Life

Sundays nice weather persuaded me to get the bike out of the cellar and do a pre-easter fire up. It's been 5 months in hibernation, and has been modified and rebuilt with a new 5 speed auto gearbox. It sprang into life easily and sounded as good as ever. The gearbox is the only change - engine wise, the only other real changes to the bike are the addition of clutch and oxygen sensors to the Racepak and removal of the kill wiring and air shifter plunger.

Easter - and the first race of the year is only a few weeks away. The entry list is quite healthy - which is unusual for the first event, but there are 8 so far in Comp bike. And 10 in Funnybike which is a real comeback for the class.

A small update on the new chassis too - i've been practicing bronze welding on a big pile of scrap tubing, the inline gas fluxer works brilliantly, making it a lot easier to get decent looking and very strong joints.
I made myself a tube notcher too, using a clamp that holds tubing in the toolpost of the lathe and a huge roughing mill in the chuck. It works well, and can cut any angle with a perfect fit-up.

One of the last parts of the frame building jigsaw is a tube bender, well i got a good deal on one and went for it. It's an American made Pro Tools 105 Bender, similar to the popular JD2 type of ratchet bender. It need s a stand and handle making so that'll be next weekends task. It's actually the dies that cost the most money, working out a bit dearer than the whole bender. Luckily, i was outbid on one of these on ebay last week, that actually went for more than i paid for a brand new one.