Few monoshocked, maybe you know this one?

Dave wrote on 02/03/20 at 15:19:23:



And it will be stiff as a MOFO. Which likely is not much worse than the stock.
Cool.
Srinath.

Nice spot, DieselBob- and thanks.

Dave, you probably remember this monoshock with a custom swing arm; I believe others [Ryca?] utilizing the stock swing arm buff up the cross member.

...and this sweet refinement by Bitterswede, using the swing arm from another bike:

Detail of the Droog back end showing the reinforced gusset:

So many of these monoshock bikes just become show bikes and are not ridden......the stock swingarm used for a monoshock most likely can be used for pushing a bike from a trailer to the display area.

The stock swingarm is too weak to be used as a monoshock - in the stock form the shock mounts are very near the rear axle and the cross member in front of the tire is thin sheet metal and only serves to keep the swingarm from twisting.  I know it is not strong enough for a shock mount and extensive reinforcement/reconstruction would be necessary if the bike were to be ridden.  I seriously doubt however that these "builder" forums ever share the photos of their failures.

With my GT550 tank I modified the steering limit to reduce how far the steering can move.  I can still turn around in a narrow two lane road and it does not affect the steering at riding speeds.

Dave wrote on 02/04/20 at 06:25:30:



The gt550 tanks on ebay are rather crappy, I think I can get away with this generic gn125 tank I got - or I will be buying a CB125 generic again to play around with. I'd probably have to figure out how I'm going to fit it first, the gn125 tank is short front to back, so allows to fit further back with some creative denting of the frame tunnel it literally can be fitted on the original mounts in the back. The problem with doing that is, it exposes the neck which isn't that attractive but let me see where it all fits and go from there.


Ooooo
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Motorcycle-Cafe-Racer-2-4-Gallon-9L-Vintage-Fuel-Gas...


Looks like this build -
http://suzukisavage.com/yabb2.2/Attachments/FullSizeRender_005_001.jpg
Uses that tank, but ofcourse he's modded the back 1/2 of the frame so it looks perfect. I don't have that option however I can figure a mount no issues as long as it will not get hit by my GS500 front end.

And another problem with the monoshock - if the bike is meant to take twin shocks the swingarm isn't used as a cantilever, fit a mono shock and it is now a cantilever. Now by turning the bike into a café by fitting clipon's or clubmans, you change its weight bias to the front, but would it still load the swingarm to the extent where it starts to tear and it would tear right at the brace starting with the underside ,and once that underside gets a little rip even on one side, the stress concentration will cause it to rip like a sheet of newspaper, will be a very very painful failure and it will never get noticed till too late. Mono shocks bikes have thick wall deep swingarms. Even a huge heavy Harley with monoshock tends to have round or oval section swingarms. So any monoshock conversion without a swingarm swap to the monoshock style swingarm is basically suicide.

PPS:
Never mind, he used FZR, but that katana build used the belt drive from the savage in the katana's rear wheel.

Cool.
Srinath.