My first build

1993 CBR600F2

This was the first bike I ever “built”. I picked up this 1993 CBR600F2 from my cousin Bart as a salvaged bike. You can see it’s pretty rough with the headlight taped in place. The engine ran and just needed some tuning.

Tearing the bike down moves quick and is like demo-ing for a remodel.

The hunt began through motorcycle bone-yards looking for similar bikes. Hiking through acres of salvage yard is like a quest. Sometimes you go home empty handed and other times you find a treasure.

One day I stopped at a Honda dealership between jobs to kill some time. Chatting with one of the guys on the parts counter about my current bike project, he suddenly had a stunned look on his face. He said, “Follow me”.

We went down a set of concrete stairs into a dark and dingy basement full of boxes and random parts. The stunned look was when he remembered he had a full set of fiberglass front fairings for my almost 20 year old bike in the basement of the shop. He was supposed to have returned them over a year ago and had forgotten to. The stunned look had been a mixture of “OH SHIT” and “Wait a second!!!” at the same time.

To avoid being found out, he sold me the fairings for next to nothing.

My buddy Otis helped me paint the fairings.

This picture tells the story of a 20-something year old kid broke as broke could be. I rented out rooms in the house to make the mortgage and there was always a project leaking oil in the driveway. There is much appreciation for my neighbors being patience with my ignorance of being a good neighbor.