Many of you followed along with the KX Guru Racing Play Bike build.
At the time we expected that this bike would potentially see a magazine pic or two so we kept it a secret as to whom we were building it for.
When Sunny saw his Magazine bike he realized it was something special.
He then asked us to build another bike that he could ride and not worry about destroying.
The issue for me was knowing who some of Sunny's friends are, I thought that some high profile riders might take it for a spin.
So what started as a basic build turned into something a little more.
But before I get into this too much the bike has some very interesting history.
It turns out that I bought the bike from the current single cylinder 500cc stock class land speed record holder Stewart Rouse.
The engine in this bike had seen a lot of dyno time for R&D on building the land speed record bike.
After the land speed record was set at the East coast Macron mile and at Bonneville on the West coast Stewart completely went through the bottom end and replaced nearly everything and he topped it off with a brand new factory top end.
What could be better then riding around on the worlds fastest KX500 for your play bike?
So the engine was good to go.
From there I disassembled the bike, gusseted the frame, powder coated the sub frame and frame, as well as replaced all the bearings, seals, cables, tires, plastics, frame and engine bolt kits, ect.
The forks and shocks were gone through by Enzo and set up for Sunny.
There were also some of the normal repairs that any older KX500 experiences.
We had plans for a nice graphics kit modeled after the Magazine bike we built for Sunny.
Incidentally, the magazine bike will be coming out in Racer X Illustrated Magazine within the next month or two so watch your news stand for that.
As things turned out Sunny succumbed to his depression he had suffered from for years and he tried to commit suicide.
So the bike sat for several months in limbo.
Last week I was able to get into contact with Sunny's legal caretaker and they came and picked up the bike today.
It was sad to see the bike go but I hope that Sunny is able to recover enough at some point to enjoy riding this bike around his place up in Washington.
Below is the build up of this bike.
Enjoy.
I had a request for a play bike KX500.
No problem, I had one sitting in storage.
It had a half hour on a new KX500 cylinder (No port work) and approx 2 hours on a new bottom end.
But, the bike is a 01 and looked a bit weathered.
After a conversation, the customer decided that he wanted the frame gusseted and powder coated
Ugh.... I really didn't want to do it.
But you know, I found minor issues while tearing it down so I'm glad we spent the extra time.
I took pics of the bike and sent them to the customer but I can't find them.
But just imagine a 01 KX500 that was weather worn
