Resurrection part two

So last year, I wrote that I would update my blog more frequently... We all know how that went! The excuses are many, but I won't bore you with them! However, ms. Francesca is still running, except she is right now in her winter hibernation, in a nice and warm garage!

A lot of things has happened once again within 2013. Some rather big custom motorcycle sites has done articles about this little lady, plus she is now featured on coffee mugs and shirts in the USA. That is awesome!

But I will get back to all that in the months to come, starting from this week, and that is a promise to myself, that I should give this blog some more attention!

Until then, ride safely!

/Morten

Resurrection

So I have been quite abscent on this blog the last year or so. However, a whole lot have happened to my bike since then. All this, I will see if I can update my blog here on a weekly basis, starting next week from where I left off last year.

Until then, here is a teaser:

Have a nice day!

Disassembly

Obviously, before something can be good, it has to be mighty bad! So I have stripped down my bike, by removing the seat, the fenders, the upper fork bridge and so on. The front wheel has come off as well, due to a crash in Sweden some years ago.

So I sent the wheel to my mechanic and his contact is fixing it these days. The rear wheel will have to come off as well, given the fact that I have just bought myself some new tyres - Firestone Deluxe Champion aka. the classic cafe racer tyres.

These look very cool, I think, and will give my Ducati a nice old school feel.

Anyways, the old front light has come off as well, along with the instruments.

So the bike has really been stripped down to it's toes. It has maybe taken me one-two hours to disassemble it, but it will definately take up a lot of extra time to put it back together again with the new parts and so on.

I will also replace the part of the wiring that I can, so that I have also disassembled. I hate cords, so I figured that if I could hide some of them, that would be excellent. So now, the fuse box, which was earlier located on the rear fender, will be located underneath the tank, with all it's cords and so on. Plus all the cords from the instruments in the front, will be hidden under the tank, and just a few cords will be visible, leading to the head light and speedometer.

New parts

So I went to this place in Copenhagen, called wrenchmonkees - see their bikes at www.wrenchmonkees.com
They make some awesome looking bikes, if you ask me, and my build will be much inspired by their bikes.

Their workshop and showroom, has a nice touch to it, and they are very polite and helpful in there. Of course, I did not go only to browse bikes, but I went there primarily to buy some parts for my project. More precisely, I bought a new head light, a new rear fender, a new rear light and a new speedometer, with lamps inside it for Neutral, Oil, Blinker and High Beam. Very nice little device.

Moreover, I bought three meters of some sort of woven mesh to cover the new wiring for the new lights and so on. It is very nice looking, as you can see on this example underneath.

Yes, what to look for?! It is the two black woven meshes in the left side of the picture, in between the two bars. It looks very nice, I think.

Of course, I will need a whole lot more for this build, like new tyres, and a new seat also. More about that later.

Update

So here's an update! It has been roughly two years and a half, I can see. Things have changed, ideas have come and gone, and now I am ready to sacrifice my old Pantah for this build.

Since my last post, my Pantah has gotten a new engine, because the old one got torn up. And I literally mean torn up. The piston of the top cylinder had disintegrated and smashed up the cylinder. That explained the "funny" metallic sound coming from the cylinder, like a nut was being thrown around in the combustion chamber.

Luckily, the mechanic had some good contacts, and fixed me up with a 1983 650 ccm Pantah engine, which of course fitted right into the frame. The mileage of the engine was unknown, but it's interior was good looking, the mechanic said. We were rolling again.

From a crash in the forests of Sweden, my front wheel was bent out of shape, and therefore it had to be straitened out. One of the fork legs was also damaged, but it was replaceable. The front wheel was not. Two times a guy tried to straighten it out without luck, and right now, it is at the mechanic who is pricier, but have straighten it out before.

So with those little things being fixed, I am now ready to proceed with my blog here, to show you in pictures and words how my Pantah Cafe Racer is going to look.

Design idea and inspiration

So where should one start, when considering how the bike should look? Well, browsing the Internet is definately the thing to do in my personal oppinion.

Google will get you far. Always remember, that Google is your friend! So by typing for example cafe racer, and selecting "Pictures", you will be able to find a lot of cool cafe racers to be inspired by. The ones I am most inspired by are shown below.







This bike is particularly cool... I love the spoked wheels, and the low look of the bike itself. The exhaust system is also very good looking, with the weldings still visible, to add to that raw look that the bike represents.

Another cool bike to be inspired by, is the Monkee #11 from the Danish custom bike creators, wrenchmonkees. See the link, in my links-box on the right.

I believe that this bike is one of the coolest looking custom cafe racers, that I have ever come across. The fact that it is stripped of all unnecessary components, adds to the cafe racer look and philosophy.

Some other sources of inspiration appear below.

So there You go... Some inspiration for a nice looking cafe racer!

Introduction

Hello everyone that might be reading this blog!

For some time, I have been playing with the idea of building a real old school cafe racer. For those of you, who are not familiar with the concept of the cafe racer, here is some further reading:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Café_racer

Having that straightened out, I will tell you a bit more about my ideas for this project, which have not even launched yet.

I own a Ducati Pantah 500, and from time to another I have been thinking of the design of the Pantah as boring and "soft". So I always thought that there would be room for improvement. Be your own judge on that matter.

Never the less, I believed that the Pantah frame would be a great platform to build a cafe racer on. I sometimes wondered, if I should sacrifice my Pantah to this project, but that became unnecessary when a friend said that he had a Cagiva Alazzurra for sale. The Cagiva Alazzurra is based on more or less the same frame as a Ducati Pantah. Back in the '80s, Cagiva and Ducati - and Moto Guzzi for that matter - shared a lot of components. However, the Cagivas also used Ducati engines, which means that a 600-700ccm ducati engine up until today should fit right in, with no major changes to the frame.
Yes, that is the beauty of Ducati... Take a 25 y.o. frame, and then fit it with an engine from the 21st century, and you have a bike that is future-proofed for many years, regarding spare parts and so on.