Big Al's Shadow 1100

My good friend and ridin/beer drinkin/motorcycle nut buddy  Big Al (I call him Tiny cause he's like 6'6") had this 1100 sittin in his garage for the past three years. It was/is is first m/c. Anyways, got to talkin to him bout why this ol girl hasn't been on the road for 3 yrs. While drinkin a few cold ones he tells me that he had taken the bike to Ohio Cycle Workxs in Elida several years back to have the 2nd gear fixed in her (gotta split the cases to do this). When he got the bike back it ran like molasses on a cold winters day. The all wise and knowing gurus at OCW said there wasn't anything wrong with it. Big Al disagreed. To make a long story short, they didn't/wouldn't fix it so Big Al parked it after have some stencling put on the rear fender stating that the bike ran like shit and thanked Ohio Cycle Workx for it.
After some prodding, I told Big Al to bring the ol girl out to my place and him and I would see if we could get her back to runnin like she use to. So, he brought it out this past weekend and we put some fresh gas and a new battery in her and get her fired up. Right away I could tell something was definitely not right. We pulled the carbs and checked the jets and they were all super clean. So I synced the carbs and it ran a little better but not perfect. I told Al that it sounded like the timing was off. The manual says that the timing isn't adjustable and that any issue there would be due to an electrical problem. So were gonna tackle that next but I truly feel that when OCW put the motor back together after splittin the case they probably didn't put the cams back in correctly and I'm thinking that it's off by one tooth on the chain. I hope this isn't the case but if it is we will tear into and try and get her right. I'll post more pics in the future and keep ya all updated on our progress.
Here's a few pics of Al's bike. If ya look though some of my other posts you'll see Big Al's daily rider "PHATAZZ" a Kawasaki 2000cc !

Home Made Carb Tool

Carb tuning is not one of my most favorite things to do. Throw in the CV carbs on the Kawasaki KZ and its even more of a p.i.t.a.! Well, I have been trying to sync the carbs on this bike and I am having an issue with trying to tighten up the sync lock nut without disturbing the the position of the sync screw. So, being the cheap ass that I am I decided to make my own tool instead of buying one.
What I did was I took a 1/4 drive 8mm socket and welded it onto a hollow 1/2" pice of pipe about 10" long. Then I took a piece of  3/8' solid rod and ground down the end like a flat head screwdriver. I welded a short arm on the main tube to be able to turn the locknut while the screwdriver holds the screw in position. I then painted it an ugly ass green so I wouldn't missplace it in my tool box.
All in all, I had $0 in making this tool (left over scrap). And it's definately been much easier the adjust the sync on these carbs!

Motor Mounts

I, for one, really dont like when a bike builder spends all their time hardtailing a bike and then leaves the ugliest rear motor mount swing arm bracket in place. My nephew decided when he built his frame that he wanted a clean, open area behind the motor and under the seat. We hashed out how this could be done without sacrificing the strength and integrity of the frame. We came up with the idea of tying together the lower frame rails and then fabricating a "T" post that goes up to the rear motor mount. We are hoping (and praying) that this set up will be strong enough (without the lower rails being tied together to the back bone) when the bike is on the road hitting bumps and crossing train tracks.

It's a roller!

My newphew Don has been putting some time in on his build lately and he sent me a pic! What do ya'll think?