More pieces for the Trash Bin.

Have you ever started a home project and the farther you get into it the more things you find wrong that the previous owner hacked together?  That is exactly what this project is like. This hole in the gas tank is somewhat self inflicted, however only because previous owner put a bolt that was too long into an insert and overtightened causing said bolt to become stuck. Same with the one above it that you can see in the photo. My thought was if I could get the insert out of the tank then get the bolt out, I could use epoxy to reinsert the nut insert and be good to go.  Did not go as Planned. This tank was going to be reused, so was the rad shroud that was attached, it was in pretty good condition with very little discoloration. Now it goes in the trash.

The throttle cable and the clutch perch both go in the trash can.

The reed valve intake boot looks to have had some dry cracking

on it at some point so the previous owner (po) smeared some silicone sealant all around it, looks like it will go in the trash as well.

When draining the Radiator I found that there was no coolant mixed with the water, who needs the green stuff right? Oh well at least to this point the radiator doesn't leak and the hoses look good too.

Down to just the motor now, I will save that for tomorrow or the next time I get out to the garage.  The Triple Tree came out good and the bearings look good on that. It is the first set of bearings that have looked good so far.

Taring it Down.

I Started the tare down process, and inventoried the pieces that will work and the ones that wont along the way.  Yes there are way more that wont then the ones that will.  The big pieces are good for the most part though so that's a good thing. By big I mean expensive.

As you can see the frame was painted blue somewhere along the way. The original color was silver. Plastic....well I just hope that I can get the fenders and side panels. The rad shroud is in pretty good shape as well as the tank, usable if I have to on the shroud. I don't think I could find a better tank. I wonder if this bike ever saw a Motocross track. It seem that these are the original rims, in 1986 the KX had bad rims, I broke mine in the first few months of racing it and had to put on new. Cant imagine them making it 25 years but they seem oem. Well yes wheel bearings are required front and rear as well as the dust seals and tires.

The Silencer is not usable either, the core is completely broke loose from the outside and the front mount is broken.

In this photo you can see that the shock is the wrong one for this bike. The original had a silver spring and the reservoir was blue, also this unit is not adjustable for preload, in the trash it goes.

As suspected all the bearings in the swing arm linkage need replacing as well as the swing arm bearings and all bushings. The lower uni-track arm of the linkage was ruined when the bearings went bad and did not get replaced so that goes into the trash can as well as the dog bones that connect the whole mess together because who ever put the different shock on the bike didn't use original hardware. The new hardware was too long. What do you do when the hardware is too long? Notch out the dog bone linkage of coarse. INTO THE TRASH. UGH. So on the rear suspension the only thing that is left usable is the Swing arm. At least there is that.... 

The Beginning

Here it is, the $500 beauty. 

All in all I was pretty happy to find this all in one piece. I have been looking for a long time for project bikes and don't come across very many of them. This one was in the right spot at the right time and it has my current number on it so I pretty much had to have it.  The guy was asking $650 for it and even though I wanted it pretty bad I really didn't want to pay that for it. I took $600 with me.  Upon inspection of the bike I found that the shock was blown out and the wrong one for the model as well as all the bearings being gone so the swing are just fell down when lifting the bike.  I expected it to be in bad shape so at least I wasn't surprised.  I offered the guy $400 and we settled on $500. The one thing that did surprise me was that it started on the first kick! WOW!  It sounded quite good too, nice tight 125 Braap, didn't even rattle. That was a big plus even though I would have bought it not running. Soon the tare down will begin.