I’ve branched this off from the Shunsaku Tamiya Tribue Campaign so as not to clutter up the thread.
So - I bought my first bike at Ft. Devens in 1983. it was a beautiful '76 CB 750 Super Sport. I didn’t even buy it to ride. I had purchased plans to build a three wheeled car that utilized a Volkswagen front end, a KZ 650 rear end, and lots of building foam and fibeglass. I naively thought I could just start building it in the team house.
The guy who sold it to me gave me a brief class on how to make it go, and somehow I made it the twenty miles back to Ft, Devens without dumping it. I was hooked. By '86, in Berlin, I was already on my fifth bike, Now I’ve owned some pretty nice bikes over the years, many of them ground breaking bikes during their time, but the Katana was always my favorite, When the campaign came up, I had a choice of several Tamiya kits to build, including four bikes. I chose the Katana because we have a history, and because of the four bikes, this one seemed to come from the “right” period of Mr. Tamiya’s reign.
In addition to taking young ASA gals out on rides to South Post, I still tried to maintain another hobby I was fond of - modeling. I’ve had this issue since '84. I learned a lot about making motorcylce models better, and to this day still learn new techniques.
This is what I’m shooting for - My Katana from Berlin. Shortened frame, aftermarket Speer sitzbank and fender, Marzocchi gas shocks, and a simple, badass paint job:
The kit has ridiculously few pieces.
I am not one of those Announce on Friday, post Photos on Monday kind of modelers, but in twenty four hours all of the sub-assemblies are complete. The big hold up at the moment is finding the correct shade of red:
The great thing about motorcyles is the variety of finishes. There’s not just black. There’s matte black, gloss black, semi gloss black, faded black, satin black. Same with the metals. You’ve got stainless, aluminum, copper, chromed steel, titanium, various colors of heat treatment on the pipes.
On the 1:1 build I used barbecue grill paint for the motor. I painted it in the frame. In fact I painted the frame with minimal disassembly as well. So hopefuly this conveys the look of the motor:
Of course I still have to scratch the seat, front fender, and gas shcoks, but it’s coming along nicely.
