Welcome to the Roketa Café

[Weldangrind]

I need to work on my TW and Lifan, but there are two bikes in pieces that need to move forward. One is an XR200 for a young man who is staying with us for awhile, and the other is a Roketa-based café that will likely go to my Brother in law.

This follows my recent discovery that the Roketa and 1981 XR200 frames are nearly identical. To further cement the point in my mind, I installed the upper and lower XR200 triples in the Roketa frame today. Perfect fit. While at it, I trimmed the steering lock off, because I intend to weld it onto the Lifan.







The swingarm mounts are also identical, so I mounted the XR200 swingarm into the frame. The following pics also illustrate the differences between the XR200 swingarm and the Roketa swingarm.





The original shock mounts are used for the carrying rack on the Roketa, so they're not machined quite right for the shocks. I'll weld some XR200 mounts there soon. For now, the frame is mocked up with the shocks on the rack mounts. The proportions are ok, but they'll be even better once I bend the subframe to suit a café seat and install 18" wheels front and rear.



While at it, I mounted the Roketa triples, a set of Gio forks and the Roketa swingarm to the XR200 frame. The steering stop doesn't line up quite right, but that's an easy fix.



This shot shows the rear suspension link that I need to pirate from the Roketa frame and transplant onto the XR200. I'll also move the upper monoshock mount to the XR200. The frame member that supports the link (and the footpegs) is really poor on the Roketa, so I'll eventually weld a spare XR200 piece on there.



That'll be it for awhile. I need to work on the other bikes for now. My Bro in law will visit next weekend, at which point we'll make more progress.