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Old April 15th, 2019, 11:12 PM   #1
MrMcTavish
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1992 ninja 250 budget street fighter(resized pics)

I've been lurking around this site gather info and ideas for a few months now and finally decided to put together a proper build thread so that others can steal ideas from me if they so choose. I picked up this unloved ninja, running and titled for $250 and man was it ugly when I got it. But after a spin around the block, it ran pretty good so i took it home. After diagnosing the hesitation issue it had on the test ride, i found that carb boots were not seated all the way thanks in part to the spring retainers instead of clamps. After I fixed that, it ran like it was brand new. The gauges that came with the bike read about 10k miles and the engines was in good enough shape and ran well enough for me to believe that. On to making it look pretty.







I didn't really have a plan, I know that I wanted it to look cool and be under $1000. As of now, I'm almost at $1100 but i also included registration and tax. First thing that had to go was the ugly and completely useless headlight that put out about as much light as a candle in the wind. following that were the ugly and not bright enough turn signals and rear tail light.
I was able to find a set of 4 bright, led turn signals on eBay for $12 shipped. The best part about them, the fronts doubled as white marker lights and the rears doubled as brake lights.


Next thing to go was the passenger pegs and most of the brackets on the subframe support....then the subframe support. I didnt like the angle that it was at and I also don't plan on having a passenger(sorry wife). So it got chopped off and rewelded closer up.








To address the headlight, I decided to go with something that looked nice and output enough light. So to check both of those boxes, streetfighter rules say it must be one of three lights. Vrod, dominators or an MT03. I always liked the MT03 so I bought a new one off ebay and proceeded to have no clue how to mount it. I began learning to TIG weld with this project so a lot of the welds you will see are due to the fact that i was/am still learning. I decided to use 1/4" steel rod to make the mount and found that the bolt holes for the horn mount would work nicely for secure it to the bike. I ended up scraping this design because I ended up hating the way it looked and wanted something slimmer and less seen.




I also wanted to do something about the ugly tank that these bikes come with. With the fairings on, i don't mind the tank. It's when the fairing come off that you see the line in the tank and the bolt holes. That's when i thought of making radiator shrouds to hide them. I though about buying a broken stock fairing and cutting it but after a quick peruse of eBay, I said no thanks to those prices and decided to buy more 1/4" steel rod and try to form my own. My buddy even lent me some kx80 plastics to see if they would fit and I actually kinda liked the way they looked but decided against it because it didn't fit what I was looking for and it wasn't even close to the radiator. They would have been purely cosmetic and not even that great looking. So I began slowly building my own. It's nice that My wife works on the weekends, it gives me all day to sit in the garage and swear to myself when things don't go right.
















I actually really like the stock tachometer and stock gauges but they were really big and were going to stick out like a sore thumb with my new sexy headlight so they had to go. It was actually harder than I had imagined to find a tachometer that went to 14k rpm. I really like the trail tech vapor and I've used it before but it only went to 12k. I ended up finding a nice Koso digital gauge that read to 14k and i also happened to have an ebay coupon code to get for $60 shipped. I mounted it using the supplied bracket and using longer allen head bolts for the clip ons and secured it underneath the top triple.


Next on the list was the wheels. I liked the stock red wheels for the fact that they were red while everything else was black. That's it though. I didn't like the design or the tires available. So after a bad day at work, I said eff it and ordered a set of new gen wheels off ebay. And of course, they were black.
[/URL]

At this point, I had the structural part of the shrouds done. I just needed something to put on top of them to make them, well, not ugly. I had planned to use fiberglass buy my buddy talked me into using sheet metal. i used some cardboard to get the rough shape and design then cut out the metal.















I also scored a used Yoshi exhaust for the old gen bikes. Its a bit rusty and the can is dented but the tubing is solid. After a little sanding(a lot of sanding) it will look not crap any more.



Moving to the back of the bikes, I needed a way to hold the turn signals and plate. I had bought 2 6' sections of 1/4" rod for the shrouds and only ended up using not quite 6' for both of them so i had a lot left. So 1/4" rod it was. The led turn signals served as the brake lights for the back but i needed some running lights and plate lights. I was able to find those stud lights for fairly cheap and installed those in the lower holes of the plate.






All of that(if you're still reading and not just looking at the pictures) brings you up to speed with where I am currently. All that's left on my to do list is as follows
-center front wheel
-front caliper bracket
-figure out coolant expansion chamber relocation
-smooth and paint the shrouds
-paint all the parts of the frame that got stripped and welded
-finish cleaning up the exhaust
-jet the carbs for the new exhaust
-Muffler support bracket
-new tires
-Enjoy

I would love your guy's feedback on what I've done so far or any thoughts or ideas that you have on finishing things up. This build has been a major learning experience for me. I done things, mostly with the TIG welder I never though I would be able to do. My other builds have been far less enjoyable. Maybe It's because I'm older and wiser than I was a few years ago, Maybe it's the fact that I have more disposable income now to buy the parts I need faster and not having to cheap out. I have had numerous bikes over my 10ish years of riding and I think that I'm most excited to ride this one. Currently, this is my only bike. I had sold a '17 grom and an '05 fz1 to put money down for my house that I'm building.

To anyone who actually makes it this far down, It's been a while since I've made a build thread so I don't know how to make the pictures smaller. I apologize for the massive pictures.

Last futzed with by MrMcTavish; May 25th, 2019 at 09:56 PM. Reason: OMG no more big pictures
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Old April 16th, 2019, 06:39 AM   #2
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Looks like a great build! (Hope to get a good look of the photos once an admin resizes them.)

Press on!
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Old April 16th, 2019, 04:18 PM   #3
MrMcTavish
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Quote:
Originally Posted by dodgerdad View Post
Looks like a great build! (Hope to get a good look of the photos once an admin resizes them.)

Press on!
Thanks! I had a pretty hard time viewing the pictures on my computer but it wasn’t so bad when viewing on my phone.
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Old April 17th, 2019, 06:57 AM   #4
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Nice work!
I am really interested in the final product. I have one 250 going under the knife for Bluecollerbobber Cafe Kit.
I am looking for another to do a street fighter.

Maybe even one with stock full fairings! These little bikes are fun, fast enough, easy to wrench, reliable, and really cheap for what you get. No reason to spend more then $1000 dollars for a good example. I like the not running low mileage ones for $500 bucks. If it has a spark it will run. Usually a good carb cleaning and you are off and running. I bought one with a new battery, but a blown 30 amp main fuse, for $400 bucks. The guy could put a battery in, but never checked the fuse. Go figure!
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Old April 17th, 2019, 06:59 AM   #5
MrMcTavish
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cafe Racer View Post
Nice work!
I am really interested in the final product. I have one 250 going under the knife for Bluecollerbobber Cafe Kit.
I am looking for another to do a street fighter.

Maybe even one with stock full fairings! These little bikes are fun, fast enough, easy to wrench, reliable, and really cheap for what you get. No reason to spend more then $1000 dollars for a good example. I like the not running low mileage ones for $500 bucks. If it has a spark it will run. Usually a good carb cleaning and you are off and running. I bought one with a new battery, but a blown 30 amp main fuse, for $400 bucks. The guy could put a battery in, but never checked the fuse. Go figure!
Yeah that’s why I figured $250 for a running titled bike I’ll take any day of the week. The guy had even put in a new battery.
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Old April 28th, 2019, 05:49 PM   #6
MrMcTavish
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I managed to make a small amount of progress this weekend. With the weather being as it has, I haven't been able to paint anything and there's a lot that needs to be painted. I was able to finish the front wheel spacers, center the front wheel, make the front brake caliper bracket.




I also ziptied am aluminum water bottle to the front for an coolant expansion chamber. That was so i could take it for a ride up and down the street. I was hoping that it would run better, The new exhaust messed with the jetting more than I had anticipated. I had already planned on rejetting for it but thought I could get away with some light riding without doing that. So that'll be next on the to do list. I had purchased a yoshimura silencer insert to help quite it. It wasn't as quite as I hoped. May be time for a repacking of the muffler.




It felt good to get it outside even though it started snowing while I was taking it out of the garage. Thanks Wisconsin weather.
This picture is before I had swapped the coolant expansion chamber. I had it hanging there to make it easier to roll around.



Again, I'm sorry for the oversized pictures. It looks better from a mobile site.
EDIT:finally figured out how to resize the images for future posts. Sorry to all you guys that were interested in seeing them.

Last futzed with by MrMcTavish; May 25th, 2019 at 10:01 PM. Reason: resizing pictures
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Old May 25th, 2019, 10:26 PM   #7
MrMcTavish
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No pictures for this update because photobucket is telling me I'm over my limit now. I will try to delete some useless older ones to get the updated pictures up for you guys.

I have all the basic stuff crossed off my list currently. I haven't updated this recently because I've been having too much fun actually riding it now. I did manage to get most of the bare metal brackets that I have made painted along with the shrouds, but because I'm not a body guy and have almost zero patients, didn't sand the bondo well enough and you can see it straight through the paint. It's covered though so it won't rust. Never got around to painting the inside of the shrouds. Oh well, that's for another day.

I have decided to switch back to the stock exhaust for the mean time so I don't have to touch the jetting and I can just enjoy it for the summer. I will try to plan and swap it out and rejet over this winter along with maybe a few cosmetic changes and maybe some suspension upgrades. Because I switched back to the stock mufflers, that required that I made some support brackets for them. They turned out ok but look kinda bulky compared to the oem aluminum ones. Again, because I just wanted to ride it, they never got painted. I have been waiting for a day when I don't feel like riding and the humidity isn't 90% or higher.

I received my new tires earlier this week and had them put on today. I've got maybe 40 miles on them. I went with some Michelin pilot steet radials. The tires that came on the new gen rear wheel I bought was a 140/70/17 and it was rubbing just ever so slightly on the swingarm so I went with the OEM new gen size of 130/70/17 and there's no clearance issues now.

Another thing I plan on changing when I can, is the coolant overflow. I used the water bottle out of necessity not because I like the way it looks.

I'm loving riding this thing around and ringing it all the way up to that crazy 14k redline. I plan to take a trip from Milwaukee to Indiana this coming weekend for an annual get together with a bunch of motorcycle buddies. Can't wait to make the trip on this bike.
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Old June 5th, 2019, 04:04 PM   #8
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This great! Thanks for sharing your project. I'm hoping to do something similar with mine
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Old June 5th, 2019, 06:12 PM   #9
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Originally Posted by MrMcTavish View Post
No pictures for this update because photobucket is telling me I'm over my limit now. I will try to delete some useless older ones to get the updated pictures up for you guys.
You can upload photos directly to your post with the "manage attachments" selection below the text box.

Last futzed with by Triple Jim; June 6th, 2019 at 05:45 AM.
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Old June 5th, 2019, 07:29 PM   #10
MrMcTavish
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These are the most up to date photos that i have. Saddly, they are not how the bike currently looks. I keep meaning to take picture of it as it sits, but I've been having way more fun riding it than I have on any of my other bikes. Currently the exhaust hangers have been painted, and I swapped the front master cylinder for a 08-12 master because the perch has a threaded spot for a mirror. I also added amazon sport bike mirrors. Makes my life much easier now that I dont have to keep turning around just to keep a tab on the cars behind me.
A buddy of mine was also getting rid of some newer zx6/zzr? stuff so I managed to snag some newer clip ons and switch gear. I'm hoping I can swap the clip on tubes because mine were bent and unbend with oxy. So they're not perfectly straight. Either way, I'm excited to wire up the new switch gear because I hate the older style and the way the blinkers work. I much prefer the newer, click to cancel rather than the older slide side to side.
Again, I still have the 2-1 yoshi sitting in my garage and the plan is to put that on and rejet over this coming winter when I cant ride anyway.
One thing I will hopefully get to before the end of summer is a proper coolant overflow container that isn't blue/purple.
Hopefully I'll remember to snap a few pictures tomorrow before I ride into work and get them up tomorrow night. Thanks for everyone who has been following along.

Quote:
You can upload photos direction to your post with the "manage attachments" selection below the text box.
I would do that but all the photos are on my iphone and the only computer I have is a chromebook so I've found just uploading to photobucket is the easiest and I hate dealing with iCloud.









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Old June 5th, 2019, 07:40 PM   #11
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Strangely enough that looks nothing like the yoshimura I got.
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Old June 5th, 2019, 07:44 PM   #12
MrMcTavish
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Strangely enough that looks nothing like the yoshimura I got.
Do you have a slip on or a full exhaust?
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Old June 5th, 2019, 09:51 PM   #13
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Old June 6th, 2019, 12:39 PM   #14
Ceeloo Yello
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Do you have a slip on or a full exhaust?
Here are a couple pics from the ebay ad when I got it:
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File Type: jpg s-l1600a.jpg (69.3 KB, 7 views)
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Old June 7th, 2019, 05:01 AM   #15
MrMcTavish
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Originally Posted by Ceeloo Yello View Post
Here are a couple pics from the ebay ad when I got it:
Mine was definitely painted black. I could tell as soon as I opened up the packaging. But besides that, ours look similar if not the same
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Old June 7th, 2019, 05:08 AM   #16
MrMcTavish
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I snapped some pictures yesterday before work.
From 10-20ft away, it’s a solid looking bike. It’s when you get closer you start to notice all the little things that I need to work on. For now though, I’m riding it until the snow falls.
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Old June 7th, 2019, 05:11 AM   #17
MrMcTavish
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I figured I would show the bad of my bike as best as I can. These are pictures of the shrouds up close where you can still see the bondo through the paint. I’m hoping I can wet sand and make these look pretty eventually. My buddy suggested, a repaint with black and kawi green which I think would be killer.
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File Type: jpg 26D3079A-39BB-487F-8AE9-4D95973D5879.jpg (101.0 KB, 11 views)
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Old June 7th, 2019, 05:27 AM   #18
MrMcTavish
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Because my build is essentially done for the moment, I figured I would show you guys my purchase list and how much I currently have into it. My subtotal shows total spent and I subtracted out the parts that I currently don’t have fitted to the bike like the jet kit, the yoshi exhaust and the zx600 shock I just bought this morning.
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Old June 7th, 2019, 09:26 AM   #19
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HA! Careful notes made for my own project.

Looking forward to seeing what happens post snow!

One thing you way want to do, is cut your front fairing at a more agressive angle to match the frame angles and soften the edge from the bondo top to the plastic.

You should be proud though. I'm a bit inspired to do mine now. Thanks so much.
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Old June 7th, 2019, 12:59 PM   #20
Ceeloo Yello
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Mine was definitely painted black. I could tell as soon as I opened up the packaging. But besides that, ours look similar if not the same
No mine is more of a cast aluminum type muffler, if I get an end shot you would see what I mean. I was originally thinking someone welded a different yoshi muffler to your header.
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Old June 11th, 2019, 08:24 PM   #21
MrMcTavish
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I got some newer switch gear for basically free off a 2000s? zx6r?? Some kind of newer kawi and I’ll be damned, the plugs were exactly the same. I did have to switch some pins around and the throttle cable routing isn’t idle. That’s because the newer bike had the killswitch and throttle tube as separate housings and my cables were much shorter and not really meant to fit in that tube. That’s one thing that will need to be fixed sooner rather than later but all the buttons work as they should and the throttle works. Plus now I have a hazard button and it requires no extra wiring.
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Old July 15th, 2019, 06:29 AM   #22
MrMcTavish
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So I “accidentally” ordered a decent condition upper fairing to cut up one night. I saw the eBay list price of $49.99 and somehow missed the fact that shipping was $100. So with that on the way I got adventurous and decided to cut up the front shrouds. It didn’t bother me when I first finished the bike, because I was just so excited to finally have something to ride, but looking at it for a while, the shrouds seemed to not fit the lines of the bike. So I kinda half hazardously started cutting and what do you know, I actually liked the result. Now, this is temporary. It is currently very crude and unsymmetrical on both side, but I love the way it looks. It’s more aggressive and sleeker looking. I will be remaking the steel rod shrouds and my friend insisted that we make the actual sheet metal shroud at his place with his nice planishing hammer and bead roller.
1AE2674F-D00E-4BF6-B81D-5318367ED150.jpg
83A8C1A1-A3BA-41AA-8C40-5D96FB38A79D.jpg
2A1735BB-8FD2-4A27-A955-DB91517D68EB.jpg
I will be taking the ninja to a go cart track day at road America on Wednesday this week, and after that it will be getting the yoshi exhaust on and possibly, maybe, kinda I’m thinking pods. I have only ever unsuccessfully jetted things in the past but I have more knowledge and more patience that I’m older and thought I would give it a chance. All the very useful info on this site has given me the confidence to think it can do it. If after a few weeks of tuning and I am still not able to get it to run right, I will be returning to the oem air box.
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Old July 24th, 2019, 10:08 AM   #23
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Hey, which kosso tacho/speedo is that. Ive been running mine without both for about a week now
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Old July 24th, 2019, 03:03 PM   #24
MrMcTavish
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Hey, which kosso tacho/speedo is that. Ive been running mine without both for about a week now
Bb642w20 dL-03sr gp-style
Just copy and paste that into the google machine and it’ll pop up. I bought mine off eBay because I had a 15 or 20% off coupon so I ended up paying $127 for it. I think they’re usually $160. If you don’t wanna pay that much, my other option was the trail tech vapor. I had that on my old sv650 and I really liked it. Only problem is that it only goes to 12k instead of the 14k redline which is why I opted for the koso. Looking back, I’d rather get the vapor.
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Old July 24th, 2019, 10:40 PM   #25
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Bb642w20 dL-03sr gp-style
Just copy and paste that into the google machine and it’ll pop up. I bought mine off eBay because I had a 15 or 20% off coupon so I ended up paying $127 for it. I think they’re usually $160. If you don’t wanna pay that much, my other option was the trail tech vapor. I had that on my old sv650 and I really liked it. Only problem is that it only goes to 12k instead of the 14k redline which is why I opted for the koso. Looking back, I’d rather get the vapor.
Yeah, ive seen alot of people using the trail tech stuff. What makes you wish you had the trail tech instead. That koso looks way cleaner in my opinion.
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Old July 24th, 2019, 10:42 PM   #26
MrMcTavish
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Yeah, ive seen alot of people using the trail tech stuff. What makes you wish you had the trail tech instead. That koso looks way cleaner in my opinion.
Maybe it’s just how I remember the vapor dash being but the one thing I don’t like on the koso is that the tach is very small and sometimes hard to read. It does the job but the vapor is less expensive and does the same thing and I think it looks better
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Old August 16th, 2019, 09:21 PM   #27
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So I didn’t have as much fun at the track as I planned. Came in a little hot on the front straight and dumped it in the grass. It bent the one one shroud pretty good, dented the crap out of the overflow and put a small dent in the radiator. Also, now my tank leaks. I’m pretty sure it’s leaking from the hook that holds the tank to the frame. Tried everything short of welding it to patch the leak. I’m gonna try some Jb weld this next week while I’m off and hope that fixes it for good. Otherwise I have done some more things to it.
I finally have the zx600 shock on and I gotta say, I really don’t notice a difference. I tent to not have a great butt that notices things so I could be crazy. Also modded some stock fairings to replace my bent radiator shrouds and painted them. I have a green ninja logo that will be going on each one eventually. Also got the yoshi exhaust on. I didn’t have time to rejet so that will be happening this next week.
My buddy happened to mention that he has a 636 front end laying around that he might sell to me so it’s possible that I’ll be swapping these whimpy looking 36mm forks for some beefy USD. From what I’ve read, I’ll probably have to swap the triple stems from my bike onto the 636 forks. Well see when we get there
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Old August 16th, 2019, 11:53 PM   #28
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Brazing with silver-solder is pretty simple way to fix cracks and holes in tank.
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Old August 17th, 2019, 12:13 AM   #29
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Originally Posted by DannoXYZ View Post
Brazing with silver-solder is pretty simple way to fix cracks and holes in tank.
I’ll give that a try as well. Hadn’t thought of that.
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Old August 21st, 2019, 11:54 AM   #30
MrMcTavish
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So I finally made a half way decent exhaust mount for the yoshi pipe and the strapping kinda hides the sizeable dent in the can. I need to get my hands on some kind of rubber insulation for the pipe otherwise I’m sure the steel banding will cut through the aluminum muffler. Also was able to jet the carbs. There is still a slight stumble around 5/6k that the ninja wiki points to the needles needing to be raised. I’ll get to that probably this weekend. I also fitted a silencer into the exhaust. I basically just welded it to the perforated tubing inside then put new rivets back in. It’s not so barky as it was before. Still a little loud but not as pronounced. I also attempted using jb weld on the tank and hope that it holds for the rest of the season. I let the mixture cure for a whole 2 days before adding gas. The directions say fully cured after 17hrs but I figured I have the time, why rush it.
I’m basically done with this project at this point. There may be minor things I add or change from now but as it sits, it a fun little bike.
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Old August 21st, 2019, 12:44 PM   #31
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Looks sharp! How's the visibility with those mirrors? Mirrors are my next (hopefully last) item on my parts list and the ones I'm considering look just like those.
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Old August 21st, 2019, 12:46 PM   #32
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Brazing with silver-solder is pretty simple way to fix cracks and holes in tank.
I have experience with that, and I can tell you it's easy to cause an explosion. If you try it, take all the precautions you can, including filling the tank with water except for a small bubble where you're working.
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Old August 21st, 2019, 01:02 PM   #33
MrMcTavish
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Looks sharp! How's the visibility with those mirrors? Mirrors are my next (hopefully last) item on my parts list and the ones I'm considering look just like those.
Not bad. They’re pretty wide so I get a nice big picture but they can get buzzy at higher rpm/speeds
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I have experience with that, and I can tell you it's easy to cause an explosion. If you try it, take all the precautions you can, including filling the tank with water except for a small bubble where you're working.
That’s what I was afraid of. I’ll give the jb weld a week and see how it holds up. Otherwise I might just take it somewhere to have them fix it.
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Old August 21st, 2019, 01:08 PM   #34
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Not bad. They’re pretty wide so I get a nice big picture but they can get buzzy at higher rpm/speeds.
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Old August 21st, 2019, 04:59 PM   #35
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I have experience with that, and I can tell you it's easy to cause an explosion. If you try it, take all the precautions you can, including filling the tank with water except for a small bubble where you're working.
Yeah! Empty tank and leaving it out in sun for day pretty much evaporates all petrol from tank.
You can also test by waving ignition-source at tank beforehand....

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Old August 22nd, 2019, 06:31 AM   #36
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Yeah! Empty tank and leaving it out in sun for day pretty much evaporates all petrol from tank.
You can also test by waving ignition-source at tank beforehand....

Does he not realize the risk of dropping ashes into the tank? Geez.
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Old July 22nd, 2020, 05:47 PM   #37
MrMcTavish
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Soooooo I told myself I wasn't gonna modify this bike anymore, but I knew deep down that I was lying. This bike has kinda been sitting in my garage for a while in limbo not sure whether to sell it or keep it. Late October last year, my wife let me purchase the bike I had initially modeled this one after which was a 2019 cb300r. I love that bike very much cuz it reliability starts every morning despite the crazy cold temperatures I ride in(some mornings were hovering just above freezing). I believe the ninja is actually faster simply because it's a twin and revs so high vs the CB which is a single. Despite that, it gets me 70mpg reliably and looks cool. So that has become my daily commuter from the first heavy rain that washes the salt away until they put down salt again next winter which left my ninja feeling neglected and ever since we moved into our new house it just sat in the corner of my garage glaring at me. That is until last week when I started my two back to back weeks off from work. I had made a checklist of a bunch of things I wanted to get done before I either sell it to maximize profit or ride it again.

The major one was redoing the subframe. The way I had left the subframe already made having a passenger not a good idea because of where I had located the supports so I figured I may as well move them further up and officially make it a single rider bike. This was going to allow me to make a cowl for the rear portion and possibly hide some of the electronics in there. So I got some tubing and got to work.

After I got the supports done I moved onto make a fiberglass cowl. I've only used fiberglass once before to make a similar cowl for a bike that I never finished so I had an idea of what to do. I like the profile of the stock seat because the rear section looked like the older kz650 tail so I covered the seat in plastic and tape and just laid the glass overtop the seat and then made another for the underside. Once the two were dried I put then together to form a single cowl piece. I still have a lot to learn about fiberglass and because of that I have a lot of sanding and smoothing to do before it's ready for paint.

While I was doing all this I decided to try to polish my Yoshi muffler since after removing the paint that the PO put on it kinda left it ugly looking. Beside the giant dent that's mostly hidden, I'd say it turned out pretty good. I stopped after working my way up to a white brillow pad.

Next I moved onto mounting the turn signals and license plate. For the turn signals I just welded on some 1/8" stock with holes drilled in them to the insides of the new supports. The plate was really easy, it's just two pieces of thin gauge(16 or 18?) Steel that I bent and drilled holes in and used the existing inner fender holder bolt location. I still need to finalize the mounting for the brake light, although the turn signals also have brake lights in them. So the brake light bar in the picture may or may not stay. I haven't decided yet. I'm sure my wife will complain that more brake lights are better and she isn't wrong.

It seems like I check 5 things off my to do list for this bike and in the process I've added 10 more things. My plan was also to remove clean, regrease and repaint the swingarm since the stock muffler on the "driver's side" was rubbing and wore away the paint. Maybe I'll just try to make the silver color and just touch up the wear spot.
There's a lot I'd like to do still before i call it done but some of it may get out off or if I sell it, not done at all. Either way my to-do list is as follows from most important to the "I'll probably never get to it".
-sand/smooth/Bondo/ paint cowl
-mount brake light
-fab muffler hanger
-redo headlight mount
-make new shroud for gas tank to hide the fact there were fairings on this bike
-make new radiator shrouds
-paint swingarm
-weld some threaded bosses on the swingarm for spools
And last but not least, gsxr750 USD forks swap.

I did some quick research, and the 96-98 gsxr750 forks are similar enough in length to the stock forks that it wouldn't change the rake at all. The only issues I can really see are losing steering lock and the front axle diameter different. But the latter could probably be solved by swapping bearings. I would plan on reusing my 08-12 ninja 250 wheels because I like the style and the fact that more tire would probably make it less flick able.
Any thoughts, concerns comments or suggestions are always welcome.
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Old August 1st, 2020, 07:23 PM   #38
MrMcTavish
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So I sold my bike finally. Got it looking pretty and running good here's the last update of the bike and the pictures of it when it was listed. Maybe I'll pick up another ninjette down the road but for now this little one is some young woman's new bike. Just passed her rider safety course and needed something for her short stature. Thanks for all the help, positivity, motivation and support along the way.
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Old August 2nd, 2020, 07:48 AM   #39
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Originally Posted by DannoXYZ View Post
Yeah! Empty tank and leaving it out in sun for day pretty much evaporates all petrol from tank.
You can also test by waving ignition-source at tank beforehand....

I must admit, I lol'd hard at this pic. Seems many of use have been doing this (smoking over gas tanks) for years and years and the saga continues. Had to go through my pics even.... there is no less than 5 pics of me filling my tank while smoking as well.

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Old August 2nd, 2020, 07:49 AM   #40
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Oh, back on subject of thread. Diggin' your conversion, well done!
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