Dacota's Waconia Sled build

[dacota25d]

Getting bored just sitting here tonight so i figured id show some photos of my sled build. When i started this sled i really had no idea what i was shooting for, all i know was i wanted it to be a custom like no one has ever seen before and try my hand at a custom hood and something that i can actually ride not just a trailer queen. as the build went on i started looking at some old pictures and kind of wanted to go for a old school kind of oval sled and did things the way i kind of felt it would have been done weather or not its the way it was done...beats the hell outa me. as i went on nothing i did for this build i changed after i did exept for the motor. i picked up the 440ss at princeton that i chose to use instead of a sawed off 440 hirth. so heres what i started with a 72 nitro tunnel in pretty fair shape for its age not terrible but not great. it cleaned up pretty good. good enough for what im gonna do with it.

[dacota25d]

next i did the skis and suspension rails while i was in a polishing frenzy. I decided to use 73 nitro suspension just cuz they are easily available and we have a bunch of them. the skis i bought aluminum blanks and trimed them to rupp size and welded plates to be similar to 73 mag skis. turns out i didnt take any pics of the skis after they were welded tho. ill try to get some tomorrow.



before and after polishing




thats all for tonight

[magnumed]

Keep posting, like to see more.....

[ruppeagle]

Dacota25D Beside hard work what did you use to get the tunnel that shiny? I agree with Magnumed post more pics.

[dacota25d]

I used zephyr rouge bars and wheels to do it then finished it with bushes polish and it came out good but next time I do one I'll be truing a different method

[dankubista]

Wet sanding will give you the best results on a tunnel. As scary as it sounds, don't be afraid to start with 180 if needed. My tunnel was severely pitted so i started with 180 wet block sanding. Then 220, 320, 400, 600, 800, 1000. Always use a block on flat surfaces and lots of water. Beer helps get through it all. It's a real long process but worth it.

At that point, the polishing part is the easiest of the entire job. I used mothers on a wizards buffing kit that comes with a wool pad and 2 foam pads (using a drill lol) which will take out the scratches from 1000. Then hand buff with mothers with the blue shop towels, they surprisingly work the great!

[dacota25d]

Yea this tunnel was a process we started 220-800 with DA then 180-2500 wet sand but it was just to pitted in some spots. And the machine polish didn't work as well as I hoped it would it left a lot of haze and fine scratches that wouldn't buff out by hand. Next time I will be trying the wool pad way like you did and see how I like it

[dankubista]

I couldn't get all of the pitting out of mine either. I could of but there wouldn't have been any metal left lol. This stuff is really old, seen lots of abuse and all a person can do is just try their best. The only tunnels that ever come out perfect were either brand new or painted from the factory.

[dacota25d]

Now that the tunnel was done it was time to do the bulkhead. I wanted to use aluminum but I used steel for the ease, It can be cut apart in minuets with a torch and I can weld it. Seeing as i dont have a plasma cutter or a tig welder steel was the fast and easy way. What i did was how i thought I would've done it if the rules allowed back then and im still not sure if it was legal then but I wasn't to concerned. I widened the right side 4 inches and the left side 1 1/2 inches.




Next was sandblast all the parts and send them to powder coat. In the next couple pics If you notice the handle bars, I was looking at some old pics and notice Gene Bloom had some bars bent similar and i could only assume this was the early style for oval bars and i liked the was they looked so i took some rusty old bars and started modifying. It took quite a while to get the right bend that i wanted and wasnt to off to me but they came out pretty nice. The red deal was not something i asked for my powder coater took it upon himself to think the red would look nice. I wasnt to happy but i didnt want to wait any longer so I figured Id try it, maybe it would grow on me...and it didnt so eventually i painted them black. next was to get some pipes to fit. It was getting to close to the end and I couldnt locate any mid mount rupp pipes then I remembered I picked up a nice set of hand made pipes at Princeton a couple years ago and with a couple cuts they fit pretty decent. The last pic is a before and after cleaning the cylinders. I use fine glass bead and it does a real nice job cleaning them and isnt too agressive . I tried soda at one time but it wasnt aggressive enough to remove all the crap

[dacota25d]

The next part was the worst part and dont really plan on taking on a body job this tough again anytime soon. What I was going after was kind of a 71 mag and 72 mod hood combo look to it. I started with a 73 nitro hood and started cutting then i made the template of what i wanted the top to look like and glassed that in. next was i took a 72 american center piece and made the mold of the hole. after the hood was all done I wish I wouldve used a W/T center piece for the mold as I think the wider cutout wouldve looked a bit better but oh well. next I cutout the hole for the center piece and glassed it in. I then roughed in some body work. At that point I got to busy with work to do anything with it so Rupp Doctor did the rest of the body work. after it was primed I then looked it over with my "young eyes" for the pin holes the the "old man" couldnt see and I filled them all in and did one final blocking and it was ready for paint.

[dacota25d]

there were alot of stress cracks in this hood and a few spots that looked like they had been struck by something so, I tried something in hopes it would work and so far its still looking pretty good. The areas that had a few stress cracks i followed the cracks with a dremel and ground them out. the real bad spots I completely ground out with 36 grit on a DA. I then layed some fiberglass over the real bad sports to restrengthen it. after that I mixed up some fiberglass resin and painted it over the whole hood. My idea with this is that it would fill in the cracks and strengthen the hood so they wouldnt come back. If it works or not, time will tell. It was probably overkill but i didnt want to spent all this time on a hood and have it go to hell again.

[Ruppsforever]

damn NICE !!!

[magnumed]

Amazing work on the hood!

[kronnikracing]

Very cool! What were the pipes from? Seem to fit pretty desent without a whole lot of re-working.

[ruppman]

Love the hood. Nice work.

[dacota25d]

Thanks guys. Its definetly a labor of love that's for sure. Hours and hours into it. I actually started the hood in about may and finally got the final coat of clear on it the first week of January.
I have no clue what the pipes were off. I just had them and they fit pretty well with little work. They work OK on the sled but the motor won't Rev over 7000. I've tried different weights and springs but tthat's all I can seem to get out of it but its good enough for the few rides I'll take it on. I won't ever be racing it

[racingelvis]

nice work dakota, lots of cooool customizing!!!!!

[Ruppsforever]

Mar 3, 2015 21:14:52 GMT -6 dacota25d said:

Thanks guys. Its definetly a labor of love that's for sure. Hours and hours into it. I actually started the hood in about may and finally got the final coat of clear on it the first week of January.
I have no clue what the pipes were off. I just had them and they fit pretty well with little work. They work OK on the sled but the motor won't Rev over 7000. I've tried different weights and springs but tthat's all I can seem to get out of it but its good enough for the few rides I'll take it on. I won't ever be racing it

Make darn sure it isn't your tach. I had a brand new tach on a sled and couldn't get it to rev over 8000. Didn't matter what I did with the clutching. Tried another tach and that was the problem.

[dacota25d]

The next part was in my mind one of the more easy parts...Paint!!! this is where I really wanted it to be different and switched the colors. And for the red I also went a little different I did red basecoat then I mixed up some clear and added some red metal flake, a touch of red ghost pearl, and a touch of orange ghost pearl, in the right light at the right angle it has a more orange tint to it from the pearl. it turned out pretty good i think. one of these days ill try and get a pic of the flake. its pretty though to get it on camera though. then the fun of sanding wasnt quite done yet. One more time then the final polish!


fresh out of paint ready to sand


wet sanded ready to polish



took it out on the maiden voyage a couple weeks ago. She ran great and sure turned alot of heads.




All in all it was a great project. It was fun at times and not so fun at other times. Had a great time meeting everyone at waconia. Thanks Rick for putting on a great event! Now off to the next project

[dacota25d]

In this pic you can actually see it turns a little orangish