That came out well, and the proof is in the ride results.

I'll have to look up bull bar light brackets, they look very useful.

How did you fasten your side panels? I'm a fan of rubber 'well nuts' in the factory grommet holes, no need to reach behind with a washer and nut with these. That makes them easy to remove at the roadside if needed.

 

That came out well, and the proof is in the ride results.

I'll have to look up bull bar light brackets, they look very useful.

How did you fasten your side panels? I'm a fan of rubber 'well nuts' in the factory grommet holes, no need to reach behind with a washer and nut with these. That makes them easy to remove at the roadside if needed.

Alan, I used 8mm nuts and washers on the back side. I used an open ended wrench and electrical taped the nut in the wrench and slide the nuts down from the top without even removing the battery box. Really there is no need for the side panels to come off for any type of repairs as they are just hiding the stock battery box. On the Bull Bar Brackets I found a few different styles but ended up going with the Lampus Bull Bar mounts on Amazon.

Man that's a nice looking bike! Is the chrome tank factory 350?

This is a 1970 Honda CL350 tank that came stock on the bike. It had a few dents and rust. I wanted the bike to have a look of a battle worn spaceship like the Millennium Falcon. I stripped the paint and flame painted the tank with a torch. I then added the emblem. Han and Chewbacca riding a Ptarmigan Falcon. The orange comet is painted. I coated the tank in clear Por15 then followed that with a 2k clearcoat. More pics of the tank are on my build page.

This link should take you to the gas tank post of the build : Project Millennium Falcon: Gas Tank post #55

Untitled by Jeremy Hedrick, on Flickr

Great looking skid plate- I have been looking for one but no luck.

That was my issue. I couldn't find one mysel and I really wanted the skidplate to go up to the junction of the downtube to the lower horizontal frame twin tubes that the original didn't.

 

Man that's a nice looking bike! Is the chrome tank factory 350?

 

The newest addition to the Falcon. The Skid Plate. I had been looking for the elusive CL350 skid plate for a while and have heard of people paying obscene prices for the ones they did. For me, this bike truly does see gravel roads but not super serious aggressive terrain, maybe the occasional stream crossing of 12-18 inches realistically. So really I was just looking for the bouncing gravel and the occasional branch protection. I love the CB/ CL350's but one of the ugly features of the frame (to me) is the downtube to bottom cross bars welds. I wanted to hide that little flaw in frame design if for nothing else but aesthetics. I used 22 gauge metal and cut it to the shape I had traced from posterboard off the frame. I cut a few half inch holes in the face and added some grommets, more for appearance then air flow. Then I carefully shaped the plate by hand to get the curvature I wanted. Pro tip: Heating metal with a torch before bending helps the metal form bends, just be careful to not overheat the metal and weaken it. I wanted a scorched look so I took the metal to a slightly higher then average temperature. Even with the skidplate in place, crossflow theory tells me that air will suck in from the sides of the gap between the plate and the engine to provide good air flow to help the oil cool in the crankcase. I smoothed the edges down with 220 followed by 400 and 600 grit sandpaper but still decided to add the rubber metal edging for some protection as well as I think it help with the vintage look. To finish the bike off I made some battery box side panels out of the metal as well just to clean up the triangle since I still run the stock frame with a custom cut foam and seat cover.

I used bull bar light brackets to attach the skidplate to the frame. I had to grind the front two to get them to fit where I wanted. on the shifter side of the bike I used a spacer to bridge the gap between the skid plate and the the bracket. I've done 3 rides on it so far (275 miles total) and no issues up to 75 mph.

Honda CL350 Skiddplate by Jeremy Hedrick, on Flickr

Honda CL350 Skid Plate by Jeremy Hedrick, on Flickr

Honda CL350 Skid Plate by Jeremy Hedrick, on Flickr

Honda CL350 Skid Plate by Jeremy Hedrick, on Flickr

Honda CL350 Skid Plate by Jeremy Hedrick, on Flickr

Untitled by Jeremy Hedrick, on Flickr

Sunset ride on the Dragon with the new skid plate in place. Night on the Dragon by Jeremy Hedrick, on Flickr

Great looking skid plate- I have been looking for one but no luck.

 

Great job on the skid plate. I need one for my XL250 project and something like that would work great, may have to try something along those lines. Thanks for posting it up.