Oh, my Lord, it's hot down here. Anyway...To the chase! It's a given that you have to seal every single part of the engine, before you attack it with bead blast. I did that, and then ground off all the cast marks, just so it'll look great, once back in the bike....Or once the bike is rebuilt around the engine, to be more precise. My thoughts, for this week, as i've been blasting in 42C (107F)??? The oil cooler has an insane amount of plumbing, to get it to where it lives. I have no idea why, to be honest....Therefore, i'll be moving it to a better place, and making it bigger. It'll be directly in front of the crankcase, from now on. I'm starting to see a COG drama unfolding, aswell. I'll be moving the rear two exhausts to the left hand side of the seat cowl, and also moving the battery up there, in the center of the tail, behind my bum. The tail will be a semi monocoque, but I don't think i'll have shed enough weight, even with the relocation of all of the crap that lives up there, and the sacrifice of the rest of the tail framework, to rebalance the bike. I've looked into having two 6V batteries hooked in parallel, but I still don't think i'll be able to put them anywhere better. Maybe a bit, but not enough to really warrant all of the extra wiring that would go with making it happen. Capacitors? Too hard basket.... Leave it where it is? No can do. That real estate's now taken by the back two exhausts.

I'm starting to get the impression that you all think this is "pie in the sky' kinds stuff, and I don't blame any of you for thinking that. So, in a nutshell, here's the deal, as far as the redesign of this bike. I'd love to call it a rebuild, but it's not strictly a 'rebuild', by any means. I bought this bike to fix and ride, but I was fooling myself. I've never been very good at just fixing stuff. I can spot a design shortcut a mile away, and this bike has a few of them, to say the least. It's well built.....Don't get me wrong. It's built to a price, and a strict design regime, though. Honda, nor any other manufacturer, makes any money by hand finishing, or using anything better than the material that will fulfill the task. Nor will they get anywhere by making something that's out of reach of their perceived audience. It's a fact of life. I use to own, in a different life, a Ducati 1098S. Now there's a bike that doesn't hold back....Price? What's money? Technology? Yeah...., put a bit more optical fibre into it.....For $38,000.00 they'd want to push the technological boundaries. This bike...No. You have to do it yourself, if you want something special. And that's what i'm going to do. It'll be no match for a 1098S, but it'll be special, none the less. I'd like to hear your thoughts....Good and bad. Nothing ever happened, by good men staying silent. I'm looking forward to some sort of feedback..........Good or not so good.