Stripping Down My Original SL90

 

I finally got some time to begin disassembling my original SL90 - the exhaust is in really bad shape, wrong heat shield screws, lots of rust.  It's a good thing I have my restored exhaust to replace it!

 

Here's my bike after 2 hours of work (sunset) - all tin is off along with most of the small parts.  Now, it's time to take off the wheels, forks, swing arm and finally the engine...

Completed Seat

 

 

The seat now has a new foam base and is recovered.  I saved the old foam base in case I come across another seat pan that needs a new foam base and cover.

 

 

 

Looks pretty good!

 

 

Pipe Cleaning

Chrome platers do not like to rechrome used exhausts due to the carbon gunking up the plating tanks, so I need to de-rust my SL90 exhaust to make it presentable

 Before Soaking.

After Soaking and Drying.

                

Shiny pipe!

Mirror, mirror on the wall, who's the rustiest mirror of all?

Things are going a slowly with my project - I'm at the chrome restoration phase and plating takes time...

My SL90 has the orignal mirrors and they are in rough condition.  I decided I wanted OEM mirrors, but after seeing the prices for NOS mirrors I decided to replate the originals (plus the fact that the NOS right side mirrors are hard to find).  I found that if you pry the mirror around the edge of the glass (ever so gently), you can get the mirror to pop out - it's attached by a combination of the rim and adhesive on the back.  Once the glass is out, you can simply unbolt the stem and stem cups from the mirror backing.  The photo shows assembled and disassembled mirrors.

Here's a close-up.  I had to use penetrating oil to loosen the nut...  I will replace the mirror glass with new pieces.

And it's off to the chrome plater to restore the mirrors, exhaust system, tailight and shift lever! 

 Here they are, freshly re-plated (ignore the dust and fingerprint smudges).