Rickati Progress

The bike's coming together. I got the swingarm tacked together, machined the backing plate and stuck the thing under the bike to see how it looked. It looked good. The static height of the bike is just about perfect - plenty of ground clearance and nice stance. I need to check and see about the length of the shocks before I weld on the bosses for them but I'll get on that pretty much pronto. Now that I know where the shocks are going to be I can finish up the exhaust. I'm thinking just a little short muffler with a right angle bend on the outlet just ahead of the shocks should work and look good. I can also start working on the footpegs and the levers. I'm liking it. It'll be a runner this spring.

They're finally done with the construction in the shop so I can start catching up on some other projects. The shenanigans in my one class has come to a halt, finally. One guy got expelled and three more were removed. The boys underestimated the old man. They didn't realize that in addition to my welding skills, I can run a video camera. That's going to allow me to bring jobs in for the boys to work on again. When you have a class that gives you the opportunity to work on real jobs and get valuable experience, you'd think they would want to protect that. Should be business as usual now.

We got a couple pieces made for the steam engine today. Should be right on schedule to have it running on air by Christmas break. I'm having breakfast with my buddy and Cuzzin Ricky Saturday morning to talk a little steam. We'll see what comes out of that. I need to get Cuzzin Ricky's buggy back in the shop one of these days as well. I'm in the project mode now and I want to make a little hay. I've got lots of jobs to start on and a bunch to be finished but good things are happening now.