"First" build

Well, I've been hanging out here for a little over two years and I've finally made something. In the title, first is in quotes because I've gone through a couple frames and a few engines. I started with a 2hp Briggs & Stratton, then went to a 3hp with a larger tank, and now I have a Honda GX160. It's not the greatest looking, but it gets the job done. I can cruise around town with traffic doing about 45. I don't know what the gear ratio is, but from a dead stop, if I start rolling at idle and then go to WOT, the belt will chirp and I'll accelerate past the cars that are taking off next to me. It still needs a bunch of work, but I'm quite happy with how it turned out. I have to take the engine off later to reinforce the engine mount being that the engine is twice as big as the last one, so I'll get some pictures of how it's stuck on there. In the meantime, there's this picture that I hope I attached properly.

I bolted to rims together; one acts as the pulley, and the other as the wheel. It will peak at about 45 mph. As for scaring the neighbors, I can't ride it where I live. I live in a 55+ mobile home park and they don't allow motorcycles. I have to walk about 5 houses down to get out of the community before I start it up.

I replaced the throttle lever today and took some pictures of how this thing is stuck together. I couldn't post them on here because of their large file size, so here's a link to where they are: http://s972.beta.photobucket.com/user/livesteamfan/library/?

I also have some YouTube videos starting from when I was beginning to build this here: http://www.youtube.com/user/livesteamfan1

Before the current engine, it had an 80202 model Briggs from 1992. Now it has a Honda GX160 from 1995.

Got in a wreck the other day. I was doing about 40mph and someone pulled out in front of me at the last second. I hit the just behind the rear wheel on the passenger side. Front wheel is shaped like a taco and the forks are bent. Luckily, I'm fine and he gave me a ride home and I had another bike to use for parts. Now has newer forks and wheel and I'm back on the road. He said he never saw me coming; I wear a shiny chrome motorcycle helmet so people can see me and I run without a muffler so people can hear me. Oh well, it happened and it's been dealt with.

It has good brakes. I just didn't have enough time to even think about them. And now both my fiance and my grandmother are bugging me to get rid of it. I don't want to do that because it's my ride to work and around town everyday because I would prefer to save the gas in my truck to run out to school and back every night and go to my fiance's house when I can. Both are in another town across the river and I do not want to go that far and at night on this thing.

I've been meaning to add lights to it, just haven't had the time. The little plastic box was going to be the switch box for when I got all the lights. Right now it just has a key switch for the ignition. The main reason behind the lights not being on it, besides lack of time, is that I would like to try and use the little bit of power coming off of the kill switch wire to either run a single headlight or charge a 12v SLA battery to run headlight, taillight, and turn signals. I haven't found a single way to do it because everything I've tried just shuts it off. I can get a single led that was in a computer to light up both with and without a rectifier, but nothing else works and that little thing is far from bright being it was just an indicator light.

Thank you very much. I'm quite comfortable at that speed mainly because it doesn't look all that fast to me. Then again, I said the same thing a few days ago when I was doing 100 down the highway in my truck. I was thinking of using an electric motor on the belt as a generator; maybe even figure out how to use it as my tensioner. Either way, I'll figure out something. I can still ride this time of the year because it's not too cold here in mid-Florida. I think it's about 70 out right now.

Well, the Honda GX160 is dead. The low-oil sensor didn't work when it should've and the engine locked up. I was able to free it up for a 10 minute run and then it threw the rod which put a hole in the block and broke the cam in half. Now, I have a Honda GC160 that I think will look a lot better; especially after I strip it down to almost nothing and put the GX flywheel on it. Being I'm quite busy with school and work, it may take awhile for me to get to doing that, but it will be on and running tomorrow and I'll take pictures of it then.

Dan said:

Oh Man Steam.

Sorry to read that!

Click to expand...

Oh well, things happen. It's my fault for not checking the oil because I didn't know that it leaked. Either way, that was a free engine and so is the one that's going on it. If there were no problems, half the fun would be gone!

Since my last post, I picked up a Honda GC160 from my boss. It ran okay for awhile. I don't like Honda motors because I like to hear a really low idle and they have a compression release that won't allow it; that and the GC160 has the exhaust on the front and kept burning holes in my socks. Either way, the GC160 wouldn't start the other day because the compression release mech was stuck in the open position. So after a drive to the local lawnmower repair shop and $10 later, I had a walk-behind edger that had been sitting since 1999. He said he got it running and let it sit because the owner never came to get it; he didn't know if it would run or not after all these years. Well, the little 3.5hp B&S fired up and it runs just fine. I have the low idle that I want, straight pipe exhaust, I cleaned the engine up some, and even finally made a mount that holds it by all four mount holes instead of two because the plate was too small. I did have to go to Advanced Auto to get a slightly bigger belt though. The only thing I don't like about it is it's a fixed-jet pulsa-jet carburetor on the smaller gas tank. I would be okay with the big tank, but I don't like the pulsa-jet's fuel pump and I don't like that this one is a fixed-jet. The really nice thing is that it had a belt guard on it which I am using. Also on a different frame because I felt the last one was becoming too unstable because of all the holes in it; I do need new front forks though because the ones that were on this frame were bent. I'll get pictures in the morning. I'm thinking of putting "Powered by Briggs & Stratton" where the original label was by the top of the shroud and having "Hardly Davidson Piglet" in the center of the pull start.

Finally took time to get some pictures of this thing. I've been riding it so much I never really took the time to get pictures. The first one is how it looks now, and the second is for everyone wondering where I put my feet on this thing. It looks awkward, but it's really quite comfortable. But recently money troubles have forced me to sell it. I have an offer of $300 which is extremely good for this monstrosity, and I'm gonna go ahead and use an old weed wacker for a friction drive setup on a bike I found in the trash. I also have another 3.5 briggs that is running and that'll go on a bike once I find one. So, even though the original is out the door, I'm not out of the motorbike fun.