Kiddy DIY Project: Kawasaki KS2 Restoration

Kawasaki KS2 first off-road test ride after a very long sleep.

2010-10-17T11:29:00.000-07:00

Kawasaki KS2 first off-road test ride after a very long sleep

my son was very happy with his new (antique) toy

he didn't seem to bother riding on tall grass...

I love this photo

weed whacker

helmet hair

Coca-Cola!!!

jungle?

going down

riding his bike like on the slab

he still wanted to ride but it was school day the next day

it was also his duty to wash his bike after every ride

getting ready for tomorrow's test ride

2010-10-17T11:01:00.000-07:00

the pile on the right all came from the two parts bike

He challenged me that if he can pop a wheelie and put the front tire over his junk pile that I'll treat him sushi for lunch. He was able to do it so he now he is showing how a man he is... hahaha!

Then I challenged him that if he can sit and balance his bike, I'll treat him ice cream for dessert...

Then he told me that if he can stand and balance his bike that I owe him two ice cream...

He did stand-up and was able to balance his bike for several minutes and now he is laughing because I lost and I owe him sushi, ice cream and a double burger, hahaha!

He was also the one who repaired the bikes on the center and on the right. He did a piston ring change on the yellow bike (Suzuki Street Magic) and tire replacement on the blue bike (retro Suzuki Colleda)

I don't know why this photo is dark...

very eager to load his bike

I don't know why he likes loading bikes standing from the right side. He said that he is comfortable doing it because he can hit the rear brake easily...

testing his bike again

2010-10-15T07:46:00.000-07:00

very happy with his little project

I told him to park his bike because it was past 2 in the afternoon and I was really hungry but he kept on telling excuses that the bike needed some minor adjustment but the truth is all he wanted to do is to play with his new (antique) toy.

finished bike

2010-10-15T07:36:00.000-07:00

After several months of knuckle busting and head scratching, my 10 year old son finally finished his 1st full motorcycle restoration / repair. The engine has lots of power (fitted with a racer mod piston and cylinder), gear box OK, brakes OK, suspension and tires OK, all key cylinders OK, lights and electronics OK, steering head and swing arm grease-up OK, fuel tank and fuel filter OK, bike is purring like a pussy cat!!! I give him a 10 out of 10 not because he is 10 years old but because he really did a good job. He utilized parts from the donor bikes and did not spend anything for new parts. The front light and the front fender came from a 4th bike donor (KSR) and the front brake master is from the 5th donor bike (KDX125). Other stuffs he got from me like paint, brushes, grease, oil, fuel... and lots of McDonalds, cheap sushis and piles of Coca-Colas and Pepsis :) I think that this is the real classic way of fixing stuffs.

Now most of the "big boys" tend to give-up too easily and just keeps on replacing new parts which I think is not repair but just parts replacement... So for you DIY grown-ups, please don't give-up that easily. My 10 year old son didn't give-up on his 30 year old bike and we wish that you don't too.

bike make-up

2010-10-14T23:35:00.000-07:00

Cleaning the plastics was the most boring part. It took my son several weeks to finish cleaning the front headlight cowl, front fender side fender and the rear fender. All the plastics were dirty and sun burned. He cleaned them all by using a stainless steel wool/brush (used in the kitchen for cleaning the sink and pots), Scotch Brite, sand paper and water usually after school. I should have given him the electric brush but best for him to sweat and learn doing it the old fashion way. You can see the color difference on the side fender if you check the photos posted earlier. He planned to use the original front fender and headlight cowl but since one of my friend gave him a better front fender and headlight cowl from a crashed KSR, he then decided to use the KSR's parts.

doing some painting using a touch paint pen

Heating the plastics to bring back some shine in them. He also changed the front fender coming from a damaged Kawasaki KSR and tied the crack with plastic tie wraps.

heating more plastic

After touch painting the fuel tank, heating the plastic, cleaning and waxing now the bike is ready for some test runs.

starting the engine

2010-10-14T22:56:00.000-07:00

This was the first time he tried kick-starting the engine. After several kicks and still the engine wont fire-up he started getting worried.

Mom too was excited to see if his bike will really start so she tagged along with us. My son got the bike to start but while he was bragging about his work, the engine stalled because of clutch-mis and we all had a good time telling him that he killed the engine and he has to do the repairs all over again...

He finally got the engine to start and have adjusted the carburetor... now he is one happy biker. Notice the prefab on the background, that is just mom playing ghost... no wonder where my son inherited all his corny jokes... (don't look at me OK, hahaha!)

now I'm left with this big pile of rubbish...

He still might need donor parts so we moved the parts inside our small prefab and had to stay there for several weeks because he can only do his repairs on Sundays and school-off days. Those parts were a real pain in the xxx but I really cannot complain...

with his parts plus mine, it was no fun to walk inside the prefab

cleaning the fuel tank

2010-10-14T22:37:00.000-07:00

this was the best of three fuel tanks but it still needed to be cleaned

he had to do this about 20 time plus and he seems to be getting bored...

I thinks this is the fun part... shaking water inside the tank

engine and clutch repair

2010-05-10T12:55:00.001-07:00

After he finished overhauling the carburetor, we learned that one of the dead engines had a race engine piston cylinder. It was additional work but I could not stop him from pulling the the exhaust pipe and swapping piston and cylinder. After swapping the the engine cylinder and piston, we fired up the bike and it started almost instantly then we found out that the clutch discs were sticking so he had to open the the gear box cover and pull out the clutch discs. The clutch disc holder was not in good condition so he had to open up another engine to salvage the part.

Damaged clutch discs.

installing the silencer

2010-05-10T05:45:00.000-07:00

This is the bolt that he had a hard time repairing. Notice that he also painted the silencer.

installing the side cover

painting the frame

2010-05-10T05:23:00.001-07:00

I thought that it was best to just let him use a can spray paint rather than a real paint gun. I really don't want him spraying paint all over the place.

He didn't do much preparation before painting. He just brushed the frame and used Scotch Brite cleaning pads. Covered the engine and swing arm with newspaper and off he painted. No primers nor bogs, I just let him spray it the way he wanted to.

The wind was quite strong that day and got some paint on four of my other motorcycles including the Kawasaki ZZR on the background. It took me days polishing the other four bikes to remove the black paint but since I was the one who was too lazy to move them, I really couldn't put the blame on anybody.

He did about five coatings. Two coats or three are enough but he seemed to be having a good time so I just let him enjoy his project.

back to square one

2010-05-10T05:12:00.000-07:00

He finally assembled the parts that he wanted for his project. Next step was painting so he had to strip some parts off again. I thought that it was best for him to assemble it first so that he could have a better view of what is going on and before painting the frame. We all know that the best way to paint a bike is to do it with less parts attached but I have to let him see his progress or he might get bored.

wheel repair and painting

2010-05-10T04:49:00.001-07:00

Painting the rim.

Removing the rim.

rusty nuts and bolts

2010-05-09T21:29:00.001-07:00

Removing some broken bolts. He was able to remove some of the bolts by heating but some bolts are just too deep that he had to use a drill. He repaired the threads using thread taps.

Trying to extract some damaged bolts with a burner.

Heating some parts for straightening.

now it looks like a bicycle

2010-05-09T21:07:00.001-07:00

He looks to be really enjoying his little project.

look ma! I found a new toy

2010-05-09T21:02:00.001-07:00

Son with a big smile! He finally got the donor engine out after busting his knuckles from the narrow frame.

getting ready to remove the engine

2010-05-09T21:01:00.001-07:00

My son trying to figure out how to remove the donor engine.

figuring out what to do next

2010-05-09T20:58:00.002-07:00

I think that he is in trouble but still looks happy.

looking for more parts

2010-05-09T20:58:00.001-07:00

Salvaging some more parts.

selecting the parts

2010-05-09T20:56:00.000-07:00

Deciding which parts to choose.

getting ready

2010-05-09T17:03:00.000-07:00

First we started by choosing which parts to use. We have three bikes to choose from but all of them have their pros and cons. One bike had a bent fork, one bike had good forks but with a damaged front rim, one had a good frame but a rusty swing arm and the kick starter wont go down. One had a better handle bar, one had better brake unit, one had a better wiring harness loom, one had a good carburetor, etc... It was really like one big puzzle for my son for this is his first full motorcycle restoration.

First Post

2010-05-09T15:12:00.000-07:00

My son was 9 years old when he first saw these three little green bikes sitting inside the tent at my work garage. He had to climb on top of the other bikes just to see them because they were at the corner of the tent and it was filled with dead bikes. He sat on the bikes and was full of excitement. It was past lunch time and I couldn't get him to get out of the tent. Just to get him out, I promised that I'll pull the bikes out after we had lunch. When I got the bikes out, he asked me how much I could sell a bike for him. I know that he had pennies only enough to buy some candies and I really couldn't sell a dead bike to my son so I offered him a deal. The deal was that I'll give him all three dead bikes to make one working bike for himself but he has to do a full repair / restoration and I'll only be the coach.