Thanks in no small part to peer pressure from Mr. E and Deviant along with the Indy crew I started getting an inch and the only cure was more....enduro!
As circumstances would have it the story starts with my buddy Jared going down to Batteries Plus for a battery for his bike one day and the employee at the counter asked the question with only one answer. "So you like old bikes? I have one sitting at my house you can have for $100...interested?" He answered yes. I knew about the bike as it sat idly in storage and through a little bit of horse trading I happened to have a set of Avon Roadriders he needed, a trade was sparked, and I opened the dark storage building and brought this home. It's a 1982 Suzuki DR500.
In all of its 80s broke back styling I was starting to see beneath the surface. The goal here was to have a capable off-road motorcycle that could easily ride on the street, and carry a stash of camping gear for the adventures I was conjuring in my head. So I leaned it against the shop and opened a beer, and began to design the bike in the normal fashion in my head.
I knew that the suspension was heavy and outdated, I knew the tank wasn't good for a long trip, and I knew that the motor was locked up. First things first I tore down the top end of the engine and thankfully the piston had seized with water at the very top of the bore so I was able to get it free and send it off for a one size over bore. I then sent the head out to Joe at DWMS Racing to have the valve seats and faces recut (turned out to be a blessing as he found a bent valve!).
While the motor was down, I put in a Barnett clutch and through a little gamble I discovered that an early DR650 stator and CDI would bolt into these cases. This is preferred because the original bike was a simple battery-less magneto with a lighting coil at 6v so I wanted to upgrade to 12v with a battery to allow auxiliary lighting and a 12vdc power outlet for gps and phone charging.
Old magneto:
New side cover with stator:
Barnett clutch and heavy duty clutch springs:
Motor cleaned up and 463lbs of dirt and gunk removed.
It was now time to start focusing on the chassis and suspension. The swingarm was very narrow on the original bike so I had to find something that would fit which turned out to be a headache. I discovered that a 2001 TTR250 swinger would fit if I made new mounts so I bought a used one off of eBay and rebuilt the linkage bearings and then added on custom pivot mounts to the frame after surgically removing the factory versions. I turned down a couple of pivot point bushings on the lathe and welded them in:
After finding an XR600 shock that would both for the swingarm and the frame (attached reservoir shocks wouldn't fit into the skinny frame) I finalized all of the mounts:
I then sourced a set of RMZ450 forks which are a common upgrade on DR650s and made a new steering stem and grafted them onto the frame:
And since that tank drove me nuts with the way it looked I sourced a 94 DR650 tank and fabricated new mounts on the frame to bolt it right up.
And then fabricated a rear master cylinder bracket:
Which gets us to where she now sits:
On the way is a new seat, fender, etc. next up is getting the motor back together when the head comes back so I can mock up the exhaust and air filter system and start finalizing the rear of the frame for pannier mounts and a rack. I'm hoping for a completion date of the Spring Thaw, but only time will tell! I'll try to keep you updated as I progress!
Peer pressure is a biotch!
As circumstances would have it the story starts with my buddy Jared going down to Batteries Plus for a battery for his bike one day and the employee at the counter asked the question with only one answer. "So you like old bikes? I have one sitting at my house you can have for $100...interested?" He answered yes. I knew about the bike as it sat idly in storage and through a little bit of horse trading I happened to have a set of Avon Roadriders he needed, a trade was sparked, and I opened the dark storage building and brought this home. It's a 1982 Suzuki DR500.
In all of its 80s broke back styling I was starting to see beneath the surface. The goal here was to have a capable off-road motorcycle that could easily ride on the street, and carry a stash of camping gear for the adventures I was conjuring in my head. So I leaned it against the shop and opened a beer, and began to design the bike in the normal fashion in my head.
I knew that the suspension was heavy and outdated, I knew the tank wasn't good for a long trip, and I knew that the motor was locked up. First things first I tore down the top end of the engine and thankfully the piston had seized with water at the very top of the bore so I was able to get it free and send it off for a one size over bore. I then sent the head out to Joe at DWMS Racing to have the valve seats and faces recut (turned out to be a blessing as he found a bent valve!).
While the motor was down, I put in a Barnett clutch and through a little gamble I discovered that an early DR650 stator and CDI would bolt into these cases. This is preferred because the original bike was a simple battery-less magneto with a lighting coil at 6v so I wanted to upgrade to 12v with a battery to allow auxiliary lighting and a 12vdc power outlet for gps and phone charging.
Old magneto:
New side cover with stator:
Barnett clutch and heavy duty clutch springs:
Motor cleaned up and 463lbs of dirt and gunk removed.
It was now time to start focusing on the chassis and suspension. The swingarm was very narrow on the original bike so I had to find something that would fit which turned out to be a headache. I discovered that a 2001 TTR250 swinger would fit if I made new mounts so I bought a used one off of eBay and rebuilt the linkage bearings and then added on custom pivot mounts to the frame after surgically removing the factory versions. I turned down a couple of pivot point bushings on the lathe and welded them in:
After finding an XR600 shock that would both for the swingarm and the frame (attached reservoir shocks wouldn't fit into the skinny frame) I finalized all of the mounts:
I then sourced a set of RMZ450 forks which are a common upgrade on DR650s and made a new steering stem and grafted them onto the frame:
And since that tank drove me nuts with the way it looked I sourced a 94 DR650 tank and fabricated new mounts on the frame to bolt it right up.
And then fabricated a rear master cylinder bracket:
Which gets us to where she now sits:
On the way is a new seat, fender, etc. next up is getting the motor back together when the head comes back so I can mock up the exhaust and air filter system and start finalizing the rear of the frame for pannier mounts and a rack. I'm hoping for a completion date of the Spring Thaw, but only time will tell! I'll try to keep you updated as I progress!
Peer pressure is a biotch!
I'm thinking you'll need the hot stuff to finish this build.
