Re: Sandrew's XS400 - Facelift in progress !
Rather than just fixing what was broken I decided to go even further with tweaking.
So it's safe to say vol 2.0 is happening.
I'm gonna do c/p posts from xs400.net as I did a few years earlier.
Here goes:
...
It was what it was...
On to the future now.
Since the bike is in my home town and I get to go home once or twice a month and half the times I don't even make it to the garages, which means, making all the planning and drawings while I'm away and use the few days to make them count.
So in the past month and a half I've spent a few evenings on it. First off was ripping it back to molecules and throwing away what's damaged. Then sorting out which parts to order and what to repair.
I knew one thing, when I'm gonna rebuilt it, I'm not just restoring it, rather facelifting and detailing the things I didn't care to last time around.
Main ideas:
1) new paintjob (more eye-catching and maybe more race-looky)
2) more agressive stance
3) new frame color
4) Swapping out everything that still made it feel old and worn out.
Starting with the small things.
Big scratches on the right engine cover. Easiest way was sanding them out and polish. Now matching the left side. Came out nice me thinks.
Then:
Meanwhile:
Now:
Then new forks came along. Only item on the local market and the price was exceptional. Minor marks here and there, in overall good condition. Really like these silver tubes instead of gold ones, will go better with my color scheme also gold would be leaving rest of the bike in shadow.
But they will receive a cosmetic update.
Now that I've ridden it without front fender for a while without the rain bothering me that much, not further thought was given:
Cone:
And disappeared:
Next up was lower yoke. I hate the molding lines.. These casting molds cost like million euros each and yet they can't make the end product more refined.
Time to pick up the file.
Beff:
Aff:
Big plans for top yoke also, more on that later.
Last but not least, with the modern front end my vision of the stance change a bit. Nothing drastic yet makes a huge different compared to the old picture (Best way to look at it: subframe rails and bottom of the tank were previously parallel to the ground). To achieve this stance I need to move upper shock mounts 6 cm lower along the frame rails.
So much for now. Hopefully some progress in a months time.
...
It's been well over a month now, but I didn't have anything update worthy until this weekend.
In the meantime I've gathered some parts like new bars switches, foot pegs and stem bearings.
And finally got around to do the frame modifications. Firstly, off went the old steering stopper and two unnecessary brackets on neck area which I for some reason forgot about the last time. New stopper welded on.
Then some additional bolts welded on for electrics to avoid using double sided tape from now on. Also scratches that came from the crash are gone.
I don't know if I mentioned this but I wanted lo lift the rear end about 6 cm, so to make it happen I modified old upper shock mounts and left only the threaded plates in place. They will now act as my turn signal couriers. Neat solution I think.
Before:
And after shaving:
New mounts. They look rough atm, but once sandblasted and a little tweaked, should look as good as new.
Hopefully get it blasted next week, then under some powder and reassemble may begin.
Upper yoke.
The top yoke didn't look so good with the Aprilia branding and those ugly bar mounts, although it had potential in it so instead of machining out completely new one (which would have been less time consuming), I decided to cut it up a little (as usual for me).
I don't have a picture of it before (Maybe LuckyEight can help out with the matter).
Firstly it went in the CNC table face up to remove about 1 mm from the top to get rid of the Aprilia branding.
The we flipped it and milled the underside nice and even:
As I only had a short window with the machine, I figured I finished the sides off with grinder and file. Took about 4 hrs but I think we have a product.
Also started with the cap.
Updates should be coming a bit more often now.
Sander