My Cali 3 cafe racer build

[Misterb]

Within a couple of hours the frame was off the engine, that done, and after a well earned tea break, I made a start on one of the improvements I wanted to make. The first step was to make a simple plate to protect the bevel box when its bead blasted to clean its surface. I'll need to go and buy a nice cake as a bribe/payment when I go to the local machine shop where they'll hopefully let me use their blasting cabinet.

First I took the bevel box over to my mate Jeff's workshop, where we just managed to secure its underside to a small rotary table (very useful bit of kit) then we got artistic with the pillar drill... 

I bead blasted the bevel box and caliper mount at a local machine shop, they look much better but they needed to be painted to stop corrosion, so the next task is to buy some suitable paint.. etch primer, primer and silver alloy paint, oh and drain / level plugs were replaced with stainless bolts which had their heads machined too.

[Misterb]

We're up to Feb this year now, and the next task was to weld on a few extra brackets to the frame, to make fitting a new seat unit, splash guard etc a lot easier.

A stainless splash guard was made to fit from 1.5mm plate, a bit OTT, but I wanted it strong in case I had to bolt the coils / battery / electrics to it. Not sure what model the side stand is from, but it was way too short and allowed the bike to lean over to a worrying degree, so I had a couple of inches added to it, before the whole lot went off to be powder coated for the second time.

 







 

[Misterb]

With the frame mods completed, I took the frame to Triple S in Bingley, Yorkshire where the main frame was coated gloss black and the swing arm and lowers were one in silver. I went for this option for a couple of reasons, first the swing arm has hard a hard life with a few gouges and marks which the lighter silver finish will help to hide, while I'd also seen a Radical Guzzi from Germany with this combo which I really liked. Sadly for my wallet it cost me more than it should've as the frame had already ben powder coated, which is a time consuming an therefore expensive finish to remove. I used a hair dryer to warm up the headstock to help ease the bearing races in... works surprisingly well.







 

[Misterb]

Despite the lack of space in the garage, I decided to press on and try to get the frame back onto the engine. But first I assembled the rear bevel box and swing arm, cos it was easy and looked like I'd done something. I also replaced the old drain / level plugs with stainless bolts which had their head machined to make them look a bit better.

Ideally an extra pair of hands would've helpful when fitting the frame, but I was working alone so I managed to bolt the front engine mount first, with the frame up ended, then it was a case of pivoting the frame down and bolting up the lower frame rails. This worked surprisingly well with no damage to the new powder coat. Oh and I was using new stainless engine bolts too. The only problem I hit was that the clutch arm on the back of the gearbox needed its adjuster bolt removing to clear the frame as it pivoted down. This little issue turned into a massive nightmare soon after..

It was all going so well, once the frame was on, I decided to remove a few alloy parts and bead blast / polish them before refitting..

One part I wanted to tidy up was the clutch arm on the back of the gearbox, its not that noticeable, but it all helps. Its held in place by a pivot bolt which in turn is kept secure by a split pin. The split pin was rusty and fell apart when I tried to remove it, ended up having to grind off its remnants, which still left the pivot bolt not wanting to come out. So I used a small drift and hammer to gently tap it out. It was stubborn, but moved eventually, or rather it seemed to move. What had actually happened was that the casting it pivoted in on the gearbox cover had snapped. What I nightmare. I was shocked as I hadn't used much force at all, god knows how it had failed.

At that point, I downed tool,  I was too annoyed to carry on that day.

[Misterb]

So the frame had to come off yet again, followed by the gearbox. The gearbox was easy enough to remove so I could get the broken clutch arm mount welded. But first had to use heat to get the pivot pin out of the broken casting. The next step was to make a temporary spacer to hold the broken casting in place when it was welded back on. Turned out the pivot pin was 7mm diameter, an odd size, so I reamed the mount and arm out to 8mm so I could use an 8mm stainless bolt to replace the rusted out pin.

Then I took the whole lot to Geoff the welder, who did the job while I waited, just need to polish the arm and fit a shorter 8mm bolt to finish things off, after that the box went back on followed by the frame... all went ok, practice makes perfect I guess..

[fotoguzzi]

MrB.. when the casting broke did you quickly brew up some tea?  or go for some Spirits?

 what a bummer that must have felt like..

Like your reports, keep it up..

[canuck750]

Nice work!

[Misterb]

I bought a 60mm electronic speedo, which will need mounting on the top yoke, The speedo mount was made made from a scrap piece of 3mm alloy plate, fortunately it was shaped by my mate Jeff on his miller, which saved me a lot of effort with a hacksaw and file. The plate needed a lot of heat to put a bend in it, cant just use force, as alloy tends to crack if your not careful. It also got a billet cover machined for the speedo body. Finally the old handlebar mounts on the top yoke were milled down as far as we dared to make the speedo mount a bit neater.
 

[Misterb]

MrB.. when the casting broke did you quickly brew up some tea?  or go for some Spirits?

 what a bummer that must have felt like..

Like your reports, keep it up..

Just tea for me... I was just relieved I didn't have to take the gearbox apart, as that would need some special tools which I don't have.

[Misterb]

That's it for me tonight, its gone midnight here. I'll post some more tomorrow, in the meantime here's a teaser..

[Misterb]

I decided the wheels weren't good enough, the anodised Akront rims were scuffed and scratched, while the hubs had been painted badly along with the rest of the bike by a previous owner. When I got the bike, I tried to remove as much paint as possible, the stainless spokes turned out ok, but it was impossible to clean up the hubs with the spokes in the way.

I wasn't sure whether the original rims could be restored to a good enough finish to be re-used, if not I'll get new Morad rims. Expensive but worth it. While ideally I wanted to also reuse the stainless spokes, as they looked to be in good condition.





Early one morning I took the wheels to my LBS, who removed the tyres for me, then it was off to my mates workshop to dismantle the wheels, shouldn't take long, just need to unscrew 80 spoke nipples. How wrong could I be ! The first few spokes snapped inside the nipple as I tried to unscrew them. Not good, and a surprise given that the spokes were stainless.

There was nothing more that could be done, but to cut the spokes, as they were beyond saving anyway. At least that didn't take long, five minutes with the bolt cutters and the hubs were free. But my wheel troubles weren't over yet. The spokes were seized solid into the hubs, they didn't want to come out, even applying a blowtorch didn't make any difference. Instead I spend 4 hours
hammering each spoke out of the hubs. What a pita, if I hit the spoke hard enough to move it, it would bend the spoke like a cheap nail. Don't hit it hard enough and its going nowhere. 

I've since spoken to a rep at Central Wheels in Birmingham who supply rims and spokes as well as rebuilding wheels, and he said they insist that such Guzzi wheels be dismantled by the owner before they'll rebuild them, as they have regularly faced the same problem with the spokes corroded into the hub (due to galvanic corrosion), at which point customers in the past have been reluctant to pay for the extra work involved in dismantling the wheels.
 
Eventually, they were all out, and with the old wheel bearings removed, the hubs, rims and disc carriers were ready for bead blasting, which I could do at a local machine shot, for the price of yet more biscuits..








 

[Misterb]

Here's a couple of pics of the bead blasting set up at the local machine shop, the hose / nozzle which fires out the blasting medium has a heck of a kick to it, you need to hold it tight, they've got a big old compressor that drives it. The shop owner likes bikes too, and keeps his owned from new GS1000S at the shop, though these days it doesn't get ridden much.












The hubs were blasted, as were the disc mounts, and both came out well, then I moved on to the rims which were anodised, so I blasted the anodising of one rim to see how it looked. At this point I wasn't sure if I could reuse the rims, and whether they should be polished, re anodised, painted or powder coated. While the hubs could be painted or powder coated, I think they are too rough to be anodised, in the end I sprayed them with the same finish I used on the bevel box.

After cleaning up the first rim, I stopped as it was clear the corrosion pitting in the rim was worse than I thought, they could still be reused if painted or powder coated perhaps? but at that point I decided to go for new rims. 

[Rick4003]

Looking good still, But it seems to me that I have read about this project before. Have you posted the project on another site before? ADV?

[Misterb]

New rims and spokes aren't cheap, so while I saved up for those, there were still lots of small improvements to be made, the devil is in the detail..

First I decided the gloss black paint I'd used on the starter motor didn't look quite right. In the end I re-sprayed it satin black, not sure how durable the finish will turn out to be, but it looks better to me now.

Next the two old bolts which fasten the starter to the crankcase were replaced by new stainless bolts, but not before their heads were machined smooth..

The billet battery tray was looking dull, as I hadn't spend much time polishing it when I drilled and modified it a couple of years ago. I prepped it carefully, working my way to using 400 grade wet and dry, before using my mates homemade buffer. Its about thirty years old and still works really well. Once fitted to the top of the gearbox, its clear a couple of spacers would be needed to take up the gap to the rear frame mounts. Last time I just used a few washers, this time I did things properly.











Next I took the carbs to my LBS who kindly popped them into their ultra sonic cleaner for me for free, afterwards they didn't look that different on the outside at least..






 

[Misterb]

Looking good still, But it seems to me that I have read about this project before. Have you posted the project on another site before? ADV?

Yes that's correct, though I didn't go into so much detail on ADV, and haven't updated it recently, there didn't seem to be much interest on the ADV site.

[Misterb]

Having first spend a lot of time carefully sealing the carb bodies to protect the internals, I bead blasted the carbs. It worked ok for one carb, but the other somehow got a small amount of medium inside (its very fine, almost like talc powder). Oh well, I'd already ordered new gasket kits for the carbs just in case, they're nearly thirty years old, so new gaskets aren't a bad idea anyway.

[Misterb]

There are a couple of chrome parts that need attention before being refitted. First the side stand pivot bolt, and second the two wheel spindles, both of which are corroded in places. Rather than have them re-chromed, I decided to make replacements, so I ordered a length of 17mm stainless Hex bar to make a new pivot bolt. While my initial idea of making new spindles from Grade 5 Titanium wasn't such a good one, as Ti has issues with fatigue, I was told Ti spindles are banned from racing for that reason. Instead I ordered 600mm x 25mm diameter 303 (marine grade)stainless bar, which is enough to make two spindles. Luckily the thickest part of each spindle is exactly 25mm. We could do the outline machining on these parts, but once that was done I left the final machining to my local machine shop, who wrote a program on their CNC to do the job... this cost me several packets of biscuits and the task of re-lacing a wheel. 

We also made four alloy 'top hats' for the Tarozzi rear set mounting bolts. The problem here was that the rear sets have 12mm holes (a bit OTT) while the equivalent mounting holes in the frame were a more sensible 10mm. Using 10mm bolts through a 12mm hole worked ok I guess, but I didn't like the idea, so we made top hats to take the rear set holes to 10mm... much better.

[Misterb]

The cast iron floating Brembo discs were looking very tired and rusty, being cast iron they're always going to rust, but nevertheless they could be cleaned up.

The floating rotors are held to the alloy centres by steel bobbins which are in turn held in place by a sprung washer (called Belleville washers) and circlip. The front discs came apart easily, while the rear was badly corroded and put up more of a fight. A couple of the sprung washers were rusted through and fell apart, so it turned out to be one of my better ideas to rebuild the discs. The tops of the rear discs bobbins were badly scored too, which were skimmed in the lathe along with the rotors to clean them up. The centres were repainted and the whole lot reassembled. I would have preferred to fit new rotors too, particularly for the rear disc, but they don't seem to be available. Another expensive alternative was to fit new EBC discs all round, which I may do in the future.









 

[Misterb]

I needed to get a couple of parts rechromed, and after a lot of flip flopping on my part also decided to get the black headlight shell chromed too. Got it done at a place in Crewe, not cheap but its run by the chap who used to run the chrome shop at Bentley/Rolls Royce, so the quality is excellent.

I also replaced the old brake pad pins with new stainless ones and polished the caliper bolts too.

The original Cali headlight brackets weren't very café racer-ish, so they were changed for some that looked better.. 









 

[Misterb]

At this point a parcel arrived, I was like a kid on Christmas morning, it didn't take long to open it and see its contents   

My hand made Endurance racing alloy tank had arrived from TABII in Wales..   







 

 

[swooshdave]

At this point a parcel arrived, I was like a kid on Christmas morning, it didn't take long to open it and see its contents   

My hand made Endurance racing alloy tank had arrived from TABII in Wales..   

You can't possibly post enough pictures of that tank. 

[swooshdave]

The cast iron floating Brembo discs were looking very tired and rusty, being cast iron they're always going to rust, but nevertheless they could be cleaned up.

The floating rotors are held to the alloy centres by steel bobbins which are in turn held in place by a sprung washer (called Belleville washers) and circlip. The front discs came apart easily, while the rear was badly corroded and put up more of a fight. A couple of the sprung washers were rusted through and fell apart, so it turned out to be one of my better ideas to rebuild the discs. The tops of the rear discs bobbins were badly scored too, which were skimmed in the lathe along with the rotors to clean them up. The centres were repainted and the whole lot reassembled. I would have preferred to fit new rotors too, particularly for the rear disc, but they don't seem to be available. Another expensive alternative was to fit new EBC discs all round, which I may do in the future.

Incorrectly skimming the rotors can lead to issues. It can leave a spiral groove that can cause your pads to not bed correctly and to actually pop up and you lose braking efficiency. Precision grinding or replacement would be the preferred options. I'm not saying you can't machine them, it's just that it has to be done slow and carefully.

http://www.aa1car.com/library/2003/bf110322.htm

[Misterb]

Next I had to decide on what style of seat to go for, its a tricky decision as there are half a dozen options I'm considering. One complication is that the seat rails of the Guzzi Tonti frame are very low, so any seat unit will have to sit an inch or more above the seat rails. It wont be easy to get right, without it looking awkward, or resorting to a thick foam seat, which may be comfy, but not look the part ..

In the end I went for a seat which I knew was 1/2 inch too narrow to fit over the frame rails, it needed to be mounted above the rails in any case, so not a problem. A SS750 / 900 Bevel seat from Mead Speed, complete with a handy zipped area in the seat hump.

It needed a stainless under tray to help mount it to the frame and support the back of the seat..







 

[Misterb]

Looking at options for a battery, I couldn't understand why old Guzzis like mine needed such a huge battery?

Looking at Lithium battery options for the bike, the cold cranking amps figure was the important factor for me, since I wanted the bike to turn over easily and I wasn't planning on adding extra lights or other bells and whistles.

To calculate CCA (approx) for a modern lead acid battery you multiply the Amp/hour capacity by 15.... ie 20AH x 15 = 300CCA

But Lithium batteries are more efficient, so to calculate their CCA you multiply Amp/hour by 50......... ie 20AH x 50 = 1000CCA

So (in theory) you can fit a Lithium battery a third of the A/H capacity of the original Lead acid battery fitted to a bike, though in practice Lithium batteries aren't quite that efficient.

With that in mind, I had a look at the Ballistic website (already got one of these on my Norley, it works well).. they recommend two options

 1) Evo2 16 cell with a CCA = 480 $229 (over £200 here)

 2) Evo3 with a CCA = 720 ($400 !)

My local bike shop can do me a good deal on Lithium batteries made by Shido (no never heard of them either), one of their selling points is that they are a direct replacement for an OE battery, ie the same size, not so good for me. The Shido catalogue recommends a model with over 600 CCA (cold cranking amps) this is a huge number for any bike, while costing £300.

Ok, well that's too much, what about a good old fashioned lead acid battery, there must be some that are a bit smaller than the originals..

Motobatt make a nice 32AH, 390CCA battery which is only £80, so that's a possibility, but for standard batteries I tend to go with Yuasa, with their 12 month warranty.

The Yuasa site lists two options for the Guzzi, a high tech 31AH, 400CCA model listed at £206, and a basic 30AH, CCA 180 model for £106.

Hang on, if Yuasa recommend a battery with 'only' a CCA of 180, why on earth do I need one twice or three times the power? I reckon I don't, so working from the CCA, a smaller Lithium battery with say, 10AH capacity should do the job, as long as its CCA was over 180.

Normally it wouldn't matter that much if I got it wrong, but there's so little room on the bike to fit a battery without it looking crap, that it'll have to be squeezed under the gearbox. Which in turn will mean making a stainless battery box, mounts and making the wiring loom to suite. If after all that the Lithium battery wont start the bike, I'll be a tad annoyed.

[Misterb]

At this point I worked out how to use my little camera to take video, so I pointed it at the Guzzi, and off I went. I'd intended to make one short video, but soon found myself filming each step along the build from that point on... Its now up to part 18 ! Some of them are pretty simple, wiring basics, lacing a wheel and so on. But there's some machining / milling one off parts too which may be of interest. On youtube I set it up as a playlist, I have other projects on there too, anyway here is the list of vids if your interested.   

Part 1 - Overview
https://youtu.be/AaYPYpQhGE4

Part 2 - Next steps
https://youtu.be/Usa9XrhSqq0

Part 3 - Chrome
https://youtu.be/svDXSaWxT_U

Part 3a - Billet parts
https://youtu.be/CVJN8aAj-Cs

Part 4 - Paint options
https://youtu.be/2KgdeH3zvSM

Part 5 - Machining a fork brace
https://youtu.be/Ukfh86TyHmM

Part 6 - CNC machining new stainless spindles
https://youtu.be/WxE7igxmmM0

Part 7 - Making a billet alternator cover
https://youtu.be/nyTRQspnKPM

Part 7a - Making a biller alternator cover
https://youtu.be/RvYt0DyP6E8

Part 8 - More on the fork brace and wheels spindles 
https://youtu.be/zXBYWlaDPHM

Part 9 - Polishing the billet parts
https://youtu.be/RrAEDVnvSdM

Part 10 - Fabricating a stainless battery box
https://youtu.be/JfUj5Zn41iA

Part 11 / 12 - Wiring basics
https://youtu.be/Tl7cDD_IgL4
https://youtu.be/C_IGs1_k-nA

Part 13a - Lacing the wheels
https://youtu.be/4KXXeWj8p2Q

Part 13b - Truing the wheels
https://youtu.be/rVhruA1_Rdk

Part 14 - On its wheels at last
https://youtu.be/xkL0H2AX0j8

Part 15 - More bead blasting & painting
https://youtu.be/UT-Gwae0Ois

Part 16 - New parts & making some brackets
https://youtu.be/O3vWBnLQk6I

Part 17 -  Todays To Do list
https://youtu.be/axQEhhSVVWU

Part 18 - Keihen silencers
https://youtu.be/UpVHUBEkcLA

[swooshdave]

At this point I worked out how to use my little camera to take video, so I pointed it at the Guzzi, and off I went. I'd intended to make one short video, but soon found myself filming each step along the build from that point on... Its now up to part 18 ! Some of them are pretty simple, wiring basics, lacing a wheel and so on. But there's some machining / milling one off parts too which may be of interest. On youtube I set it up as a playlist, I have other projects on there too, anyway here is the list of vids if your interested.   

Well, there goes my f'n weekend... inside watching YouTube... 

[Misterb]

Well, there goes my f'n weekend... inside watching YouTube... 

I hope there not too boring, at the moment the coils are giving me a headache in finding them a home on the bike, so I'm waiting for a single fire coil I've ordered to turn up. While the billet cover I made for the rear light still doesn't quite look the part, so more machining will be needed on that.

For those without an hour to spare on youtube, here's how it looks now, still haven't finalised the colour scheme in my head, but it'll probably end up red with gold pinstripes an Guzzi decals..

[Antiquar]

Wow, thanks for posting this write up. Gotta love project threads. The bike is looking great. Can't wait to see what color scheme you'll end up on.

And the videos--they're not at all boring for a gear head to watch. Great stuff!

[swooshdave]

I hope there not too boring, at the moment the coils are giving me a headache in finding them a home on the bike, so I'm waiting for a single fire coil I've ordered to turn up. While the billet cover I made for the rear light still doesn't quite look the part, so more machining will be needed on that.

For those without an hour to spare on youtube, here's how it looks now, still haven't finalised the colour scheme in my head, but it'll probably end up red with gold pinstripes an Guzzi decals..

Have you considered Sport stripes on the polished tank?

A guy on the Norton forum built a custom Vincent with a similar tail. He had an LED strip that combined the brake and turn signals. It was very slick and clean. Let me know if you want me to look it up for you.

[ritratto]

Was wondering about your mufflers. Who made them, where'd you get them and what did they cost?

Thanks!