I KNEW someone would call me out on that lol. The edges of the cups were rusty so they got sanded and primed with the rest of the frame! They're still nice and greasy inside so paint won't stick in the inside. I'll clean up the grease/paint and pack with fresh moly grease when I re-assembleIf you're going to go through all the trouble to break down a bike to paint the frame... go the extra step & remove the bearing cups!!!
I guess I will take em out then lol. You raise a good point! Today I worked on my ignition module and got everything put together. It was a very tight fit but it's all assembled. Also began shooting the paint. Will definitely be using wet sand paper and compound for the final finish.
Thanks for the support guys! My wife and mom have been cheering me on as well. Today was both a productive and frustrating day for bike building. I got my wiring done, ran and adjusted the throttle cable, ran the fuel line, and riveted on the original badge. I also restored a nifty little tail light and made a mount for the headlight that attaches to the stem. What didn't go so well today was attaching the chain... What I didn't realize is the bike is actually quite long, I haven't made any comparisons to a modern cruiser but it seems to have a long wheelbase. As a result the chain would not reach to close with a master link. I needed to dramatically shift the position of the engine to get the gap to close. Of course now it's hitting the part of the casting where the upper right hand clutch arm/cover bolt goes. Some filing is in order to make it fit. Another annoyance is that the air filter I had picked out won't fit with the change in engine position. I have a velocity stack with a built in filter coming Friday. Anyway here are some pictures from today!
Thank you! I was thinking that, in hindsight that is probably what I should have done lol. Everything is still loose so that I can still install the pedal chain with relative ease. The tensioner I bought for the engine chain side was driving me a little nuts. It came with a plastic roller that wouldn't clear my rear engine mount, just another headache. I shimmed a bearing into a spare drive gear I had lying around and then used the hardware for the cruddy tensioner that comes with the kit. I'll have some pics of that laterLooking good!
One of my tips for builders is to always install the pedals & pedal chain first; then you install the engine & big chain... (because there's no way to adjust the chain tension on the pedal side).
This way you can come up with a plan for the big chain while bolting in the engine by possibly tilting the engine mounts or making shims.
