wheelchairstuntn wrote on 12/11/11 at 18:26:30:

You'll have to let us know when you're down here so we can do a get together.

verslagen1 wrote on 12/15/11 at 20:05:05:


It'll be March: My Painting workshop is scheduled for the weekend of the 24th. It'll be a short trip, and I'll be super-busy, but since you're BOTH down there, we'll have to meet up for a beer or some tacos, or a bowl of cereal somewhere, or whatever y'all SoCal types are doing these days... (I just can't keep up...)  

I sent Rpn' a PM, but it's not top secret. If you want to see what I do...
http://www.chrisdingwell.com/
or, the ever popular FaceFudge....
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=534840785&ref=tn_tnmn

e-mail
chris@chrisdingwell.com...

JohnBoy wrote on 12/17/11 at 00:07:31:


Yeah, the tank is 3.5 Gallons, or somewhere in there. I looked it when I looked up the specs for the bike: 1969 Suzuki T350.

I chose it because I mostly wanted a truly vintage looking tank, and I had it lying around, so it was already paid for! I bought it over 3 years ago to put on a Yamaha 250 that I was going to cafe at the time, but my schedule and lack of any real skills totally killed that dream, so it was just hanging around my garage taunting me! It has the correct period gas cap, and petcock. I just needed to find the badges, which wasn't too hard on Fleabay.

teabowl13 wrote on 12/22/11 at 13:54:44:


Switching to a mono-shock swingarm like that won't flow very well with the VINTAGE ROADSTER look that you were after. But, a mono-shock swingarm like that on a bobber would look pretty sweet...kinda like the one that truckinduc made for his Savage. (Even though he did many more items to make his Savage look/perform more like a street-fighter rather than a cruiser/bobber)

http://www.customfighters.com/forums/showthread.php?t=26316 - that bike cray


EJID wrote on 12/22/11 at 14:01:56:

There was a vincent with a soft tail config.
The shock were at the back bone and it flexed at the bottom.

So if you took your sketch and flipped the bracing to the top and extended it upwards.

I can help you with the math.

swingarm is 19" axle to pivot
shock mt is 15" mt to pivot
upper mt is 13" to pivot

spring rate is about 100#per inch
times 2 times or 200 # per inch at the shock mt.
The angle the shock is leaning over will change that too.
I'll be glad to look at it once you have the geometry you want.

That's a GORGOEUS Vincent! (an understatement, I know...)

And YES, it's a really good way to get a mono-shock into the frame.
In fact, as I've looked around at mono-shock conversions on the inter-nerd, and I've seen that most of them are designed basically this way; a large brace comes up above the swingarm, and the shock itself positioned more horizontally.

I can't help but assume that smarter people than me (like the nice folks at Vincent Motor Company...) have figured out that this system works better than what I have come up with so far.

Yes, I could move the shock up and forward in the frame, but I will run into the carb and filter at some point. Of course, I could turn those out to the side for a more sporting look... but I was also planning to tuck all of my electricals into that upper space...
None the less, this has me thinking about some alterations to my drawing that could be fruitful...

Either way, the complicated part is figuring out what kind of shock will actually WORK with whatever geometry I figure out (Since I can't aford to spend $1,200 to have the Ohlins R&D team build me something custom...)
The other option is to source a shock; say the CBR shock, and then work backwards from there to design a geometry that will suit it.

Either way, it ain't easy, but it is fun to think about.
And NO, it won't really fit with the "Retro" look I started aiming at, but I don't mind a bit of mish-mash....

Gets complicated, don't it?  

WOW! Finally got to go down to Jay's place and get some work done last weekend. I drove down Saturday night after the kids went to sleep, and woke up to find my bike entirely apart! It's a good thing this Savage goes together easy...


First time I'd seen the inside of the motor, and what's visible so far looks brand new!  


And the rest of it is all over here somewhere....


Swingarm is sitting on the table; Jay modified the center bracing to make more room for the rear tire... Just tacked together for now, and that's a good thing; we found it was a little too tight when we went to put it back together!


Here are the shocks sitting next to the Dyna Muffler we were going to use, but Jay found this older muffler on the shelf at his shop, and it was a great price; FREE! so we thought we'd try it. Check out the new Ballistic Lithium Ion Battery sitting there too....


And in the blink of an eye, she's all back together!
The new muffler is amazing! Looks like it was made for the bike (It actually sits tighter than it looks here, the header wasn't tightened down, but it'll work) It's the exact size to fit over the outer header pipe, so it makes a super smooth transition. My only fear is that it'll be really loud; it's pretty wide open inside, and that it'll be hard to tune correctly... but it looks too darn cool not to use it....



Footpegs come from a '91 FZR600; not quite the right period, but they bolt on just like all the aftermarket rearsets, and personally I like the way they look a lot better. Besides they were a third the price... Just have to weld a couple of brackets to the frame and she's done. The stock Savage shifter arm is even the exact right size!



And here's the battery tucked down into that "what-ever-it-is-you-California-types-get-that-we-don't-need" bracket between the engine and swingarm. It''ll be virtually invisible, as will the wires running up the back of the frame. Hooray! (let's just pray it works...  )


Gonna have to make room for the petcock... darn, it's a tight fit up here!


Getting ready to fiberglass the seat pan!!



Jay gives it a nice massage....


And there she is! That'll get cut to shape this week, and mounting bolts added, and hopefully he'll be bringing it to me this weekend to get started on the upholstery! That's my job...




OH YEAH! the chain is on... Gonna need to make some sort of delrin slider guard for that swingarm for sure!


Fender placed just for photo's sake... The stock bracket will come off, and to hold it up, he'll use two simple rods extending up from a point on the swingarm to where the original bracket's rivet holes are. Here's a few more shots just for fun...



This one shows the pipe hitting the swingarm, but when it's finally assembled, we will be able to pull that pipe forward another two inches or so, and bend it slightly out, so it should just clear the swingarm, especially once it's sitting on its full weight...


I paid way more than I wanted to for these badges on Fleabay, but they have exactly the right amount of "patina" to match the tank...


Oh, and Lastly... Jay would probably be making a lot more progress on this thing except that he just picked up this old Sportster Cafe project; FOR A DOLLAR!!  


And that's all for now, Folks!!