garageprojectmotorcycles:

I often get emails from people all over the world who’ve seen our bikes on the major blogs and magazines asking what size main jets did we use, how did we make the seat, what is the capital of Turkey, etc.

To a person, everyone is friendly and apologetic for taking up our time in answering their questions. We try and answer the questions as best we can as quickly as we can. It is our way of helping out our fellow riders and garage builders. We ask for (and sometimes get) pics of the bikes thay are working on. You might remember Ed’s CB200 and Richard Baybutt’s CD250u , Liad’s very cool Z500 video and who can forget Eric’s CB450 that went on to feature on BikeEXIF!

Last week, I had an email from Caleb who resides and rides with his wife in British Columbia, Canada.  Caleb asked what wheel sizes we used on Shaken Fist but had absolutely no interest in what was the capital of Turkey.

I asked for photos of his customised Kawasaki W650 and Caleb happily obliged. I always wanted to be a police officer* so I got my two typing fingers out and wrote an email asking for some background info. Caleb was very forthcoming, he even gave me his social insurance number! (< math nerds will love that link)

Enough of my ramblin’, over to Caleb.

“Back when these photos were taken, April 16, 2011, Erin and I were living in Chinatown in Vancouver.  The wedding ceremony took place at Rowena’s Inn, Harrison Mills, BC, which is about 110 km/ 70 miles from Vancouver.  The previous night we had spent apart, so she didn’t know I was planning to ride to the wedding.

The morning of the ceremony I left Vancouver around 8 am and rode the back roads along the Fraser River to Harrison Mills.  I should explain that BC is on the west coast of Canada and is notoriously wet even at the best of times.

By the time I arrived I was soaked and frozen, as the temp in April at that time of day was probably just above 5 degrees Celsius. [RH: Canadians are crazy. No friggin way I would ride in that cold] I spent the rest of the morning setting up at the bed and breakfast we had reserved for the ceremony.

Fortunately mother nature is a hopeless romantic and decided to grace our special day with sunshine.  After a lovely ceremony and an eventful reception with live music provide by a close musician friend of ours we spent the night out in Harrison.  Unfortunately the next day the rain returned, so Erin didn’t get a chance to jump on the back and ride off with me.

sniffle...(wipes away the tears)…ok, so tell me about the bike…

The bike itself is a 2001 W650. In North America Kawasaki only sold them for 2 years so there is only a handful in Canada. I bought her back in 2009 and have done the following since then:

List of mods:

• - Oscars (out of Japan) front fender and rear fender
• - Posh brake light and indicators
• - clip-ons
• - PeytonPlace (Japan) polished top yoke
• - painted the gas tank
• - Silverstone exhaust (Germany)
• - cafe fairing
• - k&n air filters

To do list:

• - rearsets
• - solo seat
• - 17” rims
• - suspension

The plan is to keep her to use as a show bike while I work on other projects. [RH: Caleb is defintely talking about the Kawasaki here, right?]

I have two Suzuki GS1150s in the garage.  One I am restoring the other is being cafe’d as we speak.

SA…WEET mate. We definitely want to see pics of a Cafe’d GS1150!!!

*Last thing on earth I want to be. If I was, I’d hide in the bushes outside the police station and wait for the other officers to leave work. I’d use my radar gun and send them tickets in the mail two weeks after the infringement because that’ll surely change their behaviour!