Hawk GT is Done!

Well I reckon the Hawk GT project is done! The panels are back from Brandon the painter and fitted to the bike. I applied the gold striping and decals myself. I think it looks pretty good in the RC30 colour scheme.

The colour blocks even line up pretty well, which was a concern if I'm honest. The gold stripes set off the colours nicely don't they.

I figure this would be a good time to go over all the work that was done, before I forget!

• RC31 fairing, brackets, headlight kit (Facebook Hawk group)
• Bodywork and paint by Brandon Graham, local painter
• Powdercoated wheels (Villain Motorsports)
• Dunlop GPR-300 Tires - 110/80 and 160/60R17 (Fortnine)
• Stainless steel brake line (Facebook Hawk group)
• Rear wheel hubcap (Hawk GT Forum), painted by me
• Clip-on bars (Chinese, eBay)
• F1 mirrors (eBay from the UK)
• Seat cover (eBay, installed by Guy Anthony)
• Battery (Fortnine)
• Fuel filler cap restored by me
• Fork lowers sanded by me, much improved!
• Honda decals (Honda-decals.com); tank wings and stripes (eBay)

This cap is funny story. I posted on the Forum looking for one and some joker said he'd sell me one for $45 or something. Then I got a message from another user offering me one for free. Nice!

The striping was mostly straightforward but getting it round the curves was a bit tricky. Hairdryer heat helped.
 

Here's what we started with last year. Good mechanicals but poor cosmetics. The fairing was all cut up, the PO had trimmed it back to fit raised bars but that meant no top bracket and wobbly mounting...

This was fixed with the fresh vintage RC31 kit, it came with all the brackets and even the original paperwork from Two Brothers Racing, pretty cool.

Takes you back doesn't it! Although I still have a couple things to do on the bike (the horn stopped working, not sure why) it's pretty much done. I had it out for a ride over to my photo spot tonight and fortunately it fired right up with some gas added to the freshly painted tank. Man is it ever tiny though - the seat is so low it feels like a cruiser, next to the R1 or even the Buell XB9R. Fortunately I've got an old-school 900RR shock modded to fit the Hawk GT. My old Hawk GT had a 900RR shock too and it was a great mod, really improved the ride and usefully increased the rear ride height. Anyway I'll likely get that fitted this summer at some point. Then it will REALLY be done :-)

Cheers!

Hawk GT Paint is Done

OK so let's get this out of the way right off the hop: painting is expensive. Like REALLY expensive. But it was really necessary to have paint done on the Hawk GT because it was a multi-coloured mess.

Not only are the materials expensive, but it takes time to do bodywork, especially on 30-year-old fiberglass like this Two Brothers Racing fairing. But just look at the result - fantastic.

The gold pinstripes between the colour blocks will be added with tape.

It took a bit of figuring to work out how the lines would work on the tank but I think we got it.

Next thing is to get the bodywork on the bike and apply some more decals. You should see the seat unit, the red looks really good. Fingers crossed that all of the assembly goes smoothly.