freedom or death machine rebuild | post #3

THANKSGIVING

i am about to drink beer and watch football with some friends as the woman who inexplicably loves me makes the giant turkey day spread she is famous for.

because it’s thanksgiving the proper thing to do is to be thankful, even though the FREEDOM or DEATH MACHINE has been a nightmare since jeff from saint motorbikes brought her to texas over 17 months ago, she is finally getting the lovin’ she needs.

as you see with my perfectly horizontal lines across the bike, the footpegs are not even. from the top, it is apparent that the right side pegs don’t meet evenly with the left side. according to measurements eric has taken, they are over 1/2 inch off center.

when the bike arrived, the solid aluminum pegs by rock’s chops had yet to be installed, and matt at working man’s customs had promised the day the bike arrived he’d get them on. he did but didn’t tell me how uneven the mounts were that jeff had made. he also set them up so poorly that the first time i hopped on the bike, one of the mounts gave way and slipped down under my boot. turns out they all did that if they were stood upon. wow. thanks for your “help,” working man.

here is a view of the pegs from the rear:

i don’t think a thousand words are enough for that photo.

essentially, all four mounts are off center from left-to-right and top-to-bottom. eric will have to shave at least three off and re-make them. then he will mount the pegs in a manner in which they won’t fall out from under me when i lean or stand or generally ride my motorcycle.

that is the ForD, disassembled by eric. according to him, there were no lockwashers on any of the motor mounts, nor were there any on the front mount of the seat, which is why they were loose (remember, it’s been ridden only a handful of times and has clocked no more than a two miles on the road).

as every dips**t knows, any type of bolt that can come loose from vibration and bolts to moving parts should have some sort of lock washer. working man also put the seat on, as he made it, and the front mount is a high quality piece from fabricator kevin. eric also wrote that “a lot of parts like the fenders and other spots on the bike are real rough on cuts and the holes will need to be smoothed out.” he promised more photos of the kind of workmanship those who “built” the bike i “designed” did on her.

finally, eric also told me that all the electrics were “hard wired with no type of connectors for servicing parts.” eric is a former hvac tech and after almost 15 years at it, he knows about wiring sh*t properly. anybody who has seen him open the seat of his award winning xs500 cafe knows he is meticulous when it comes to the wiring and electronics. i am disappointed in limey as he told me in austin that he had “cleaned up” the wiring and that he was shocked at the condition the machine was in when i received her. he charged me $420 to fix things like that, less than half of what he said he would charge any other customer, and the condition they are in afterward is still as if the wiring was hooked up by a ******?

it’s what i get for trusting a man who didn’t drink beer.

regardless of the general half-assedness of those in austin, i am thankful because it looks like i am going to have to do this myself.

hooray for thanksgiving!

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