GS(X)-250E Motarding.

[Guest]

You have thought it out well! Those are all pretty good.

It shouldn't be hard to make and the only difficult bit from my perspective would be the bending and attaching the frame clamps to it.

I'm guessing you could buy the stock, cut and drill what you need, then mark it out for them to bend and attach the clamps. Sounds simple in theory

 

[hillsy]

That's a fair question, and aside from the fact that i'm pretty sure the valving is a slightly different diameter on the gsx compared to the tx, the question has to be asked about the advantages gained from using the valving from the road bike and only the TS's fork inners. Not a lot to be gained apart from an extra 4cm of ride-height due to the longer tubes as I am going to be limiting the stroke by using roadbike valving. Just having extra ride height isn't a big help as I've got longer stroke shocks to fit on the rear.

Huh? Isn't the point of making the fork hybrid to get more ride height to match the higher rear end?

And what do you mean by "limiting the stoke by using road bike valving" ? The stroke / travel is governed by the damper rod length and spring rate, not the damping valving. The size of holes in the damper rod affect the damping rate of the fork (you should find the holes in the TS damper rods to be larger than the GS ones).

Not arguing, just sayin'

 

[mike-s]

I should have said I'm planning on keeping the GSX springs, adding the preload spacer from the TS and changing the fork inner tube and the damping rod to the TS's instead of writing valve. Forgive me, the terminology and me on suspension didn't mix too well that day.

If i skipped changing the damping rod i would get the ride height from a longer fork inner tube as the TS inner tube is 4cm or so longer than the GSX one, but i would retain the stock suspension travel, not what I'm aiming for.

By changing the inner tube as well as the damping rod i get the longer travel and the extra ride height. It also works out to be the simplest modification I can do as I've not had a lot of luck in taking the damper rods out of the TS fork inners as yet, and am not going to if i don't have to. Also it appears that the diameters of the damping rods differ, so that is a lot simpler for me to deal with as well.

 

[mike-s]

Some good news and bad news today, first the good news. I picked up an offcut of 5mm Aluminium cut to nearly the size i require. Plus another peice cut as a strip for me to make any mountings. I also managed to figure out how to convince the after market shocks to fit, this took abit of work to do.

Now the bad news, It looks like either the bike had a fall in the past or the jig wasn't set quite right upon fabrication. Basically i took the shocks off and let the rear wheel drop down to fit the shocks and it won't work. It turns out that the left muffler mount/pillion peg mount is interfering with the swingarm movement and the right id mere mm from doing so too. Time to take the rear wheel off, tie the swingarm up so its as hich as it can go, and take to the frame with a hammer. Dealing with the now minor issue of fork modification is on hiatus until this clanger is fixed.

 

[Guest]

Well you know what they say... you can tell how good a mechanic you are by the size of your hammer

Bit of a bugger there, but hopefully it won't be too hard to sort.

Good to hear you got your shocks sorted though and that aluminium should do the trick for the bash guard by the sounds.

 

[mike-s]

How to remove rubber bushes and their steel centre in one easy go. I had to do this as the bushes and their inner housing in the top eyelet on the new shocks were for a 10mm bolt and the ones on the frame were 12mm. I then forced the inner housing and the extremely hard old rubber out of the new shocks.

I then used the inner housing out of the GSX along with cut up sections of fuel injection hose to put the GSX inner housing in the new top end shock. Getting that to fit was not easy and i had to press it in with the aid of a vice. I kludged it with the bottom one in order to do a test fit and need to buy some cheap bicycle inner tube to provide the bottom rubber mounting as there is about 1.5mm clearance between the inner housing and the bottom shock eyelet and i didn't have any spare when i did the test fit this evening.

So close, yet so far. But nothing that a little hammer work won't fix. The other side where the muffler goes is going to be half as much work to fix up fortunately.

The new 5005 sheeting, all ready and waiting to go.

 

[mike-s]

Exhaust and Rear wheel are off and blowtorch and my heaviest hammer taken to the frame. Made a little bit of progress, however i need to go get a solid metal head one tomorrow as the rubber coating on this one is taking a beating (excuse the pun) and it's got to be absorbing some of the impact. Also think i need to be a little more enthusiastic with the use of the torch.

I have to tell you though, it is surprisingly therapeutic.

[edit]Afterthought: i might bring out the scissor jack and put it between the two mounts. If I pre-tension the mounts up with the jack and then apply a bit of heat to the side of the mounts with the mapp torch and put a bit more pressure on the mounts, i might be able to bend it. It's a slightly more controlled method than just heating it and bashing the snot out of it.[/edit]

 

[Guest]

Exhaust and Rear wheel are off and blowtorch and my heaviest hammer taken to the frame. Made a little bit of progress, however i need to go get a solid metal head one tomorrow as the rubber coating on this one is taking a beating (excuse the pun) and it's got to be absorbing some of the impact. Also think i need to be a little more enthusiastic with the use of the torch.

I have to tell you though, it is surprisingly therapeutic.

[edit]Afterthought: i might bring out the scissor jack and put it between the two mounts. If I pre-tension the mounts up with the jack and then apply a bit of heat to the side of the mounts with the mapp torch and put a bit more pressure on the mounts, i might be able to bend it. It's a slightly more controlled method than just heating it and bashing the snot out of it.[/edit]

Mate, giving something a good hammering always makes me feel good! Just don't get to do it often enough for effective stress relief

Having said that, the scissor jack idea could be a good one, and by heating only the side you want to bend should ensure the other side stays still.

 

[mike-s]

Exactly what i was thinking.

 

[Guest]

Good stuff, you'll have it straight in no time

 

[mike-s]

And not so much straight as "not getting in the way"

 

[Guest]

Even better

 

[mike-s]

Got the MAPP torch out, scissor jack and tied/moved everything out of the way so nothing got smoked accidentally, including removing the muffler off the header pipe.

I put the jack between the muffler mounts/pillion pegs and preloaded it so the mounts were bending out about 3-4mm.

I then applied a heap of heat to the upper and lower peices on one side until they were just starting to go cherry red

I then gave a good few twists on the scissor jack and pushed them out even further. I then let them cool down most of the way before using a little bit of sprayed water to cool it that last little bit (The last thing i need to do is muck up the makeup of the metal by annealing it).

I did this, alternating between the sides about 2 or 3 times and it worked. The last thing i need to do is file down the right mount on the inside as i don't want to move it out too much as it will make mounting the exhaust harder.

Mission accomplished.

 

[Guest]

Nice work! Just about ready to get on with the fun stuff hey?

 

[mike-s]

Unfortunately i've been busy with work & so on and haven't had a chance to do much in the way of significant work on the bike. However i did squeeze in about 3-4 hours this evening.

The swingarm now isn't even remotely close to binding on the pillion peg/exhaust mounts. All i have to do now is trim the exhaust mount down on the right side to make sure i'm now not offsetting the exhaust too much with the altered mount.

Most work was done with the rear shocks tonight, i figure do as much as i can on those and then worry about going back to work on the forks and the template for the bash plate afterwards (I'm hoping to get the plate basics/bending done on Monday).

Unfortunately the bottom eyes on the new shocks are way too wide at 29mm, in order to use them on the inserts from my current shocks, and give myself sufficient thread to be comfortable with the mounting i had to cut them down width ways to 19mm as the inserts im using are 20mm. I'm still not sure how i didn't manage to make more of a mess of things by getting the cuts more inaccurate than i did (only 0.5mm off on each one, so only about 89.5', almost perfect) and cleaned them up to correct spec with a file.

For those interested the existing rubber was shot, so i used apushbike inner tube for the bottom eye rubber mounting as there's not a lot of room in there and have used fuel injection hosing cut to fit for the top eye. The fit on these are so snug i have had to use a mallet & vice to get the inner eye to fit. Unfortunately i've had to take the inserts out of the top eye so i can take those eyes down a couple of mm with a file to be narrower than the inserts (19mm).

It doesn't look much, but it took a damn long time to do with the crappy hacksaw blade i had (until my neighbour gave me a really good new one to use/keep as he doesn't use his saw anymore), and even with the new blade it still took about an hour to do all the cutting. Add to that the filing the faces of the eye smooth and there's a couple hours well spent.

 

[Guest]

Nicely done! Hacksaws can be painfully slow on stuff like that, but if you're like me then it's a much safer option than a power saw or angle grinder with a cut off wheel.

 

[mike-s]

Speaking of which, my neighbour gave me his angle grinder to use, and i think I'm not going to use it and just put the hacksaw blade at an angle, bound to be safer for me than a tool I've never used before. Particularly in such a tight area.

 

[Guest]

Definitely!

My first experience with an angle grinder was a month or so ago when the house mate asked me to give him a hand cutting one of the old drain pipes off the house just underneath the gutter.

So, two stories up on a plank on a pair of trestles with a cut off wheel on an angle grinder... got it done ok but I would've preferred a less risky introduction to a power tool like that...

 

[mike-s]

Would have spent more time in the garage but it was woefull weather and i just didn't want to get soaked (i end up spreading my crap out under the shelder of the garage door, not so good for diagonal rain protection).

Aside from the delay in starting i got some actual progress, finished off the second shock today and fitted them up.

Aside from the gunk i need to clean out, the chain/swingarm clearance is nearish what i was hoping for (14.5-15mm) but not quite as roomy as i wanted as it's only 11.5-12mm. I'll certainly be fabbing up a nylon rub guard for there

Not pictured is the template i worked out for the bashplate. If my plans go smoothly, 'll be taking that to the place i got it from on about Thursday so that i can get it bent up and cut to the final size i need.

 

[Guest]

Mate, progress is good, no matter how small

Have you got plans for alternative mudguards or will you stick with the stockers?