Ready to race! Well, almost...

BMW R65, rolled out and started for the first time since January.

Over the long fourth of July weekend, I managed to complete the reassembly of the beemer. She's now as complete as she was when manufactured in October of 1980. 

Good news: she started right up and ran pretty strong.

Bad news: she seems to slip in 5th gear just a bit, so we'll need to investigate and sort that out real soon.

Other than that, I have some safety wiring left to do (the first two bolts drilled real nice and easy, and I even managed to finish the holes off with nice beveled edges so nothing catches.

Another photo:

Not showroom, but not too bad for going on 34 years old.
She's not looking much like a race bike, 'cause for her race class she has to be 100% bone stock,
and let me tell you, 34 year old stock bikes are hard to come by.
I'm really happy with all I've learned on this project so far - and soon we'll get to run her at Bonneville.
Pretty cool anyway you look at it.

Making Progress...

What am I looking at?! L-R: Cylinder, Piston, Wrist pin, Connecting Rod

I finally got a large enough block of time to install the newly worked piston, cylinders and heads onto the salt bike…

My very own "Altar to the gods of Speed"...

Over $1000 worth of machine work and parts, ready to re-install!

Got the pistons back after de-carboning, with new rings and scrubbers. And the cylinders have been cleaned up and re-honed, and of course the heads have been rebuilt.
You can see in the photo above the parts are divided between the right and left sides of the engine, so I can keep track of what goes where on install, and to make sure I'm not missing anything.
Now? I've just got to get it all back together and see if she'll run!

Here's a cut-away of a BMW "airhead" engine, showing where a lot of the stuff currently on my bench goes...

R65 Heads update...

The heads just came back from Peter Bombar, all clean and spiffy, and holding perfect vacuum:

Refurbed head from the R65 - ready to install

These absolutely look great, and hold perfect vacuum. Ready to rock n' roll!

Distillery Tour...

So yesterday, Pillion and I enjoyed a tour and tasting at the Top of the Hill Distillery in Chapel Hill, NC.  The tour was given to us by my eldest daughter as a birthday gift to me.
Top of the Hill, which also operates a brewery at its restaurant site, now manages a distillery offsite, creating award winning Vodka, Gin, Whiskey and Moonshine using only Organic wheat for their mash. Here are a few pics from the tour and tasting:

We're now officially registered to go racing!

Like clockwork?

Two early memories involving any mechanical aptitude I have involve my perpetual job of being the flashlight holder for my Dad, (once while he destroyed a Holley carburetor with a ball-peen hammer because it assumedly wasn't installing itself correctly)...and a mantle clock...