We stopped at the local motorcycle boneyard and found a front wheel that should work for the dragon trike. It’s a 2.50×17 from a Honda CL70 Passport scooter/moped.

It was probably serviceable as is, but most of the spokes were lightly rusted, and the hub was a bit unsightly, so I elected to unlace it. Having trued a wire spoke wheel in the past using these and other directions, I think I can rebuild it. Besides, now I can paint the hub purple like the engine pieces.

If it sounds tedious to remove 36 spokes, wire brush each and sort them by the bend in the head, don’t try it with 120.

The same boneyard had a new tire of the proper size, a Cheng Shin moped tire. It was only $7, so it was hard to pass it up, but upon reflection, maybe I should have. It’s rated at a maximum speed of 50 km/h. That’s 30 mph for US. I found a nice Michelin Gazelle rated for at 93 mph from BikeBandit. It’s on the way.

Beginning with this post, I’m going to start displaying most pictures inline rather than with links. I’ve had a little feedback that indicates that people who look at these updates almost never click on the links, so they don’t see the pictures.

Unfortunately, I again neglected to take any pictures until I was finished.

Because of the location of the exhaust, the hitch is a bit to the right of the center line. I don’t expect this to be a problem and it was far less complicated that trying to both center it and stay out of the way of the header.

After mocking it up on the bench in several ways, I decided that the easiest would be the simplest, too. I cut a piece of 2″ x 1/8″ flat mild steel and cut a semicircular hole in one edge. I then ground it to match the profile of the bumper tubing at the angle where it meets.

I sanded all the paint off the contact areas of the receiver tube, clamped the plate in the proper spot and welded the plate to the receiver tube. I then mocked it back up with the bumper and tack welded the flat to the bumper tubing and the back of the receiver tube to the bumper tubing there.

I flipped the bumper over and welded the flat to the bumper tube and as much of the contact area at the back of the receiver tube as possible. This back joint looked too small to me, so I sanded more paint off the bottom of the tube and welded a small flat piece to bridge between the receiver tube and the bumper tube.

I also added a mounting tab for the license plate. By its location, it will also probably hold the interface for the O2 sensor. Sorry for the funky upsidedown pic. No, that is not a small anvil stuck incongruously to the bumper tube. It is actually sitting on the step of the workbench with the face on top, but I wanted the license plate bracket to look “normal”.

I dressed and sanded all the joints and it’s ready to hand off for powder coating!

I got the chrome stinger and baffle on the way home from work. It seems almost silly to pay $40 for what is essentially a slightly flared pipe with a flange, but I couldn’t make one anywhere as quickly as I picked one up. It is the swivel type and bolted on nicely, though I didn’t cinch it down permanently. I will need to remove it to drill the stinger and baffle for a retaining bolt. Sadly, this counts as the best picture I took of it. I will take a better one in the daylight and replace it.

I carefully but temporarily placed the bumper to test the clearance with the new O2 sensor bung. It clears nicely!

I dropped the body on to the frame to make sure that it clears the bumper. While it was there, I checked clearance at several other key points, such as the throttle body and air filters, the body mount under the driver seat (which will need about 1/2″ of shimming and the nose. I also looked around for open space for mounting the EFI controller. The jury is still out.

With the fit verified, it was time to make the permanent fitting for the bumper. The first step was to bend the upper mounts to coincide with the angle on the shock towers. With my anvil back in place, that was nearly trivial. I would rather have bent them hot, but I was pretty sure my torch is not big enough to heat as large an area as needed.

Of course, one shock bolt was in “backwards”, at least for my preferred mounting orientation, but it was easy enough to flip. When the bumper comes back from powder coating and is permanently installed, I will need to switch the bolts out for some that are slightly longer to account for the bumper and the washers it needs to be mounted with. I may even set it up such that loosening the bumper nuts won’t affect the shocks. Anyway, I snugged them down tight enough to stay, but loose enough to adjust if needed. I squared and leveled the bumper and made a few measurements to be sure it was as well centered as I could get it and tack welded the bumper to the upper mounts.

The lower mounts will secured with pins so that the bumper can be removed without dropping the transaxle and engine, which I nearly did accidentally with the yellow trike!

I lugged the bumper back to the bench and welded all around the top mounts and dressed the welds in preparation for powder coating. I rounded the corners of the bottom mounts, especially the ends of the tabs that go under the big bolts. I also welded on a license plate mount.

One thing I neglected was to drill a couple of holes in the top tube of the bumper for wiring. They can be drilled after powder coating, but it would probably be a neater job to drill them first.

My plan is to have a 2″ receiver hitch on the bumper. The way the stinger fits, it will be nearly impossible to use right away, but I think I will go ahead and put it in anyway, the long term plan being to have a custom exhaust that will clear the hitch. The biggest trailer it should ever be pulling is a small motorcycle cargo trailer, so it doesn’t need to be rated for 5000 lbs, but I like the flexibility of the 2″ receiver. Besides a tow bar, I can put a cargo tray or a bike rack or even a grill.

As I suggested before, I tried to heat the area around the O2 sensor bung so as to adjust the angle at which the sensor sits, due to it’s interference with the bumper. My little torch can’t heat enough area to make that strategy viable, so I decided to go with plan B, which was to plug that fitting and install a new one on the other side of the collector.

Well…

I suspect that some steel shot from the Wheelabrator must have gotten in the threads of the sparkplug, which was ironically there to protect the threads, from inside the collector. It turned about one quarter turn and seized firmly. Ratchet, breakover, 2 foot cheater and hammer impact wrench couldn’t touch it. I spent nearly an hour struggling with it before I adopted a new plan C and took it to the BTW clubhouse to use the *real* torch to cut the fitting out.

I brought it back home and welded in an actual official O2 sensor bung, as opposed to the chopped off spark plug anti-fouling device used before. Even though the torched out hole was significantly too large, I did a somewhat better job putting this one in. I think I even got the angle right. I did have to use a bit of 3/16 rod as filler around one side of the bung. Oh, and here’s a tip: don’t poke yourself in the neck with red hot metal.

I spent a bit of time chipping  and sanding off sputter and generally cleaning up the joint. I then degreased the header and sprayed on a coat of paint. I will let that dry overnight, then flip it over and paint the other side.

So, basically I spent an entire evening working on one little thing. Ugh.

The HID conversion kit arrived earlier this week and the halogen reflector arrived today. I verified that the parts fit together and assembled them into the existing headlight bucket. It looks pretty good. Looks even better installed.

I probably shouldn’t say anything, but it looks likely that I may get to work on the trike tonight!

The trigger wheel is possibly going to be shipped tomorrow.

My H4 to HID conversion kit arrived yesterday and the H4 headlight arrived today!

While the sealed beam headlight is probably adequate for the Dragon Trike, I decided that I would like to update it. Its a pretty standard 5 3/4″ headlight, probably salvaged from a current model Sportster when the trike was built in the mid-70’s. There are lots of kits to convert sealed beam to halogen, notably using the H4 bulb.

There are also kits to convert halogen lights to HID.

So, I have ordered both. I have a halogen replacement headlight coming and today I received the HID kit to convert the new headlight.

The little 12 volt supply at my desk doesn’t provide enough current to light it effectively, so I’ll have to play with it later….

 I spoke with an upholsterer of some renown. Looks like it will run about $350. He has some cool snake/lizard pattern vinyl that seems appropriate for a dragon trike….