It was on Cafe Racer here and E Boz ride it. Absolutely my kind of bike!












The headlight looks great as is from the side. It's just avout as close as you can get it. I like it.

 

cheers man, managed to squeeze it in about another 2-3mm, much happier with it. just need to drill some holes in the brackets so that i can mount the indicators to it, seems like the simplest place to mount them.

 

Yeah, and you can get some really small ones nowadays. I have a set that is 6 LEDs (2 rows of 3) and only sits out about an inch. $5 on eBay.


Or, you could also mount them with an "L" or corner bracket off of the lower triple tree pinch bolts

 

so its been a few weeks, only had a few hours over the last couple of weekends to work on it as well but she's running about now.

so after riding it for about a week and it could just be that naked bikes feel quicker as the wind isn't getting deflected but the bike feels to be running much smoother without the air solenoid, something that i find strange anyway. roads are pretty grim here at the moment but bike seems to handle really quite well, definite improved turn in speed not that I've been able to really push on it.

the brakes definitely need new pads, got some ebc hh's on the way but otherwise feel pretty damn strong but not all that much of an improvement over the f3's but we shall see what its like with new pads and braided lines when i get round to that. its worth noting that its a bit of a **** to squeeze brake calipers off of a 330mm disk without making contact with the rim and scratching it.

thought i had a slight warp in the disk, freed off all the floating bobbins on the disk and it seems to have sorted itself, either that or its just no longer noticeable at the lever lol

no pictures of the routing of the wiring loom really but i'll take some when I'm working on it later, i cut about 7'' out of it to squeeze it all in, once i got everything where i wanted it, soldered, heat shrunk and taped up i realised that i still needed to take a huge chunk out of the wiring to stop it being so bunched up and to make sure its not going to rub off of anything. but it looks sweet with it not on the frame, just have to remove the tabs from the frame before it comes to respray/powdercoat time.

never underestimate just how much time is involved in re-routing a wiring loom! :P



no wires on the frame! need to look at alternative routing for the clutch cable or perhaps just hide it a little better.



not going to relocate the cdi/ecu box & R/R until the subframe is being modified but it would look pretty sweet as is with them stashed elsewhere. goingto have to find a suitable place for the R/R when the other tail goes on.



could do with putting the RHS control cable round the front of the forks. you can see where I've went in through the frame though



& LHS. i did notice that now I'm going to have to address the round headlight brackets not clearing the frame. and that with the radiator actually in place the forks graze its bracket. i think that this is just stopping the steering lock from getting into place as well.



some temporary spacers either side of the headlight. when the headlight was tightened up prior to these its made the shell oval and it impossible to get the lens on so rather than haul the whole thing off to turn the brackets round i just spaced it out to stop the squeeze.



speedo bracket caused issues with getting the plug for it in, it just needs tweaked and nipped down a bit. vinyl glove over the plug just to stop it getting crude up for now. (yes I'm riding without a speedo lol) also need to replace the front brake light switch as the casing was broken off beside the mounting point.



fuse box wires stretched out and relocated to battery tray.



fuse box wires wrapped up / cable tied into an inner tube i had lying around, used this method for all the places where the wires needed some beefy protection in tight places.



some of the nest of wires under the tank, the loom is just a bit too long in there at the moment, it also made the fuel pipe a total dick to squeeze on with the limited room. i managed to bring all the control cables to this point, so this is where all the connectors are. pics to follow.

so the plan for today is to get the speedo wired in, decide on a drilling pattern for the headlight bracket (thinking about doing something similar to the holes in the headlight fairing of an early fireblade) get indicators mounted and possibly tidy the loom up a little bit more if I've got the time.

i'll snag some pics of the routing and my new toys whilst i'm at it.

ahwell, there should be an update later on.

 

nice clean look averall. good job. that one picture makes it look like you installed a basket on your rear seat. Now that's what i call custom. :-)

 

Naked bikes are just faster! Haha, its a very different sensation, isn't it, riding the bike with no fairings? Needless to point out, I'm very fond of it.

Its looking really good. Great job on the headlight and wiring. The new pads will help. And SS lines would also make a difference in that department as well.

 

yeah conrice! quite curious as to wether the loss of weight is countered in performance by increased air drag but they certainly feel quicker! =P completely forgot what naked bikes felt like, love it.

padwise i almost went for brembo ceramic carbon (road compound) but there really is so much information on pad materials that completely counter any gains to be made. so i stuck with what i knew, good ol' sintered pads lol quite curious to see how good the ebc's are, they get a good write up.

also found out that i've got access to a hydraulic press for making up brake lines and whatnot so i'm going to have a look at the cost of materials vs just buying lines.

any way, heres some toys before i head out into the cold to play about with electrics.



the indicators i had previously are actually stuck on the front fairing haha so I've got some led replacements / resisters. exhaust gaskets aren't really a toy haha but I've got some sanding / polishing mops for the drill coming next week so i can get my downpipes off and cleaned so I'm as well off replacing the gaskets. could do with doing the brake seals whilst I'm doing the pads just for peace of mind but they're not cheap and the old ones are probably still good for another decade if I'm being honest xP really looking forward to battling with what are probably going to be seized header bolts ... honest :P



heres the main bit! :P k5 gsxr 750 steering dampener. really looking forward to getting that on. its going to be a fair bit of messing around to get it fitted with the headlight and ram air duct in the way but i'll show that when it becomes a priority. definitely needs bled a little but the plan is to get it on, see how it feels and then maybe go to a heavier grade of oil. we shall see.

wish progress with this build would speed up a bit but it's all about time and resources but i'm closing into the end of the first stage.

 

I build my own lines! Haven't bought complete lines since I learned how. Look forward to the looks you get when you tell them that you build them yourself. Its priceless!

The thing is that its getting expensive to build your own, at least through Earl's. Russell's lines have gotten incredibly cheap and all you need are the hose ends - so thats what I've done for the front (as building the line AFTER I've snaked it through the swingarm on the rear is a must).

 

haha i can imagine dude! thats really cool though, there's just something inherently badass about building your own brake lines isn't there. i can definitely see both sides of it though but at the end of the day its just a bit of hydraulic hose with a couple of banjos crimped on the end, nothing fancy or 'trustworthy' until they write HEL or goodridge on them.

saving doing lines until I've got the renthals/on.

 

so this is how i had to leave it last time, you can't really see it but the whole section doubles back on itself underneath. the brown tape!! so much brown tape lol ran out of black and the only person around only had brown. does the job but it looks a bit crap.



cables routed between the ducts.



need to keep the coil area as clear as possible, there is practically zero room between the coils and airbox when its on, thats why i have everything tucked to the sides. otherwise the airbox will not marry up with its inlet.



wiring up the speedo! soldering, heat shrinking & taping.



this style of connector, is absolute garbage however i have used them to piggy back onto the battery and ignition switch, ideally i would have stripped a section of cable and crimped the wire in but i had these to hand, you really need to make sure that they have cut into the wire else you'll spend half an hour trying to figure out why you don't have power though haha



slightly tidier now anyway, still want to shorten the unseen bit that doubles back on itself to make life easier.



speedo cables taped & wrapped in inner tube down the right hand side. also using the inner tube cut open and flat on top of the coils just to reduce any rubbing of the wires in that area.



speedo sensor bracket wasn't long enough so i had to get a bit creative, used two different sized brackets and managed to attach it to the mudguard bolt. had to put an extension bar through the bobbin on the disk and squeeze a socket onto it before using pipe grips to hold it whilst tightening. bit of a nightmare but ii got there.



speed sensor cable hidden as best i can, falling the brake line up.





new indicators. turned brackets around to get a tighter fit on the headlight and eliminate the spacers i had before. indicators are flashing too quickly despite having resistors, must need stronger ones in.



its not terrible but I'm not sure if i like the indicators replacing the normal bolts, certainly made life easier.



speedo//off



speedo//on. its only attached to on of the strips at the moment. the cable tie is just a precaution. the speedo is currently not programmed correctly but everything functions as it should. I've used the engine management light on the gauge for the side stand switch light, because... why not lol. the gauge is a pretty tidy bit of kit, decent amount of adjustability, can set previous mileage in, couple of backlight colours. terrible instructions but it was reasonably easy to wire up.



got the bike back together and myself home by 3am, dread to think what spelling.grammar is like right now.

next thing I'm hoping to do is get the wire loom completely finalised.