The $50 Nirve build.

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utilityart

utilityart

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Oct 25, 2010
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Well this will be my first "build" here. I quote build because it won't be as intense as a lot of builds but more of a restyle along the way. Anyway, we'll have to see what shakes out.
Some of you may remember I got this bike for $50, it will be interesting to see how many times that I will put back into it. I've probably already equaled that between hub parts, the triple clamps and steel.
Here is the bike the day I got it.
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I didn't take any pics of the hub repair but suffice it to say there were some destroyed parts.

The first of order of business is to put on a triple clam fork. I could have just bought one and saved a lot of time and maybe a few bucks, but where's the fun in that. I got this one from Oggy in the classifieds. He was kind enough to pull out the suspension parts to save me some money on shipping.
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So with these parts and some bars I picked up at the motorcycle salvage yard I have a start.
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The steer tube was a little short so I cut and ground it.
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Then I cut a piece of 1" DOM tubing to use as an extension.
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I cleaned up all the metal then tacked it in place to make sure my measurements were correct. Sorry for the bad pic.
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They were. Everything fit great and the stem didn't bottom out on the insert tube, which I was a little concerned about.
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I think I might narrow these bars a few inches.
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About this time my neighbor mentioned going across the street to the sports bar to get a few beers and some burgers. Needless to say I'll have to finish weld this later. During this week I hope to find time to finish weld this and get the dropouts situated on the fork tubes.
Speaking of dropouts, this is the design I decided to use. These are cut out of sheet to see if I liked them. I have a set ready to get cut out of a plate that is about .175" thick, that should be plenty beefy. I used a little artistic license and a snap-on open end wrench for reference to come up with a design that should have enough welded area and still look something like I welded on a couple wrenches.
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That's all for now.
 
It needs a repaint. Not sure where I'm going with that though. I thought about some desert camo but that probably won't work for this one. I'm not really thinking about that too much right now.
 
I found a little time to work on this today.
I water jet cut the dropouts out of the plate. Tomorrow I hope to get them prepped and tacked into place.
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I did some ugly finish welding on the steer tube. They aren't pretty but I haven't had one fail yet. :shock: Always a first I suppose...
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A few cuts of tubing and there we have it. I'll get them cut to length after I get the drop outs tacked and decide where I want them.
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I found these steel domes at the steel yard and picked up a few. I'm thinking of using them on the bottom of the tubing to give it a finished look.
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Something like this
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Not sure what I want to do on the top yet. I was thinking maybe a hexagon to look like a big bolt or the primer end of a bullet/shot shell.
 
Interesting build, I like what you´ve done so far.
I bet is so cool to have access to a water jet cutter, y spent two days cutting my drop outs with a grinder :?
 
Thanks GDCast.
It is cool, but I wish it was unlimited access to the water jet. I can get away with a few small items here and there. It took me about 20-30 minutes to do the drawing for these and about 2 minutes to cut them out. I'll spend a lot more time cleaning up the edges and prepping the metal for welding.

Didn't feel like being in the shop tonight, it was windy and I hate working with the doors closed. So no progress to report...
 
Found a few minutes today to prep the drop outs and get them tacked into place. A lot easier said than done, to get them where I wanted and centered so the wheel runs true to the bike.
Sorry for the bad pics. It was night time and it looks like my son was using the camera last. There was some sort of greasy something or another all over the lens.
Still need to trim the tops, obviously, and finish weld everything.
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Probably could have made the wrenches a little bigger...
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So, no progress to report, but I did get a little shoptime in. Figured out two things,
1- cork grips are a no go. I knocked over the bike and the grip just broke a big chunk off. I guess I'll go back to the brown leather I wanted to in the first place but was too cheap. Maybe I'll just make some.
2- my welding sucks. I took some time and just practiced not trying to weld anything in particular, just practicing. I learned that I have been welding way too quick. I found that youtube can actually be educational. :shock: Of coarse this means I am going to grind all the weld off my steer tube extension and reweld it with better penetration. I've never had a weld fail but that's not where I want to test it out.
 
My welding sucks too, I learned that the more you practice the better (what a tip ugh?) the important thing: never surrender! Keep trying until you get it! And You will :wink:
 
I re-welded the steer tube and feel a lot better about it. It now has a big fat hot bead on it instead of a skinny piled up one. I also got the fork tubes trimmed and started to finish weld the drop outs. The welds still aren't as pretty as they could be but a little better each time. The camera batteries are dead so no pics, but I'll get some when I finish the fork tubes.
 
rydr1 said:
its coming along nicely.
Click to expand...

Thanks.
It's coming along slowly at the moment. I volunteer to help organize a woodturning symposium and it's this weekend so I've been a little wrapped up in that lately. After the weekend it's back to bike building though, and that pesky job I have to keep.
 
Well the garage is being taken over by all kinds of c### for my wife's garage sale. So work has came to a standstill until that gets cleared out. I have spent some time disassembling the Stealth and getting it ready for sale. If I get that done it should open up some room in the bugdet for any parts I may want on this.
 

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