ninjette.org - View Single Post - Just another Ninja Café...finished project.

LTCTPU · August 26th, 2016, 09:26 AM

Project execution

Figuring out when to begin the project was complicated in that The Girl had stayed at school to work over the summer on a part time internship as well as a part time job. So we picked a 10 day period where she could both get home to visit and to do “the project”. Of course it was the hottest part of the year. Damn it was Hot.

Motor/Maintenance

First thing was to change out the bad motor for the good motor and get the maintenance up to date. Ideally this would have all been done and bike running around and maintenance all up to date and have had put some miles on the bike before starting any mods. It was decided do not do it that way so we could do the motor change and maintenance together, all from a project and learning more about the bike perspective as well saving time by not putting the fairings back on. Best decision for us, but it had its trouble shooting consequences later.

Fiberglass tail

Next part was to get started on the making the tail. We had never worked with fiberglass before, so did a lot of looking at the DIY sites and YouTube to figure that out …. Invaluable advice gleamed early on was: to draw it out in exact detail first and the smoother and more correctly shaped the form was the better the end product.

We decided on a shape and cut out cardboard templates for sides & top and test fit them on the bike.

Bobbed the rear of the frame about 5” which was into the weld joint where the lower frame joins into the tail frame and removed old tail mounting tabs so the new tail would lower over the frame.

Made and prepped a form, got out the fiberglass: resin, cloth & mat and just got after it…we like how it came out. Mounted it at three points; two screws drilled and tapped in to side frame rails and 3rd point was via a bracket we made for the old rear seat support.

Seat
Heat gunned the seat base and formed it around the tail seat curve. Trimmed to shape with a Dremel tool and angle grinder. Trimmed the OEM foam and covered with the OEM seat cover, trimmed and heated to form. It is serviceable for now but needs some more smoothing and reinforcing the rear base to fill some holes that ended up right in the rear seat curve. Just ran out of time.

August 26th, 2016, 09:26 AM	#4
LTCTPU ninjette.org newbie Name: Tom Location: Missouri City TX Join Date: Jun 2016 Motorcycle(s): BMW R1200gsa, KLR650 Posts: 7	Just another Ninja Café Project execution Figuring out when to begin the project was complicated in that The Girl had stayed at school to work over the summer on a part time internship as well as a part time job. So we picked a 10 day period where she could both get home to visit and to do “the project”. Of course it was the hottest part of the year. Damn it was Hot. Motor/Maintenance First thing was to change out the bad motor for the good motor and get the maintenance up to date. Ideally this would have all been done and bike running around and maintenance all up to date and have had put some miles on the bike before starting any mods. It was decided do not do it that way so we could do the motor change and maintenance together, all from a project and learning more about the bike perspective as well saving time by not putting the fairings back on. Best decision for us, but it had its trouble shooting consequences later. Fiberglass tail Next part was to get started on the making the tail. We had never worked with fiberglass before, so did a lot of looking at the DIY sites and YouTube to figure that out …. Invaluable advice gleamed early on was: to draw it out in exact detail first and the smoother and more correctly shaped the form was the better the end product. We decided on a shape and cut out cardboard templates for sides & top and test fit them on the bike. Bobbed the rear of the frame about 5” which was into the weld joint where the lower frame joins into the tail frame and removed old tail mounting tabs so the new tail would lower over the frame. Made and prepped a form, got out the fiberglass: resin, cloth & mat and just got after it…we like how it came out. Mounted it at three points; two screws drilled and tapped in to side frame rails and 3rd point was via a bracket we made for the old rear seat support. Seat Heat gunned the seat base and formed it around the tail seat curve. Trimmed to shape with a Dremel tool and angle grinder. Trimmed the OEM foam and covered with the OEM seat cover, trimmed and heated to form. It is serviceable for now but needs some more smoothing and reinforcing the rear base to fill some holes that ended up right in the rear seat curve. Just ran out of time.