XV920 build or affectionately Super Advanced Life-Threatening Lego (Y)Project

Hello everyone, new guy here.

I've been trolling the site for a while sponging information like a leech without returning the favor. My initial plan was to not do a build thread until I had all the pieces sorted out, and then was going to only document the final assembly. I was going to choose this method purely on the basis that it was less pressure on me to take pictures of things that may not even be relevant, less pressure on me to deliver consistent updates. Also, to possibly save my foolish face from proving to everyone with photo evidence, that I have no idea what I am doing, that I don't even know how to ride a motorcycle, but that if I am going to hurt myself on one, it will be the one that I made.

So let me provide myself a small amount of credit and say that I am not a stranger to building things with tires. I was a car mechanic for ten years, restored and modified older model cars in a semi-employed status for 6 of those years, and have consistently been gear-headed since I was small.

I would like to extend a quick thank you to some of the members whose 'activities' have inspired me to accumulate the mess I have gathered, paved the way, and provided the direction I have taken with this thing.
Sqiurlley, Swapmeetlouis(sp?), Turbodog, Swagger, loekm, knifemaker87, The Red Wonder, Pacomotorstuff(sp?) Beachcomber, Biker reject Mjpriceisright, Rich Ard, Tim (mod), that nay-sayer Swivel, and sighboysigh (for his oh-my-god-what-the-f***-shut-the-f***-up-I-think-he-might-be-on-to-something-no-i-was-wrong) and a bunch of others whose names are escaping me. Chances are, if you've done what I have done to a motorcycle, especially an early XV and posted it on Dotheton, I've read it, and copied it. Thank you.

The current working title of this serenade with death is the Super Advanced (Possibly) Life-Threatening Lego (Y)Project. The Possibly is implied, and the Y is silent, unless you are using the acronym S.A.L.L.Y. We all know thats not how acronyms work, but thats not stopped any of us before.

Enough of that, here is what I am working on.

This is the only picture I have of this thing before I took it apart. We all know how ugly this thing was, no one needs more pictures of sin. It sat in my yard from February to July of 2012 and amassed a healthy collection of aggressive looking spiders. It fell over because I undid the wrong tie down first. At least I got that out of the way on someone else's paint job.

Decided to take the Squirrelly route using GSXR forks and triples, and the Harley front wheel. In retrospect the '06 GSXR forks seem to be a bit short for the height of this particular bike.

Found a relatively cheap, mostly complete '06 GSXR750 front end in decent shape on ebay, and a decent '05 Harley Narrow glide front wheel, 19x2.5 via CL for $100

A little guidance from the redboywonder's thread about actually fitting these bits together and there we go. Sort of.

In the end, I do not like the fitment of the 01 GSXR rotors on this wheel. I can have a ring machined, and then weld that to the rotor to fill in the gap, but doing that for every new rotor irritates me and I haven't even done it to the first pair yet. Brake tech makes a rotor that'll solve this, but its cryogenically treated mermaid nuts expensive. Not terribly worried about it, the brake lines aren't even attached yet.

Spacers were needed and made for the calipers, and the front axle. No pictures of the actual pieces by themselves, but here are some drawings I made of them. there is another spacer for which I have no drawing. The spacer for the right side (with the lip) is basically the stock one extended 7mm-ish. Another 7mm spacer needed to be made for the left side, but with no lip.

I decided that since I did all that work to make the front brakes appear to have been improved, that the rear brake should at least look improved as well.

After many months of deliberation, I decided on the '77 CB750F Supersport disc rear wheel. It was the only wheel that I could find that fit my three primary requirements. It had to have a cushioned drive, it had to have a disk brake, It had to be spoked, and of the same style as the front, and cheaper than a one-off.

I asked and asked and asked everyone I knew who knew someone into old hondas, scoured CL and ebay for months, to no avail. I was ready to give up and get a drum brake wheel, and then all of a sudden no one had any of those either. You can't give em away till someone needs one, and then its gold plated.

My understanding is the stock '77 disc brake is hardly an 'upgrade', even for that bike back in the 70's. So after even more research and I decided to adapt an '03 R1 disc, caliper and carrier to the Honda wheel, not so much from a performance aspect, but because thats pretty much the only 220mm rear brake that could possibly be adapted to it.

That adapter was a complicated little fellow, shrouded in mystery and pretension. I almost got it right, but fell 1mm short on the backside. Not a critical error, just a little something to nitpick.

Nice work DH ...............yep, many more of these here Yam Vees and we'll be getting our own thread [ not really ]

As you are aware, my particular take ["Vindicator" ] is an homage to my own youth with a Sixties Brit style Cafe Racer.

I have lot's of ideas rummaging around in my brain for a "Special", I have the imagination, but have to admit to myself I no longer have the facilities, and NEVER possesed the artisan skill to make the necessary bits - spacers, adaptors, etc.

It is good to know that that spirit of adventure from the Sixties is alive an well with the new generation of Special builders. Long may you all flourish. 8)

Yzf600 shock installed. It's too short and requires a new upper mount to recoup what little precious ground clearance it can.

And this is how it sits currently... so much more to do...

beachcomber said:

Nice work DH ...............yep, many more of these here Yam Vees and we'll be getting our own thread [ not really ]

As you are aware, my particular take ["Vindicator" ] is an homage to my own youth with a Sixties Brit style Cafe Racer.

I have lot's of ideas rummaging around in my brain for a "Special", I have the imagination, but have to admit to myself I no longer have the facilities, and NEVER possesed the artisan skill to make the necessary bits - spacers, adaptors, etc.

It is good to know that that spirit of adventure from the Sixties is alive an well with the new generation of Special builders. Long may you all flourish. 8)

Click to expand...

Thank you BC. I didn't make the bits, I just measured them out. Although with how flakey and prissy the machinists are in my area, I might start having to make them simply to save the earache.

I've been following your builds here since I found this site. Thanks for the ideas and inspirations...

Welcome to the fray, dirtyhands - looking forward to watching your progress!

Thanks Rich Ard, I hope its worth watching!

Forgot to mention that the earlier YZF600 shocks do not have an external reservoir and are the same length as your stocker.

Rich Ard said:

Forgot to mention that the earlier YZF600 shocks do not have an external reservoir and are the same length as your stocker.

Click to expand...

Hmm… Im pretty sure I got a yzf600 shock, but it has an external reservoir. It may not be 'early' enough.
I've been contemplating a swing arm/ linked suspension conversion with a vertical shock arrangement and alloy arm, because even though a new top mount wouldn't be hard to make, it kind of makes more sense to upgrade the kinda junky steel arm altogether.

Also, I'm also out of fun money for the moment and window shopping swing arms on eBay that might be easily adapted, so I'm going to leave it alone for the time being.

Also considering sectioning the front of the frame to get the weird goose neck bend out of it to get the engine up higher.

So I finally have an update, but the site wont let me upload pictures.

I decided to go forth with an alloy swingarm conversion. I opted for the Honda VTR as it seemed like the most logical choice. It has similar cc's, is a v-twin, and uses a mounting design that is easily adapted to the XV frame, it also has the same axle diameter as the CB750/XV20 parts I was using on the rear wheel, so I managed to not make a bunch of extra work for myself there.

here it is. this is basically how its going to sit. I'm going to have to modify the case near the swing arm pivot so that I will have room to install/remove the chain slider.
The VTR pivot area is quite a bit wider than the VX's as well as the pivot bearings being in the swingarm ears rather than in the frame.
Steel spacer bushings will be made to replace the needle bearings in the XV pivot tube as well as an extension, about an inch long, for the left side of the XV frame to support the extra length of the new spacers/tube.
Once the swing arm is located properly to the frame, the dog-link, and upper shock mounts can be fabricated.
The way it is looking currently, the upper shock mount with have to be integrated to the subframe, with I find a little unfortunate, as I wanted to do the tank seat and rear sets after the suspension was all set up. I might be able to work around it, but I wont know until I am further along.

thanks for the shout out dude, I love how your bike is coming along, looks awesome.. I keep telling Richard I wanna do a chain drive XV with a single sided swinger, its gonna be my next project! looks great though, love that front end, currently using one on my 450.

Yeah thank you MJ, your work and shit talking has been inspirational .

The exhaust you just put on yours is pretty rad and fits the look of that thing really well. Bummer you're having such a headache with that CDI(TCI) garbage, I'm not looking forward to that end of my build myself.

Yeah the single sided swing arm XV that Classified moto built is pretty neat looking, but those parts are so damn expensive, its ridiculous.
All the honda rear suspension stuff I just bought ran me just under 150 total sourced from ebay, those single sides are 550-800, mostly bare without hubs, brakes, or anything, and you dont even want to look at those Duc wheels. Mostly, my aversion to those parts has to do with that once you've gone that route, you're totally locked into Ducati parts, theres very little aftermarket, or crossover even across Ducati models/years. This Japanese stuff has been pretty easy so far, considering.

Whoa... How the hell did I miss this? Rad stuff so far Dirtyhands. Keep at it.

VonYinzer said:

Whoa... How the hell did I miss this? Rad stuff so far Dirtyhands. Keep at it.

Click to expand...

Von Yinzer, thanks, I'll try!