A Mexican Ducati rescue and rebuild

[flemsmith]

Mind saying a few words about how messy the soda blast is? ie, did you wear some full suit, breathing garb, get it in your hair,eyes, etc? I've never tried that, but I'd like to think about trying it.

roy

[Airhead Wrangler]

It's messy alright. It's definitely an outdoor activity unless you have a good blast cabinet. I did it out doors as far from the house as possible. I wore a nice respirator with particulate filters (not just a cheap disposable dust mask) and goggles. Other than that I was doing it in shorts and a t-shirt. Not exactly ATGATT. It covered my driveway in white, but soda is water soluble, so nothing a garden hose couldn't fix. The hurricane that passed through here on Friday took care of whatever I missed with the garden hose. Also, soda isn't really that bad of an inhalation hazard as it's water soluble and relatively non-toxic. Any that you inhale will just dissolve in your lungs relatively quickly, get into your blood stream and eventually get pissed out unlike silica which stays there FOREVER causing respiratory issues. Soda might cause some temporary lung irritation, but nothing lasting, at least when inhaled in moderate amounts. As for myself, I was covered head to toe in soda/sweat crust, but a quick spin around in the shower took care of it. The clothes took a trip through the laundry and came out smelling extra fresh due to the extra baking soda. In a cooler climate I'd use a tyvek suit and hood, but it's just way too damn hot for that here. All in all, not bad. I'll add that the soda I was using (dry chem fire extinguisher fill) was a good amount finer than soda blasting media which is more like normal household baking soda in grain size, I think.

[Airhead Wrangler]

I finally found a shop that I trust to do a good job sandblasting the frame. I dropped off the frame and swingarm this afternoon and they said they'd blast them in the morning, so we'll see what tomorrow brings. If they do a decent job on the frame I'll have them do the wheels as well. The local hydraulic shop sent the fork legs out to Guadalajara to get stripped, hard chromed and honed. I'm not sure when they'll be back, maybe a week or two. Also, 2 of the 4 aluminum spacers on the engine mounting bolts had been replaced with what appears to be slices of black iron gas pipe. The slices aren't even cut anywhere close to straight so I'm having a machinist turn 2 more spacers out of aluminum identical to the original two as the parts catalog says all 4 are the same part number. Those should be ready tomorrow too. One by one things are getting done and before I know I might even be putting things back together. My girlfriend will be up in the states in July at which point she can smuggle back my mountain of parts which has accumulated there - most importantly a stator and gasket/seal kit. I've realized that the wiring is seriously wonky on this thing. The ignition is a certainly non-stock mix of bosch pickups, nippon denso coils and a hitachi ignition box - all of it joined together with some seriously goofy homebrew wiring. I'll probably end up tossing all the wiring and making my own loom from scratch. It'll be minimalist as I really don't enjoy wiring.

[jbcaddy]

I am enjoying following along, watching your progress. I guess I need to get busy on my projects instead of watching the progress of others JB

[Airhead Wrangler]

Well, bad news. The frame came back from the paint shop looking like they had turned a 5 year old loose on it. Huge parts of the frame were left bare, not enough pigment was used, so the paint is somewhat transparent and bluish in places where the steel shows through, huge runs, smudges, scrapes and fingerprints and the whole thing just generally looks like shit. I'm going to have to blast it clean again and drive it 4 hours up to Guadalajara to a powdercoat shop that I know can do a decent job. Oh the joys of living in Mexico.

[Wirespokes]

Why not try POR15 frame paint? I've heard you can brush it on without leaving brush marks. And it's tough, besides being a cheap way to go.

[groop]

Originally Posted by Airhead Wrangler

Oh the joys of living in Mexico.

The irony.....Mexico is exactly where we used to send cars and parts to get painted. Living in CA has its own challenges.

[Airhead Wrangler]

Originally Posted by Wirespokes

Why not try POR15 frame paint? I've heard you can brush it on without leaving brush marks. And it's tough, besides being a cheap way to go.

It doesn't exist here and customs usually seizes stuff like that. They say they have a distributor in Mexico, but when I called them they'd never heard of POR15. Been there done that. Best to go with what's available locally (or 4 hours away).

[adventure950]

Its nice to see tha pantah coming back to life another lovely bike this might interest you but hope I am not hijacking your thread - This is a picture of a panther (Harris Ducati) [/IMG] this belonged to a mate of mine at the time the bike was raced in the isle of man TT. I rode this a few times - it was the most composed and best handling machine I ever rode back in them days. My guzzi is in the background behind my mates son, I ended up buying an italian framed version of this but it was impossible to live with and so uncomfortable to ride for any distance due to my tall build and long arms and legs that i sold it on - the Harris though was a very special bike. Then there is one of me back in 1978 /79 on my Bevel ducati - I used this as everyday transport for a year and rode up and down to Scotland from Cornwall on it every two or three weeks to see my girl who lived in Ayr. I remember getting a record of 6 1/2 hours door to door that included 300 mile of motorway, 120 mile of hellish Cornish roads ( very demanding and 90 mile of Scottish twisty A and B roads. I sat on the motorway at the bikes then top speed only stopping for fuel every hundred mile for most of the motorway section. The Montjuic was another great bike I loved small but fun i restored this one from a box of bits its the first bike I ever painted - in my greenhouse with diy cans of orange paint and lots of cutting back between coats., I had this jarama Jota at the same time it was a re import by Slater brothers who bought in a lot of unsold jaramas from the states and converted to jota spec by them - I had another jota before this one a cropody liberator but cant find a photo then a huge string of Guzzis - this was a mk2 lemon but I put the mk 1 clocks and fairing on it still one of my favourite bikes - guzzis maybe another one will find its way back into my life sometime.

[Airhead Wrangler]

Alright, the frame went back to get blasted again this morning and the wheels went along with them. Tomorrow they're hitching a ride with a friend of mine 4 hours up to Guadalajara to the powdercoat shop. The rechromed fork legs might arrive back tomorrow too. We'll see. I'm hoping this powdercoat shop up in Guadalajara knows what the hell they're doing.

[limeymike]

A powdercoat shop in Guadalajara Mexico, what could possibly go wrong?

[Airhead Wrangler]

Originally Posted by limeymike

A powdercoat shop in Guadalajara Mexico, what could possibly go wrong?

I could make you quite a list. That said, Guadalajara is eons ahead of what we have here in Manzanillo. Rattlecan is high class here. I just wish I took photos of what the local paint shop tried to charge me for. It was seriously sad. It wasn't even passable from 30 feet away.

[Airhead Wrangler]

The new exhaust finally arrived from Italy. Not the prettiest welds, but I knew that going in. Looks like it'll fit the bill nicely. I'll need to find some kind of removable baffle to put in this thing as it's straight through as it is.

[Airhead Wrangler]

Originally Posted by adventure950

Its nice to see tha pantah coming back to life another lovely bike this might interest you but hope I am not hijacking your thread

As long as your hijacks look like that, feel free to hijack away. That thing is HOT.

[adventure950]

Hi Airhead this site might help you its great for all the desmo valve info and set up http://www.ducatitech.com/2v/maint/adjust/ regards Jake.

Originally Posted by Airhead Wrangler

Anybody know what the openning rocker clearances are supposed to be for Pantahs? The PDF of the shop manual that's floating around says zero. That doesn't sound right. I know the closing rockers are supposed to be zero, but able to spin the collar shim while pushing down on the rocker. The openning cap shims are way too loose, but I'm not sure what the spec is. It can't be zero though... can it?