Get your Sportster running…
Part 2: Street legal and running—somewhat.
By Bill
Andrews
 May
6 – After sitting for more years than it ran, and in
various states of disassembly, the 1975 Sportster named "Blue"
was running again. Not well and not consistently, but it had shown signs
of life. And that's all the encouragement I needed to move on to the hard
part: making it street legal and a daily runner.
The next day I cleaned out the gunk that was sitting in the bottom of
the carburetor's float bowl. That allowed the bike to fire up on command,
and idle.
To get the bike back on the road, though, I was going to need to come
up with some street legal pipes, and a front brake.
Since my old buddy never really looked into exactly what type of brake
fluid this machine should run, he just grabbed what was sitting around the
garage, which happened to be DOT 5. It was supposed to take DOT 3—a
complete brake rebuild kit was now added to the list.
A few phone calls made it clear that finding 28-year-old parts wasn't
going to be easy. Some leads were dead ends, while others turned out to be
incredibly expensive. One shop wanted to sell me an entire new brake
system to the tune of $800.
I also needed to come up with pipes. I figured that as often as people
changed stock pipes, there should be a lot of stockers laying around. I
was very wrong.
"We usually just toss them in the dumpster," one shop owner
told me.
Through an out-of-town Harley-Davidson dealer, I finally discovered a
bike shop that specialized in older Harleys. He was 45 miles away.
 "Do
you happen to have any used, '70s era, stock Sportster pipes," I
asked?
"Yeah, I got a room full," he said. "You're welcome to
rummage through 'em. I'm sure I've got what you need. And if you find it,
you can have it."
"Ooh, the nice price," I thought.
He also said he had the caliper and master cylinder rebuild kits I
needed. I was on my way.
The shop turned out to be an old converted gas station. When I pulled
in, I noticed a bunch of old Shovelhead Harleys in the lot, and a guy who
was probably middle aged when the Sportster was first made—definitely my
kind of place.
"You must be the guy looking for the pipes," he said.
"Come on around back. I've got your rebuild kits in the front
office."
The back room was actually the old gas station's bathroom, and
Greybeard had a hard time just opening the door. With it budged just a
couple of inches, I discovered why. Peering in I could see the remains of
countless exhausts, piled in like so many old bones. They were shoved in
so tight, they were blocking the door.
"You're welcome to pull 'em out," he said. "Just put 'em
back when you're done. And like I said, you can take whatever you
want."
Slowly I pulled out pipe after pipe. Most of them were off big twins,
everything from old '50s era stuff on up. I was amazed to see the stock
exhaust off a new 2002 V Rod. Occasionally, I'd pull out either a front
pipe to the Sportster, or a rear, but finding a matching set was proving
elusive.
 I
eventually walked out with five pipes that might work.
"Those two are off a '79," the guy said. "They won't fit
your bike."
Amazing.
After retuning them to the pipe closet, we walked into his shop. Parts,
new and used, were everywhere, and he had a gorgeous "Evo stroker"
he said he built on the lift.
After handing me my brake kits, he said, "20 bucks, and we'll call
it even."
He even gave me a sheet to wrap the three pipes in, and helped me strap
them to the back of the bike. Nice guy.
Once home, I discovered only one of the pipes would actually work with
the existing hangers. Not a problem, though, since I now had a set of
baffles I could bolt in.
Working on the brakes, I rebuilt the caliper and master cylinder, and
then cleaned the line and fittings. As I started to refill the system,
though, fluid started squirting out between the line and the master
cylinder. The fitting was stripped, and a new brake line was needed.
This time I actually had to order the part, and it would take another
$25 from my budget. Luckily, though, the fitting was available at the
local auto parts store for $1.13. Sometimes you get lucky.
I now had front brakes, a legal exhaust, and a running bike
for practically nothing. So far so good.
I picked up a temporary tag so I could ride the bike around and work
out any final bugs that might park it again. In a search for a new air
cleaner, I rode over to the nearby Harley shop. On the trip over, the bike
was running really well, and I was enjoying the ride.
 The
thought that this whole thing might work out started to cross my mind.
The parts guys looked around, but once again, '70s era parts are just
too old to keep in stock. So I headed back out to the lot to fire up the
bike, and all I got was a little "poof."
"Hmm, this isn't good," I thought.
I kicked a few more times without the benefit of even another poof.
Now, I usually have my multi-tool attached to my belt, but on this
afternoon, I left home only with my wallet. I had one small crescent
wrench, which I quickly discovered wouldn't even take out the spark plug,
and the small wire with alligator clips Mike used to ride around with.
Since it was the last tool in the box, I thought I might as well try
the old 12-volts-to-the-coil trick before making that hard call home.
 The
bike started first kick.
"Must be that electrical gremlin again," I thought.
Still, I wasn't out of the woods yet. As I was pulling out of the lot,
I heard "broom, broom—clink, clink—braap, braap."
One of the baffles had shot out of the pipe.
Yeah, there are a few bugs that need to be worked out. But I think that
ol' Blue might actually be back on the road for good.
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