Well....the boat just went down the driveway on its way to Ohio.
That means there is room in the stable for another project.
Enter the wife's new custom sled. It is going to be completely stripped down to the chassis and everything will be powder coated flat black and neon pink.
It is a 2007 MXZ-X 550F.
I got it from Glen, RS Rider on Dootalk.
I will be selling the BR Tech hood, the yellow console, the C&A skis.
Once the RK Tech engine build is done and my stereo is done in the Tacoma, this will be the project.
I go to pick it up on Monday. He are some before shots:
Got the sled home today after a good bath on the way home... It flat out POURED...cars were pulled over it was raining so hard.
It needs a little TLC, but it runs fine and that is all I cared about.
The hood and console are sold. Thanks 02mxz700x
The skis are also sold and delivered. I met up with Socker002. It is always good to put faces with names from Dootalk. Thanks again for meeting up in Dubuque. It was good talking with you.
Also, thanks to Glenn and his son for meeting up with me in Portage and saving me half the trip to Conover. It was good shooting the breeze with you two, and getting to meet you.
I think I can safely say that you won't recognize the sled when I am done with it. LOL
This will probable get going in about August, or so.
Well....the rain pretty much ruined my golf plans for the day.
So....Olivia and I putzed around in the guyrage (as my wife calls it).
Here are some pictures of the hood and console for honda400ex2003. I have the hood all cleaned up and polished.
I am waiting on parts for the RK Tech 827 project, namely the cylinders back from US Chrome and a crank bearing from BRP to get going on that project. I am also waiting on Fat-Mat sound deadener for the Tacoma project.
I decided to start in on the easy stuff for this project. I took the exhaust out of the sled. It was pretty beat up. I drilled out the heat sheilds from the muffler. I did some sheet metal work and was able to save those. I will do some DA sanding and then polish that.
The head shield for the expansion pipe was too far gone with parts of it worn away. So I will order new ones of those.
I got the Y-Pipe off the engine, the heat shields off the pipes and I dropped them off a Cool Concepts to be ceramic coated in a matte black.
I also worked out a trade with socker002. I am getting my completely black seat and trunk.
Here is the current state of the sled, with side panels removed, exhaust removed, fan shroud and engine cover all off the sled.
I got the exhaust back today from Cool Concepts. Looks like Rick's usual outstanding work.
I am putzing around with it when in between delivery times.
I am supposed to have my crank back on Wednesday for the RK Tech 827 build.
OK.
I just locked up a deal for a brand new Camoplast track. I may put this on my sled. LOL J/K
It is a 121" X 15" X 1.5". I will be putting 96 1.62" studs with power tower nuts.
I got the rest of the front end apart yesterday. It is pretty trashed. I have been trying to get ahold of Matt, but haven't had much luck.
So...I am going to make my own front plate, and engine support plate. It already has the 440X PTO side brace.
Here is the front end apart:
Here is the stress crack in the chassis. It isn't a big deal to me. Once the chassis stripped down, I will weld it back up and it will just fine.
Got a bunch of stuff boxed and ready to ship out today.
I also got the engine out of the sled. More bad news. The mount plate is cracked and bent. No biggie. I will just straighten it out, weld it and redrill the hole.
I am glad I am stripping this down to find all these goodies. A lot of rivets are also loose. I will be drilling those and putting in new ones.
I have decided to wait on the Tacoma stuff until fall. I don't really have the room to have 5 sleds in the garage with one torn apart AND tear the Tacoma apart.
The rest of the weekend will be tearing the sled down.
Here is the broken mounting plate.
I have been trying to get ahold of Matt for another set of his braces. He is nowhere to be found.
I decided to make my own. This is lower A-Arm support, the PTO side brace and the front end-cap piece. I got them cut out today, and bent up. I still need to drill the holes.
Here is the engine sitting out of the sled, looking lonely.
I was going to work on the sled today, but decided to go play golf instead. I will get it torn down the rest of the way this week. I will need to put in an order for more body parts. Once torn down, I can get the stuff finished up on the body and off to powder coating.
I decided to wait on the Tacoma project. There just isn't enough room in the garage to have 4 whole snowmobiles and a 5th in pieces AND tear apart the Tacoma. It really isn't a big deal, the stereo is OK, it just isn't loud enough.
I will need to rebuild all the shocks, the rear suspension and front suspension. The rear ski will get all new bushings, and the front will get Oilite bushings from Kurt at Goodwin's.
I did get some of the sled torn down before my buddy called to go play golf. I got the chaincase torn down, the engine out (from before), the oil tank out, the gas tank removed, the supports removed, the wiring harness removed and bunch of dents pounded out with the hammer and dolly.
The tunnel in oil canned on the rear. I think I am just going to drill out the rivets and put a new one in. The center piece is only about $38 my cost, so it isn't worth messing with.
I will post some pictures of the progress later tonight. Tonight is "Date Night" with the wife. So no working on the sleds tonight. LOL
Here are the shots of the sled in its current state:
I should have looked at the rear shock better, it is actually a triple adjust shock as well. SCORE!!!
I got the rear skid out of the sled last night, along with the chaincase, axle and track.
I used the body hammer and dolly to flatten the sheet metal back out on the back rear. Once that was done, I took a file and cleaned up the lower edge. Once I get the rest of the front end apart, I will start removing all the bad pieces and make the new chassis pieces.
Here is the current state and rear skid out. The axle front shock axle is bent in the skid, and the right side rail has a slight tweak to it on the top side. The bottom side is straight. I can straighten it with the shop press, no worries there.
Here is the completed body work. I will sand it out with a DA, and you won't even know it was creased in 3 different places.
Here is the rear skid. You can't see the tweak in the rail, but it is there.
Well. With all the OT I have been working at Toyota, I havn't had much time to work on it. I decided to not work OT last night or today.
I didn't have to go in until 10a this morning, and got off at 5:30p yesterday. I got some time in on this project.
I pretty much have it torn down, still a couple of things need to come off.
All the damage is exposed, I got the right massaged out and ready to weld.
I also got my parts list of wheat I need to fix everything, and the extra stuff I want to add. I can post that list tonight. It comes to about $200, my cost.
I didn't care what shape the chassis was in, as long it was fixable. It was coming down this far no matter what (for the powder coating) anyway.
The Snow Eliminators should be here this week. So hopefully I can get them mocked up and all the welding done up next week. We have to see how OT goes at work.
I also have sled shocks starting to trickle in for the upcoming season. So those get done up tonight.
Ahhhh......if I could just this kind of sled stuff all day and be independantly wealthy......SLAP!!!!! back to reality. LOL
This side is good, I just need to remove the footwell brace.
This side is wasted. I am getting both side steel braces new and the steel center supports from the 440X to add to this sled. Once the aluminum is welded, it will be as good as new.
Here you can see where the sheet metal is cracked.
This I can't get to flatten out. It just 'oil-cans'. So I am replacing the whole center section.
The bracket to hold the oil tank is broken off. Rather than weld, I am just replacing the jack shaft protector.
I am making new ones of these from .080" and then flaring the holes to make them more rigid.
I got a ton of work done today, tomorrow is get shocks done.
I got the RPM Composites complete skidplate Friday. I went with the traditional carbon fiber. There can be too much pink on this thing. So I opted for the regular look.
I found a couple of more 'issues' today. I foun the L rear drop bracket almost broken off, and couple of cracked welds on the NUN. Nothing that can't be fixed.
I have the tunnel stripped down to where everything is off of it that I wanted off.
I should have the Snow Eliminators this week. I can cut the running boards out. I may get another set of the Van Amburg edges to go on this project.
So this week will be TIG'ing up the cracked and broken chassis after the Snow Eliminators are fit. Then it is off to powder coating.
I did a few sets of customer's shocks today. While I was bleeding them out, I worked on the exhaust.
I got the tins all pounded out and sanded down and then polished. There are a couple of flaws, but they turned out pretty nicely. Here is the finished exhaust:
I got a couple of things in the mail an on email over the last couple of days.
I got the Snow Eliminators on Monday:
I decided to go with custom boards, and get the Van Amburg stuff again. I am going to do running boards and edges like I did on the mountain sled. I need to get ahold of them tomorrow to get it ordered.
I also got the final proof of the wrap from Casey at HP Wraps. This looks KILLER in pink!!!
I also got in touch with Brian from Tricked Toys. He is hooking me up with Billet Spoke wheels with powder coating, a gas cap, spring adjusters, brake lever and choke lever.
Here is the picture of the wheels with the powdercoating that I am getting for this. It should look nice against the pink rails.
