I am waaaay to slow at this stuff to make any money at it. I might get faster....dunno. I still have my wife's bike to build after this. Hers will be a lot simpler. I was thinking I should be making this stuff for the new liquid cooled GS1200's.....then I could make a serious profit. Too funny man! This was a predicted post by my wife. Her words were "what's his name is going to freak out when he sees them now"! I had to purchase the die to make these, so I will have more invested in my crash bars than anyone here I think, but the next set will be cheap.
TIG is something that takes a little getting used to. I would TIG everything if I had the time, but I'm usually in a crunch so I MIG most of my stuff. But once you get it down, and stop electrocuting yourself, TIG can become an art.
So...the electrocution thing is normal. . I can mig like the wind, but haven't done much of it lately. I had to tack welded some of the tubing in the crash bar with mig and that was a huge mistake. I made a mess trying to go over them with tig. I wish I would have learned that on another project. We talked about glasses or lens inserts earlier on this thread and as much as I hate to admit it, my eyes are getting worse. I am looking forward to a ride report when you do your run on the boarder road RE. Be sure and keep us up to date on that. What we got out of it was priceless. We are going to have some great rides ahead of us Ken.
Lol...wise woman you got there Let her know that my desktop background on my work pc is now that pic (uh....yeah, seriously ). I feel you on the die cost man, I have a JD2 also. Me and a couple 4x4 friends here at work went in on one a few years ago so we could build up some custom roll cages on our rigs. I built a simple "sport cage" add-on for my TJ and we made a couple CRAZY stout cages for their FJ40 and FJ60. Bending tube is definetly an art, and I am nooooooo artist I'm sure you mentioned it before, but what size tube did you use for your bars? I know I will never be happy with the SW-Motechs bars after seeing yours, and I am thinking of just biting the bullet and getting a new die to make some myself. Just thinking out loud right now...I am still hoping the Hepco bars form Motomachines.com will be similar to yours
That would be fantastic if you built your own kjack! I will be glad to walk you through it. The tubing was ordered through Online Metals. It took them a looooong time to ship it for some reason and all steel was in stock, so they said. It is A513 type 5 DOM. 1" OD .065 wall. I used a 3" radius die. I bought 3 of the 8 foot sticks of DOM and planed on waste. You at least have a design to follow, so you might not have much waste. I have 6' left over and had 3 waste pieces that came in handy as model tools. The Notchmaster is a nice tool if you don't have one already. I have a few tips on that too if you need. I will have to finish mine so you can have a better screen saver.
This thread makes me want to buy a TIG, and a mandrel bender, and a house with a garage, and quite a lot of metal tubing. Nicely done guys!
Ya..it will give you a slight tingle on high frequency start if you ground to the table and not the work if you are leaning on the table. When the arc starts, it goes away. I just assume its from a poor ground, but I don't know for sure.
Completely covered and no where near the ground....but it usually is when I clamp the work in the vise and lean on the table or work.
Teaser photos of the aux. fueltank. Got the filler neck, alu. weld in fittings, the alu. sheet is bent according to the card-board mock up waiting for welding, will have a heavier gauge top plate that will function as a rear rack. Thinking about making another tank that will replace the plastic rear rack completely with the same mounting points. Sorry for the bad cellphone pics.
This could be the greatest TR650 mod to date Hansi!! Thanks for sharing it with us. Am I seeing this correctly that there is going to be a useable rack on top of the tank?
Yes, usable rack on top. 12" x 14" x 10" or thereabouts. Tank is only 3"tall. Dimensions are changing as we are going along for practical reasons. I have a friend of mine, that owns a muffler repair/fabricating business, doing the TIG welding since I suck at it and I don't want for the tank to fall apart on a trail ride. If the tank works out he is thinking about making up some more to sell.
My Seat Concepts stuff is on! Had a friend help with installation and it looks great. The difference between the stock and SC saddle is all in the middle of the seat, where it is about 1" higher. I haven't had a chance to ride it yet, but I no longer feel like my butt is being drawn into a hole. The bump is still on the back, but it's a bit easier to slide forward and back now. After my ride later this month I'll have a much better idea of how the change works, but for now, I like it!
Looks Great Ken! I'm interested to hear how you like it. Particularly if it helps your legs stretch out - without messing up the butt to bar height ratio too much
That's a nice looking seat. I'll have to get a few longer rides under my belt and see if a seat upgrade might be good to get. Seat Concepts is a quick side trip from the end of my normal ride, so it wouldn't be any problem. Any differences in the foam?
