A short "Build" History, and Introduction

[Spindat]

My 79 XS400. A stock example, that ran pretty good.

From This:

To This:

And now this:

At first, this ended up just god awful...

But now it's come around pretty good and I love the way it looks.

This winter will see another remodel of the entire bike. At first I thought I was the kind of all parts of a build. Well it turns out I'm not a painter, wiring guru (well, I am now), sheet metal worker, upholsterererer (trimmer). But I can sure as heck make weird ideas work and fiddle my way through a lot of things. This time I'll take the help that is offered to me.

I am Eric Spinney, and I have a "take my bike completely apart every winter" problem.

 

[mmcdx]

What mufflers are those? I need to replace mine this winter and have had trouble finding something.

 

[Spindat]

I'm not entirely sure to tell you the truth, they were on there when I picked the bike up. They are a little louder than I would really like them to be honestly. I plan to have a stainless 2 into 1 made this winter and tossing these.

 

[xschris]

Is that a honda front wheel?

 

[Spindat]

CB550 Fork, Wheel, Brakes. Weird upgrade I guess but that was what I had haha. Gives a disc brake, and a 35mm diameter fork.

 

[xschris]

As long as it works for you

 

[Spad]

Spindat, nice, what about that brown seat and tank on the floor? What seat is tat and does it fit on the Yamaha...You are doing good work on that XS and will be following your progress as I am building a XS café racer too. Just behind as I have been ill...Thanks for the good pictures etc...Spad

 

[Spindat]

As long as it works for you

Works so much better! When I put the clubmans on the cable never seemed to work quite right.

 

[Spindat]

Spindat, nice, what about that brown seat and tank on the floor? What seat is tat and does it fit on the Yamaha...You are doing good work on that XS and will be following your progress as I am building a XS café racer too. Just behind as I have been ill...Thanks for the good pictures etc...Spad

It is a seat from dime city cycles, it definitely isn't a direct bolt on part, but I plan to rebuild the subframe to compliment it a little more. I'll keep the thread updated with that progress as I go!

Thanks for the kind words! Good luck with your XS!

 

[Spindat]

So begins a slow progress of trying to finally pretty up this heap. I won't be rushing and biting off more than I can chew this winter.

All I want to achieve is a black frame, great fitting seat, pod filters and a new exhaust. I think that is relatively do able.



So based on this picture, I have determined I will be having the seat shortened by about 4 inches to ensure that the lines work well together. I want the angle of the subframe to be continued by the seat to give it more of a "sporty" forward rake look. Similar to what I hacked together with the grossness that is on there now, but pretty.. If you know what I mean.

 

[Spindat]

So I got into the mood to get things going on the seat fitment. Which meant tearing that ugly square section off.



Then came the scary seat shortening. I had to remove the cover, measure the foam and pan to what I wanted and cut. I decided on this length and went for it.






Broke out the sewing machine and put my rusty upholstery skills to work and recovered the newly shortened seat.

 

[xschris]

Looks good.

 

[Norman1950]

I like the shortened version. Great job.

 

[Spindat]

Thanks! Kind of a daunting task when I spent what I consider a small fortune on the seat originally. To cut it up and put my upholstery skills to the real test.

 

[Orgoth225]

Love the bike. Were the Honda front end and wheels a simple bolt on or did you have to do any modifications? Thanks

 

[OleDoc]

Thanks! Kind of a daunting task when I spent what I consider a small fortune on the seat originally. To cut it up and put my upholstery skills to the real test.

That's what makes it yours.lookin good

 

[Spindat]

Orgoth,

The Honda swap was not bolt on, I had to put my XS stem into the CB lower and make a shim for the top tree. Looking back I should have really saved some coin and got a modern set up, but this works too! Thanks for the compliment.

Oledoc,

Thanks! This is true, however I did steal the shortening idea from another guy. But that's litterally where every idea came from for me, I take the things I like from others and try to make it my own!

 

[Spindat]

Wow I can't believe it has been a year since I have been on here. My project got so side tracked with me going back to university and spending so much time training/racing bicycles.

I've been playing around with the idea of documenting the build through video instead of pictures and words, I'd like to share that with you here today! I'm getting back at it, and will have it done for spring. I want it to be understated, not perfect, "reliable". I want to have a bike rack/mount built so it can be a viable option to ride to the trails and back instead of taking the car.

Offer me some feedback!

 

[Spindat]

Second Video!

 

[Spindat]

In true Eric Spinney fashion, I haven't posted anything in a long while. But here is another video update!