69 XLCH 2020

A custom hardtail built to customer specifications. The hardtail had been previously welded on. However, the frame still needed a lot of work. There were many, many extra holes in the frame that had to be filled and welded closed, many extra brackets that had to be cut off, a few extra brackets that had to be welded on. And, perhaps most unusually, the frame had little fins (yeah, like fins on fish... What was the previous owner thinking?)  that had to be cut off. There was also a lot of hand-working, grinding and sanding needed to smooth all the rough contours prior to powder-coating. The sissy bar was hand fabricated along with the tail light. The battery tray was hand fabricated. The fender was reinforced at all attach points and features a steel conduit welded to the inside to protect the taillight wiring. Small details that can't be seen but greatly add to the durability of the final assembly. All the lumps and nodules were ground off of the triple clamps, custom fork stops were fabricated and the lower triple tree is reinforced with 3/8" thick steel plate. Two inch over fork tubes were added and the reflector boss and fender boss were turned off of the lower fork legs. The front wheel hub was polished and laced to a 21" steel rim with stainless steel spokes.

The engine, trans and primary were completely rebuilt.  When the cylinders and piston were removed from the engine I found that the engine could not be rotated by hand. A cam bushing was deformed and binding on a cam and the oil pump was binding due the the fact that a previous re-builder had improperly re-drilled the oil pump stud mounting bolt holes, they were drill at odd angles and caused the oil pump gears to bind up. Some fairly extensive custom machining was required to correct the problem. An old Keihin carb was salvaged out and rebuilt, the bike starts easy and runs great.

Most of the rebuilding was chronicled on You Tube and can be seen at the Build An Ironhead Custom Playlist.