My off-season project... Kawasaki BX 200

GuyB
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9/4/2018 3:44pm Edited Date/Time 10/16/2018 7:30am
A chunk of you may know that I have a background in BMX, so this one will cross over a bit into that.

Back in the early days of BMX, there were riders who did bikes, notably Jimmy Weinert, and a private label DeCoster bike from Mongoose. Several of the motorcycle OEs also dabbled in BMX early on (in ‘75 or so). Yamaha had their Moto-Bike, Suzuki had a BMX model, and Kawasaki had their BX 100 and 200. The 200 was interesting since it was one of the earliest aluminum frames, and they signed up David Clinton, one of the early BMX heroes, to ride for them back in ‘75 or so. While it used a lot of moto styling (including triple clamp style forks), they were actually non-functioning as far as suspension went. The rear shocks did use springs but had no damping, and the sponsored riders actually used solid struts that were machined to look like the shocks in place of the stock units.

This one was handed off to me during the summer by an MX luminary, and it’ll take a bit to bring it back to its former glory, but it should make for a fun off-season project. I’ve already sourced an original front end and replacement shocks (one of them was broken), as well as an original frame sticker.

The seat recovering should make for an interesting portion of the project.



Maybe after this one is done I’ll start hunting for a Moto-Bike. Smile



Yeah, that's not the stock front end. This one was added to make it easier for the previous owner's kids to wheelie. Smile
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Sully
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9/4/2018 4:22pm
Damn cool project.

The moto inspired bikes were a bit before my time, but I'd bet the welds alone on that thing weigh as much as a modern race bike.
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GuyB
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9/4/2018 4:41pm Edited Date/Time 9/4/2018 4:41pm
Sully wrote:
Damn cool project. The moto inspired bikes were a bit before my time, but I'd bet the welds alone on that thing weigh as much as...
Damn cool project.

The moto inspired bikes were a bit before my time, but I'd bet the welds alone on that thing weigh as much as a modern race bike.
Hahaha! I haven't gotten the frame stripped all the way down yet, but I expect that it's actually pretty light for what it was.

FMF also had a more traditional aluminum frame back in the day (produced by Race Inc.) that was really light...sometimes too light. Wink

If I could find one of those, that would also make for a cool project bike.
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newmann
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9/4/2018 8:03pm
Cool Kawasaki project! I knew the whereabouts of two of them several years ago. Neither were for sale, no idea if they still exist.

My brother and I both had our Yamaha Moto Bikes stolen back in the day. One ended up being recovered after the 18 year old punk who had stolen it ground off the serial numbers, cut off the rear fender loop, welded the tubes closed to a point and painted it primer gray. Seven years later I was in welding shop in high school looking at pictures on the wall of past students with shop projects and there was a photo of the thief with my bike all cut up and primered. Laughing
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sandman768
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9/5/2018 4:30am
Needs some black skyway tuff wheels....

The Shop

Bigfoot
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9/5/2018 6:32am
My build project is from a little bit earlier.

Anybody got a Bendix kick-back, blue band?


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Micahdogg
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10/16/2018 7:30am
I'm looking forward to seeing how this goes.
motojason
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1/4/2021 7:03pm
Restomod BX200: my favorite Vintage MX pit bike

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