XJ700 Fighter-ish project

So, what started out as an awesome sport tourer with a few mechanical and carb issues

then turned in to an adventure bike and took me all over the place

and is now in the process of getting cut up, rewired and remade in to something that will cause heads to turn as I cruise around the crowded streets of SF.

I wasn't really sure where I was going with it, but after I took off the first set of parts and made the first cut the whole project sort of took off from there. For a month or so, it sat in my yard looking something like this

After neglecting it for a bit I decided to take action and turn this in to a project with some sort of undefined finishing goal.

I first tore in to the electrical system and made the bike have an even more minimal wiring harness (I've yet to get a headlight or a brake light)

I then cut even more of the rear subframe and welded in a new piece to mark the edge of the soon to be made seat.

Now that I have room to work with I played around with the wiring and managed to hide all of the electronics + wiring and was left with 3 groupings of wires that needed to make their way by the battery: a ground, a live power wire, and a grouped set of wires/connectors which head to the now hidden TCI/coils/etc.

The coiled wire on the side is the power wire that goes to the relay and the battery. I've yet to finish up cleaning up/shortening the wires in this area as I want to make a battery box and move it forward, now that I have all this extra space in front of the battery


I'm doing all of this with limited tools (a hack saw, a grinder, HF welder and a few basic tools) so I'm spending a lot of time looking for the "right" materials to make parts and pieces (aka - can be manipulated easily with the tools at hand) so the battery box is an on-going project while I source some metal or a suitable box.

Any ideas on what you guys would do for a battery box?

In the mean time, to keep momentum (and keep myself occupied to avoid going crazy) I got inspired by a build on the street fighter forum and started making my own seat pan. It's now up to the second layer of glass and looks like it may need one more layer at the front at least.



I'm excited to get the seat pan glassed and shaped so that I can have a second try at making my own seat and cover.

What do you guys think so far?

 

Coming along NICE! What's your plan for bars, headlight and such if you're going with a streetfighter "look"? What's the story with the carb filters???

skillet

 

wow, i like it. In for updates.

 

I made the "pods." It's 1.5" plumbing tubing couplings that I cut in half, stuffed with cut up foam from a Uni air filter which is packed in to a metal screen (so the carbs don't suck in itty bitty pieces of the foam, and to keep big stuff from hitting the filter). Since all pods are effectively a nightmare for tuning, I thought atleast doing it this way I can get them super small and taking up little to no room. Mine actually run way too rich right up until around 6 - 7k RPM, but I'm going to try Rick's trick and put a breather hose to the air inlet and route that outside of the turbulent flow of air to see what happens. I actually took out the insides "package" of foam and screen and stuffed it in to the original velocity stacks. Seems to have helped a little. Here's a close up on the filters I made.


I'm not too sure about the handlebars, I really don't want to buy new ones. I had an idea of bending the stock ones just a bit. When they are flipped (as if going the cafe route), I want to raise the ends up (to flatten them along a plane with the rest of the bars) and pull them slightly more forward. Not sure though, the only pipe bender I have access to is my hands and feet. As for the light, I have an idea

Anyone know if it's possible to completely eliminate the battery on these bikes and replace it with a cap? I really don't like the idea of having a battery box, and I've ran out of places to hide the battery.

Third layer of glass went on last night, it's looking pretty good. I'm going to try and peel the pan from the mold tonight and work on it some more over the weekend.

 

very cool.


What are you doing with your airbox... wanna get rid of the little chrome covers on the airbox?

 

Looks good so far, can't wait to see how that seat turns out. I hope you don't get caught in a heavy rain with those new filters, don't think it will run good sucking water in. It does look cool.

 

I LOVE the start to this. Are you referring to CF as far as your inspiration for the seat? I saw a dude on there make a pretty kick ass pan for his. I should do the same for mine. Maybe this winter.....I think I'll go with the 2up sportster one for now.

 

Looking good man.

For the battery box you can just get some sheet metal and bend it over the edge of a table into a box anysize you need. Weld the corners together and paint it how you want.

For the handle bars you can bend them with a propane torch and something for leverage. A jack handle or a big wrench. I did this for mine with them mounted on the bike to straighten out the grip part a bit. I had a buddy hold the other side of the handle bars we torched the bar a little and slid the wrench over the end and pushed. I only bent it maybe 1/2 inch or so but it made a world of difference.

 

cool project man, imma keep an eye on this. Im doing the same thing, about bobbing my bike as well

 

schooter - I tossed those when I first got the bike, they looked a bit tacky as it was just plastic.

koolaid - yep, the CF forum is a great source of inspiration. Lots of interesting projects going on there.

I'm going to invest in a drill and a propane torch this weekend, that'll help the project move along. What's best for cutting shapes out of metal? Jig saw?

Anyway, I got the 3rd (and hopefully last) coat of glass done, going to mark the cut lines and pull the mold tonight.


Didn't do much else to the bike this weekend, decided to climb Mt. Shasta instead. I snapped a few pics along the way. This one's about halfway through the climb, taking a break above the clouds.

 

Dremel and a stack of wheels or a cutting bit for internal cuts. It'll get more use then a jigsaw.

 

I've never been a fan of the dremel cutting wheels as they are always too small, forcing me to hold the dremel at an awkward angle and make sloppy cuts. Maybe I should also elaborate, I'm looking to get a 1'x1' foot of steel plate, draw out a part/design on it and cut it out. Using a dremel on that seems quite tedious... Maybe I'm using the tool wrong, but I really hate having to rely on a dremel for cutting stuff out, unless they're small intricate patterns.

 

What thickness of steel plate?

 

Depends on the project really, but anywhere from 1/8" to a max. thickness of 1/4" (for instance if I want to cut the brackets that are going to hold forward controls). Essentially I want to get something that's multi purpose so I can also use it to cut a variety of things (I know, dremel is the "multi purpose" tool, but I just feel uncomfortable using it. That and dremel bits are expensive!)

 

I cut my 1/4 plate for my forwards with 4" cut off wheels on my angle grinder and a recpricating saw. The recip saw blades did not last long, are sort of expense and really can't make good turns. The wheels have their own limits. I don't know if a jig saw would work better. Plasma is the way to go but expensive.

 

So I got some new tools over the week: a drill, a propane torch and a rivet gun. All of which I quickly put to use. The seat's done, it looks more or less how I expected it to. Check out the progress pics below.

I pulled the fiberglass mold and cut it to size then cut some foam to shape and stuff in underneath. The whole thing is wrapped in a piece of natural cowhide. I made the belt in the pic from the same cut of leather... just 3 or 4 years earlier. I'm a fan of letting natural leather wear in, after some time it just looks "right."

The seat's going to be fastened directly to the gas tank so that's why the screw is there. It's more for placement of the hole, I just didn't have any eyelets big enough to make a nice cut out for it.





The underside before I cut and sewed down the excess leather and trimmed the rivets






I put it on the bike and it looks quite cool, need to clean up the mounting location though. What do you guys think? I'll get some shots of it on the bike in a bit; when I first went out to my bike I found out my tach died so I was in no mood to snap pics. The lights all work, but the needle won't move anywhere. Ugggh... I hate electrical.

On the plus side, I scored a 3'x 3' piece of 1/8" steel, it was just sitting on the sidewalk about a block from my place. Now I have something to make the battery box out of. May also mess around with my bars and start bending them. Before I rant too much, let me know what you think of the seat. It looks pretty awesome to me, but not too comfortable. Next time I'll use higher density foam.

 

Get some memory foam..

Are you going to cover it in that thick leather? I like that idea.. Very nice.

 

Hmm, it's been awhile since I updated. I have made progress and moved my battery up, added a "custom" brake light as well as tidied up the wiring to where I'm satisfied with the bike for now.

I had a crazy idea for the exhaust but other projects have been getting in the way... like that I got a Vstrom 650 to tear it up on, too Don't worry, the Max and the DL have been getting along just great.