Pregen fairing modification

[JasonJ]

Has anyone ever modified the main front faring on a pregen so that it more resembled that of a EX500?

It seems to me, we could replicate the slightly more modern look of the EX500 by skillfully cutting the bottom half of the front faring off. Now granted, the 500 has more curvy styling around the headlight, but the headlight is roughly the same shape.

Was just looking at pics of both the Ninja 250 and 500... just seemed like something that someone would have tried once on a busted front faring at some point.

[xorbe]

What would hold the bottom section on?

[JasonJ]

I'm imagining a line cut, from just under the bottom tank to faring bolt that follows a gentle arc over the side vent and then straight up to the front of the faring.

The faring would be short enough to be supported by the 4 tank bolts and the mirror mount bolts.

I'll try to attach a couple pictures to explain what I mean.

If you look at the pic of the pregen, ive drawn a red and blue line at hypothetical cut points. I also posted a pic of a 500r for comparison as this is what we'd be going for. Much thanks to whomever owns this pictures I got from Google.

[xorbe]

Right, but doesn't that remove 4 anchor points for the other lowest fairing? It'd still have 3 frame anchors, but kinda wobbly at the top peak probably. (And the center anchor on my lowest fairing is cracked already!)

[JasonJ]

I think the lower faring would be ok, since it has 3 triangulated mounting points. The 4 bolts that mate the lower and upper farings, I think are there primarily to support the usually flimsy upper faring.

The upper faring, once cut so much shorter than normal, I think would gain a lot of structural rigidity and not flop around at all, being mounted in the rear by the tank bolts, and in the front by the mirror mounts.

The lower faring, if it proved to be kinda flimsy at the top, could be reinforced at the 4 now missing bolts with two pieces of angle brackets.

Even more interesting an idea.... adapting the EX500 upper faring to an EX250. Clearly the back half of the 500 faring needs modding where ours mounts to the tank... perhaps cut and graft the back of the 250 upper faring to the remainder of a 500 fairing... I'd be interested to see what the 500 headlight bracket/faring stay looks like.

[kxpower?]

I've been contemplating something similar, only I'm looking at using only the very top of the fairing around the headlight and mirrors to make kind of a cafe-type fairing without having to re-invent the wheel as far as headlights, gauges, etc. That's really the only part of my fairings that don't need a lot of repair. Also, it would give you easier access to plugs, etc without removing the fairing.

Here's a pic that gave me the idea.

[CZroe]

Using the EX250J bars, forks, swingarm, brakes, and wheels goes a long way toward updating the look. Reshaping the windscreen/headlight seems to take care of the rest. The fairing profile was never the issue for me.

https://www.ninjette.org/forums/show...964#post876964

[InvisiBill]

I feel qualified to add some info to this thread...

First off, the issues with the Gen2 EX500 fairing.

• It's expensive. MSRP is just shy of $1,000. I've seen them a few hundred cheaper at Partzilla on occasion.
• It breaks easily. It's generally the first thing to break in any tipover. The metal plates that go in the back of the turn signal stalks to hold them firmly in place cause the stalks to break the fairing when they tip over.
• It's not mounted all that well. They're held on by 4 screws, two on tabs coming down from the tank, and two into the faring stay under the headlight, plus the mirror bolts. The headlight housing screws only into the plastic fairing as well, so a fall usually manages to break the mounting points on both the light and the fairing.
• While I do prefer the styling over the PreGen/Gen1, a lot of people think they're ugly '90s junk. Some EX500 guys actually swap the Gen1 front fairing (similar to the PreGen) back on, as they think it looks better ("If it's not new hotness, it might as well be 'classic' rather than just 'outdated'.").

It'll be hard to find a reasonably priced donor due to the high cost of the part and the ease with which they break on a bike. There are usually a ton of damaged/streetfighter EX500's on CL for a reason. Here's an example of how a huge chunk usually breaks off:



The tank/fairing joint on the 500 is a straight line, plus there's a mounting tab coming off the tank for the fairing to screw into.



I think you'd probably have to graft the two fairings together (or craft up some other piece to adapt them) to get a decent fit and look.

The gauge clusters are different between Gen1 and Gen2. The Gen1 fairing bulges out more around the dash, but I'm not sure how the actual measurements of the two clusters compare, or how the PreGen cluster would compare.

I can't find any good Gen2 fairing stay pics at the moment. Here's a thumbnail from an old eBay auction that Google pulled up:



You could probably fab up some mounts for a headlight, but in stock form it just has a big hole there since the light mounts directly to the fairing. The two tabs on the bottom are where the screws come through to hold the fairing on.


If it helps any for just chopping the PreGen fairing into two separate pieces, our lower is held on with just four screws. There are two mounting tabs at the bottom of the radiator, and two more mounts on the centerstand brackets.

You can just barely make out the holes here. Two in the top front and two in the crosspiece at the back.




I'm too lazy to go rip my bike apart just to take pics for you, but feel free to ask me stuff about the 500 and I'll try to answer as best I can, with relevant pics if I have them.

[soonerbillz]

I don't know what exactly you are looking for but if you go to later pages on my thread here you can see the mods I made to my pre gen fairings...

https://www.ninjette.org/forums/showthread.php?t=187989