Moving right along...

I've made a lot of good progress over the last couple of weeks. Before we get to that, though, I promised a few photos of the new and improved garage work space.

The grinding station.

Here's the great bench design that I found. Lots of storage.

Ok, so the battery box was the project that I had been trying to wrap up earlier. I wanted to keep the battery and some of the electronics tucked away under the seat, so I put together a compartment out of aluminum. I came up with a way to mount it by resting it on the inside of the frame rails and securing it with bolts that run through the threaded holes for the original battery box.

Trying to use as many of the original threaded holes as possible. 

The Shorai battery saves a lot of space.

The next project is the one that I have been looking forward to and dreading at the same time: the seat cowl. I had put together the basic foam form a while ago, and have been waiting until the battery box was finished to start. Before I could actually start cutting out the seat, I needed to make a couple of additional frame rails for the pan to sit on. The battery doesn't stick out much, but I just needed a little more height to get over it, and also some more support where I will be sitting. So I picked up some square steel, cut them to the width of the frame, and notched out the bottoms so that the weren't resting on the small lip of the frame (which would bend under pressure). 

Once those were completed, the foam cutting could commence! That stuff is great to work with, but it is very messy. I drew out the basic shape on the side of the form, then roughly cut it out with a keyhole saw and hacksaw blade. After that, I used some 400 grit sandpaper to get the shape the way I wanted it. I had to cut out a large section of the rear so that it would sit over the cross bar at the back of the frame, but that hole won't be there later. 

Once the shape was to my liking, the mold needed to be covered with masking tape and carnuba wax to help prevent the fiberglass from sticking to it. I used some rope as ribbing to give the pan some depth where the seat cushion is going to sit.

Next up: Fiberglass and bike disassembly!