Well, I finally got around to designing/fabricating the headlight brackets and seeing as how this is the most welding and designing I've done in my life, it went well. Up until the end, that is. I had a good idea of where I wanted the headlight to be, I just had to get to cutting a grinding and make it happen. The first bracket wasn't too much of a hassle, mostly because I was just flying by the seat of my pants. Once I figured out where I wanted the headlight bolts to be located, the rest was just cutting and tacking. No, I didn't tack weld the stuff while it was on my bike
Yeah, that's totally a zip strip. I found that as long as you're just doing second long tack welds it doesn't effect the plastic and they're really efficient at holding shit right where you want it.
I wanted the bracket to mimic the frame of my bike. I think it turned out pretty snazzy.
4:30's not too early to drink is it? Time for some New Belgium.
Last weekend it was Ranger.
Once the first bracket was built and approved by QA, I got to building the second. I figured if I found some way to suspend the end ring at the exact point I wanted it and make sure the ring clamps were set at the proper distances, it would go together well. I was right.
I'll save you the gory details between the first and last pictures, but just so there's some entertainment value: I definitely welded the bottom bracket right to that damn exhaust pipe. You can kinda see it in the above pic. Lesson learned. I started getting really proficient at welding just towards the end of the second bracket. I'm taking it to a guy on the local boards tomorrow who's got a nice TIG setup, so hopefully we'll get some decent looking joints out of the deal.
Dirty was helping the whole time. How else would you go about holding up your drop light? Backwards
On to the final mockup, as well as the part where about ripped off the brackets and pounded them into smithereens. The clamps went on fine, after a couple of weld breakages (hey, it's a mock up) and I then proceeded to fit the clipons and the gauges. Since I did away with the U-bracket that previously held up the whole front end, I had to devise a way to mount the pod cluster to the top triple. Nothing a few washers and some plumming gaskets can't solve.
Note the slash cut washer on the left. I wanted the gauges to have a different angle in relation to the triple. It ended up better than I had planned though and I may even make the angle a little steeper just to even out the gauges. The hole in the plastic was substantially bigger than the bolt I used, so the only thing the gauges actually touch is rubber. No damping issues there.
The first thing I realized once I got the bucket set into place, is that it is waaaaaaay too close to the steering head and the big ass wad of electronics. I guess when I mocked up the location before I started building it, I didn't allow enough forward space between the headlight and the wiring. Shit. I mean, it's waaaaay too snug. I did get it put together, but it's really not ridable the way it is. A few thousand miles of that bucket rubbing on the wiring and I'd have all sorts of issues. Whatever. After a days effort I decided to put it together anyway. The clipons are two piece so that you can fit them without removing the upper triple. Do yourself a favor and just slide them on from the top. After the bucket got bolted on, everything went smoothly. I don't have any controls or electronics hooked up, obviously, but you can see the general effect.
Before
I couldn't get a good front pic because of the room lighting. You can see how far down the headlight is though.
I'd like to get a new triple eventually, but motor and suspension mods come first. My next options are to either find a smaller, thinner headlight bucket or just to modify the brackets somehow to extend them farther towards the front of the bike. Hell, I don't know. After 10 hours in the garage, it's time for some whiskey and Star Wars.
Jarv out.
