DR 650 project: It's now a Beast!

[WILL_S]

Need to go for a ride mate
one of all those bikes must be going
braaaaaaap

[NordieBoy]

Originally Posted by DRjoe

Good onya mate your a legend

You smooth talker you

[NordieBoy]

Originally Posted by kellymac530

I swapped the crappy smog vacum slide carb on my Lc4 400 to a FCR, 2 hours. I made a custom water catch bottle out of a baby bottle for my 530 and some rear foot pegs for both just in case...other than that I just ride them.

Some people get a buzz from making/remaking things for their bikes.

Some are just legends

[LukasM]

Originally Posted by DRjoe

Good onya mate your a legend

Looking forward to seeing you apply those new skills to make a decent bike that won't blow up out of that Suzu... kati this time Joe.

[DRjoe]

Originally Posted by WILL_S

Need to go for a ride mate
one of all those bikes must be going
braaaaaaap

Yep, Where are we going?

[sidetrack one]

Originally Posted by DRjoe

Good onya mate your a legend

Ahhhh, no one does sarcasm like an Aussie! errr Scot

[DRjoe]

Originally Posted by LukasM

Looking forward to seeing you apply those new skills to make a decent bike that won't blow up out of that Suzu... kati this time Joe.

You just wait mate I've might have something coming up that'll put a horn on a jellyfish

[DRjoe]

Originally Posted by sidetrack one

Ahhhh, no one does sarcasm like an Aussie! errr Scot

Technically I'm a pom but don't tell anyone

[WILL_S]

Originally Posted by DRjoe

Yep, Where are we going?

bush or beach
got that little thing yet?

[DRjoe]

Originally Posted by WILL_S

bush or beach
got that little thing yet?

Nope, next month

[kellymac530]

A legend in my own mind.

I am not meaning to pick on you. I love projects. My garage is full of them and I am like you, I always have more than 1 going at all times.

Currently I am building a BMW R80GS into an HPN Dakar replica sort of bike, but on a budget...

Then I am close to done on a 1965 Yami YDS3 2 stroke twin 305cc Cafe bike. I am very proud of how that one is looking. Lots of custom welding and frame mods, not quite to your level of stuff, but complete foot pegs and brake reconstruction as well as rear frame reshaping and a hand built rear tail section.

Then in the wings I have a Honda VT700 that I have all designed a Street tracker/flat track replica bike for. That one needs a complete motor rebuild like the smoker did so I have to wait for funds...

Then my daily driver is a 1949 Studebaker C-cab truck that I bought for $580 USD so you can imaging how poor of shape that was in. I have since completely welded up a a bunch of frame mods and for shortening the frame, fuel tank repositioning, front bumper tucking and some new 2 pot Corvette master cylinder and 7" dual diaphram power brake booster stuff all custom welded up brackets.

My input was just on the line of building something that already exhists.I like modding things into what will ultimately end up different, unique. I see guys take a vintage old car or truck and just set it on a new car chassis with AC and bew disc brakes, FI motor, yada yada....It is just a new vehicle then. I get that it LOOKS like an old vehicle, but it is not. It looses those cool old idiosycracies and character that made it cool. I still run drum brakes on my Stude and straight front axle, a 1963 Stude V8 with a carb, 3 speed on the tree....keep it old school.

I see those guys on that Cafe racer show take a cool old vintage bike and put disc brakes and a single shock on it and inverted forks and I dont get it. They sell R1s and GSXRs that way out perform a CB450 with new stuff on it. It is NOT a cafe anymore.

Leave the DR a DR imho. Keep it cool for what it is.

To take a DR and turn it into a KTM SE replica is cool from a fabrication aspect, but you have probably spent close to the money it would take to just buy an SE or something similar and just ride.

I feel for you on the explody motor issue. I did a minor rebuild on my Stude, new bearings and rings with a hone, big cam, full valve job with some porting only to have it spin a front rod bearing at 1000 miles, really bummed me out and made me park it for a while out of frustration and self blame for not completeing the rebuild and just have the rods reconned and turn the crank while it was apart....tried to save a buck ended up costing me close to $500 USD. Oh well.

Get back to it and I am watching with interest as to the outcome.

[LukasM]

I don't agree with you at all Kelly, in fact I have an opposite view in some points.

If you have an older bike that you like and want to keep for whatever reason I am all for putting newer parts on it, as long as they improve performance/reduce weight/are more reliable, etc. And to me a well modded vehicle is always cooler than even the fanciest new stock Dukayasukati.

I personally don't really get the idea of staying with stock old parts unless we are really talking about a collectors item with value - in which case I probably wouldn't buy it anyway. If the drum brakes and the leaf spring/solid axle/etc suspension on my old car were shit, you can be sure that I would put on a set of big disc brakes with aluminum calipers and independent front and rear suspension with adjustable coilover shocks and adjustable sway-bars. In fact that's what I'm doing on my Cobra kit car.

And besides, nobody makes a good middle weight twin cylinder bike. The SE gobbles fuel and is not light enough, and Joe will probably build his bike for 1/5 of the investment of what a well used SE goes for in Australia.

[DRjoe]

Sorry I'm not sure i follow you.

The bike was never supposed to be a ktm 950se replica and I'm pretty sure that no manufacturer sells a air cooled 500cc twin cylinder dirt bike so I fail to see how you think I'm building something that already exsists.

Oh if I owned a 950se I wouldn't leave it stock, I would throw just as much time and money at it as I have done with the dr.

[BergDonk]

And if the human species never had a light bulb moment, or two, and thought to themselves, 'what if', among many other things, we wouldn't be having this discussion in any form.

Life could of course be a lot simpler if we all thought the same too. Boring perhaps, but we wouldn't necessarily know any different would we, so would it be boring? Arrrrhhhhgggg........

The DR has a unique combination of worthy core characteristics which is why why we like them. And then they have fundamentally crap suspension.

Get on with it Joe, people need to know

[kellymac530]

I am for improvements. Did not say NOT to improve things. My Stude has a V8 where it had a flat head straight 6.

My Cafe has about 20% more HP than it had and cool home made expansion chambers.

I love creative stuff and custom builds.

I guess I am just confused as to what you are trying to accomplish here. You started off talking about a KTM killer, not me.

What KTM are you killing? A nonexistant middleweight archaic tech aircooled heavy beast that does nothing well and is gutless. You are correct then, THAT KTM does NOT exist.

To have a built up DR motor in a cool customized chassis is SUPER cool to me. Nice simple air cooled and reliable bike in a good handling and welll suspended chassis is a GREAT idea. A gutless, heavy, overly linear powered, old tech air cooled twin is a mediocore chassis to begin with is nothing exciting now. Dont see the point. Then to brag about it being a cheap KTM killer is just BS talk. You can not have it both ways. You can not brag about something being a "killer" of something then have it suck and not admit it.

Build something cool. Have fun with it. But stop knocking other peoples bikes by saying yours is gonna kill it and then your bike does NOT do that, and THEN cry foul that it was never in the same class...this is a middleweight air cooled twin.....duh.

Just NOT into unjustifyed lip flapping I guess. I am more of a "put up or shut up" guy.
I just like seeing a cool build and that build standing on its own merit. Digging the hard work you are doing and the creative design, but it is NOT a Corvette or a Turbo Carrera. It is an old bike with an old twin motor in it, COOL. Dont make it what it is not and what it NEVER will be.