mounting brackets not matching up with the Tarrozzi rearsets. Not really a surprise, so that's something else to sort out.

I'd originally wanted to something similar from Armours, but despite Emails and many phone calls last week, they never replied or picked up the phone. So went with the slightly more expensive Keihans, ordered them on Tuesday, arrived today, two days later.

 

Having wasted hours trying to make a bracket to mount the silencers to the Tarozzi rearsets look anything but crap, I gave up and ordered a LeMans 1 H pipe to replace the battered original on the bike. Cost me £110 from Keihan, but it allows the silencers to move forward just enough to line up the silencer mount with the rearset mount. Looks much better too.

Cant make a start on the wiring yet, as I'm still waiting for the single fire coil I ordered last week to arrive. Though I am finally happy with the rear light mount/cover, having machined it down for the third time this week.

The next big expense will be the paintwork, still haven't decided what colour / graphics its getting, I'll probably keep flip flopping between red or black/gold until the last moment. There's no rush now, given it wont be finished until the good weather has long gone this year.. Be good to get the Guzzi all done and dusted, as I have a new mini project I'd like to make a start on soon..

 

Still waiting for a couple of parts to turn up before I can get started on the wiring. So in the meantime, I've been working on a few details.

Here's the (small) recent progress..

 

Finally made a start on the paintwork, the seat unit was pretty easy (so far anyway), while I'm still working on the prep of the tank, really want to get the colour on and get it lacquered, but telling myself to do it right and not rush anything...

Here's progress so far today..

 

A quick update... the biggest decals in the kit I had looked too small for the tank, so I ordered a bigger set which arrived today. Tricky to get the decals in the same spot on both sides of the tank, but having applied them both, I cant see any difference so that's good enough for me.

At last its time for the 2K clear top coat, or lacquer as us amateurs call it. But not so fast ... I have to be weary of 'gassing off'...

Turns out that most paints emit gas as they dry and harden, including the acrylic paint I've used so far. No big problem, so what? Well, the 2K lacquer is urethane based and is impervious to this gas. Therefore, if the lacquer is sprayed on before the colour coat has completely hardened, there is a danger that the emitted gas could in time cause tiny air pockets to develop between the colour coat and the lacquer, which in turn causes blistering of the lacquer.

There's a lot of different advice about how long you need to wait before this 'gassing off' is no longer a problem. Some say 24hrs, some say a week, some say a month or more. I did see one comment that said the way to tell, is to use your nose, just smell the paintwork, if you cant smell the paint its safe to lacquer, if not then you need to wait.

Well, I painted the seat unit a week ago, and now I cant smell the paint anymore, while the tank was last sprayed two days ago, and sure enough it still has that fresh paint smell. So I 've brought the tank indoors where it can stay warm and dry for a few more days, then I'll lacquer everything at the same time.

 

Decided I couldn't wait any longer, so sprayed on the lacquer today, one can was enough to do three coats on both the seat unit and tank. I'm not exactly working in a clean room, so got a few specs of dust in the lacquer along the way. Got to wait 24 hours for the clear coat to fully harden, then I'll use 1500 wet n dry to rub it back. Hopefully that 'll be enough to remove those annoying dust specs and smooth out the finish which is a bit orange-peely in places. If not, I've got another can of the Spraymax 2K lacquer to use. But overall I'm impressed with the lacquer, its far better than anything else I've used in the past o (out of a rattle can)

 

I was lucky with the weather today, started off calm and frosty but soon warmed up, which gave me the chance to spray on the final coats of lacquer on the Guzzi seat and tank, having first wet sanded the first few coats of lacquer to get things as smooth as possible. Felt like I was taking one step forward and two steps back, but it had to be done. Went pretty well, cant wait to fit them to the bike and stand back to see if I like the overall look. I'm a bit worried that the paint will look a bit plain, as it has no graphics (apart from the Guzzi logo), no speed stripes or pinstripes... we'll see.

That done, I paid another visit to see the recent progress on my mate Williams Z650 café project, and brought my camera along too of course. Its an interesting project, a 1978 Z650 using modern ZX6R wheels and forks and one off alloy tank an seat, made by a chap in Leeds for a very good price. Apparently he can make just about any tank / seat you may want.

I had a problem with the video as I couldn't edit it for some reason, so here it is .. Jeff and William are discussing a couple of problems.. the standard side stand interfers with the new one off rear sets, while the headlight brackets hit the tank on full lock... eventually I left them to it and went off to drink tea..

 

Although the paint still needs to be cut back and polished, I couldn't resist fitting the tank and seat to the bike. Later there was a brief break in the rain clouds, so I quickly pushed the Guzzi outside so I could stand back and see if I like it or not, and if it might need a speed stripe or two (to add 10mph to the top speed of course..).. Think I'll leave it as is for now, the shade of red I chose looks about right, though I do wonder how it'd look in black with gold decals? Perhaps I'll paint my Norley that way someday. Have to tackle the wiring now, which will be next weeks task.

Here's the second part of the DIY paint video..https://youtu.be/BAn2pw7jFEU

And here's the Guzzi in its new cloths about to get very wet..

 

Not much progress to report this week, as its too blooming cold out in the garage for me to want to spend much time in there. But at least I've made a start on the dreaded electrics at last..clicky here for the latest update video... https://youtu.be/XD1I-DDRGhI

 

Its too cold in my garage to working on the Guzzi, but with the surprising success of my DIY paint job, I decided to paint a couple of helmets. Both had been given a custom paint job a few years ago by a local place (since closed), and in both cases I wasn't really happy with the result. One is a Davida open faced and the other my old Simpson Super Bandit, the latter also having a gained a few scuffs an scratches over the years.

After a few hours of sanding, masking and a few coats of rattle primer, I sprayed it Ducati Red... what else.. Then a dug out a big envelope full of old decals that I'd bought but never got around to using, including a full MHR decal set and a few random Ducati decals, none of which were the right size sadly. But all was not lost, as I also found a pair of NCR decals, which I cut in half and used on the Simpson. I now need to order some smaller Ducati decals, not sure what, but probably the classic 70's style. The paint doesn't look like much at the moment, but when its lacquered (I'll use Spraymax 2K again), it should look a lot better....

 

Well, to be fair my mate Jeff has a workshop with a lathe and miller etc, which helps a lot. Also you don't see all my mistakes, for example the ignition barrel has now got its third mounting bracket, as the last one left it too close to the coil.

Still, I have finished my DIY paintjob on my old Simpson... its now Ducati Red, with NCR decals ..

 

With the Simpson painted, I turned my attention to an old Davida Jet which ha been given a custom paint job a few years ago, which I never liked, the painter didn't o what I wanted, more what he thought would look good. Not impressed. I chose this colour scheme because its what I have in mind for a future project bike, and I needed the practice. The pinstripes weren't as tricky as I'd expected.. in this picture the paint hadn't been cut back and polished yet, so its still a bit orange peely..

 

Then last week, we collected an unexpected new 'project', which is now taking up a lot of my time... meet Barney, 8 week old golden retriever..