Beau, Brodie, Jeff, Greg and myself were all a little nervous, but pretty excited to start up our bike. Much to our surprise, after numerous attempts we had ignition!!!

We screamed with excitement and although some thought it would fail it hummed like a baby.

So now it was time to give it a test ride. Beau jumped on and rode around the school court. Then Brodie took it for a spin. Just as Brodie was taking off our principal, Mr. Paige came out of the music room at the sound of motorbikes riding in the school grounds. Wow, was he surprised to see our bike cruising around the school!

It was then my turn. I was in shock … I had done so much work on this bike I didn’t want to crash but then I threw caution to the wind and let it go! It was awesome and it was only the second time I have riden a bike.

Check out our videos to share in this great occasion!
Video 1
Video 2
It runs like a dream

7/12/2011

Yesterday’s jobs included finishing off the fuel line and clutch and brake cables.  After all this was done we attempted to start the bike and after some magic from Greg on our final push start of the afternoon the bike sprung in to life. We as a team have felt so much pride when we were able to ride it around the basketball court. Next week we will spend some time polishing the bike in preparation for our function to thank everyone who has helped.

5/12/2011

Hello sorry it’s been so long since our last post since we have been so busy restoring our ACME. After a lot of hard work the bike is all back together again and it looks great. On Tuesday if all goes to plan, we will attempt to start the bike. It will be so good if it does start, but if it doesn’t, it will still look amazing

We are all so proud to have been involved in this project and with lots of help we have been able to bring this bike back to life

We would like to thank the following companies for their contributions

Ballarat Wrought Iron- seat clips

OPG Engineering –Removal of bolts

Ballarat Bolts n Fasteners- supply of nuts and bolts

Manx Classic Spares-supply of cables, levers and advice

Cruiser Smash Repairs- total paint job on the entire bike

Northway Sandblasting- all of the sandblasting of the bike

Qual trim- recovering the seat

Ballarat signs- recreating the ACME logo

Greg Harris Sheet metal- for making our new mufflers

JD paints- for the supply of the paint for our bike

And to Rob Smith from Motorcycling Australia for choosing us to restore the ACME 125cc 9d

Hello sorry for the very late update. We have been extremely busy with the painting and putting the bike back together, so far with the help of Greg we have managed to put the front forks on and the back stand on. We have got photos which we will publish once we download them from Jeff’s (adult supervisor for the bike) phone. It looks really good and we can’t wait until its finished. And thank you to Rob Smith from Riding Australia whom spent some of his time to come down to Yuille Park Community College and see our progress with the bike, once again Thank You.

Working on the frame

bike1

25/7/2011

Today we met Brian and Irene Henley from Geelong who have an ACME motorcycle the same as ours. They have supplied us with photo’s that show before and after pictures of the motorbike. In the next couple of weeks we will make a visit to their place and see what our bike will look like when it is finished.

Today we went to Cruisers Smash Repairs and Lenny has finished sandblasting the tank. Jeff helped grind off the welds on the guard in preparation for the body filler. This substance is a mixture of body filler and hardener which mixes together to form a paste. We then spread the paste over the guards to fill in any small dents. After the guards were all smooth we had to use a heat gun to dry out the filler. Lenny applied the body filler to the tank. All of these items will be ready to sand next week.

Today we took all the sandblasted parts of the bike into Cruisers Smash Repairs. The painter (Lenny) whom looked at the parts and told us (Jeff, Jacob) and i (beau) to take off the braces on the guards. Once we had done that he asked if he could fix the guard that was cracked. When he finished doing that Jacob and I helped him reshape the guards because they were dented. Then we left the tank and guards with Lenny and he said that he was going to sandblast the tank. The rest of the bike we brought back to school for us to scotch bright which we did last week.