widrace

I should mention that the 155 lbs is without the side stand. I'm curious as to what guys 4rt weighs as well as the new rr. Thanks for including the pic. Reminded me to cut the front fender brace. And thanks to all that have contributed! As far as getting a newer bike goes, ten years ago I said when it breaks or stuff starts going wrong that's what I'd do.

The two of us are still around. So far, the only mods are the easy and cheap stuff like addition of the second-hand flat tank from I got from Subira, machining the webbing away between the spokes on the rear wheel like the factory bikes did and replacement of all the 10mm bolts with shortened titanium cylinder head bolts salvaged from an old BMW f1 engine. At this point the bike weighs just under 71 kg (155 lbs) without fuel or lighter rear tire. The next set of bars will be aluminum rather than the stock steel jobs. I'm due for a new chain and sprockets so those will get replaced with some lighter pieces. I suppose aluminum pegs would be next but those can wait until I finish destroying what's on there. I'd be surprised if I got a pound from all of that. Continuing further gets timely and/or at high cost. If I ever have the cases split I would consider swapping a few unused gears with dummy goods to suit. Thats a good chunk of available weight but.... A huge chunk of weight is that frame. My nephew modeled it in Solidworks and did FEA analysis as a college project at Clemson. Long story short, its crazy over-engineered in strength and appears to have been designed via FEA to begin with. It's ripe for lightening but would require selective chemical milling (as employed by the aircraft industry) to be carried out properly. If I worked at one of those places maybe, but... As far as otherwise improving the bike (for me) my favorite was raising the the ride height - more so in the rear. The forks are dropped in the clamps so the cap bolts are flush with the clamp surface. The rear is raised by installing an offset bushing in the upper rear shock eye that rotates allowing adjustment. A little bit goes a long way here and I adjust it to suit the way the way I like the front end to work, which is a little steeper than stock. The mechanical turn limiters are cut back some too. It turns nearly as sharp as a new Beta but doesn't want to fold near as much.

No Beta love? Jeff S. has been talking about one. Not going to radically attack the frame. Why do you think pulling gears would weaken anything? Yep. Outside of beer for the Wgasa team, the only money I'm going to spend is on new tires, bars, chain, some gaskets (perhaps) and maybe some pegs. All the other not so crazy stuff is either stocked or freely available and will be subject for discussion over refreshments at Milford Trials Team Garage and Bar

Let's see now... wrong side of 50-something, semi-retired, with residual body damage from years of motocross and enduros. Sportsman is a real bitch on that last loop and I'm just not willing to give it up yet. Said another way: Old, broke, broken and eats ibuprofen for breakfast. Back to the task at hand... I've had lots of folks look at the bike lately and solicited suggestions just to hear all kinds of ideas - AND THAT"S ALL!!! For grins, the rules were anything goes. Thought it may be entertaining (and dangerous) to share some of them here. Got any more? The tank isn't mentioned because it already has the flat 'subira' job. So far (in no particular order): X-lite tires. Tapered aluminum bars. Lightweight chain. Aluminum pegs. Remove metal from supports like front frame lowers/rear silencer/etc. Buy TI bolt kits. Yeah, sure, I'll get right on that... Sandblast half the airbox thickness away. Remove 1st, 4th, 5th gears, forks, etc. Remove metal from the upper frame pair where FEA study indicates. Extrude-hone the hollows of the upper frame and swingarm. Chemically mill the frame and swingarm hollows. Remove most of the structure from the upper frame pair leaving basic form only, wrap over with pre-preg, hybrid kevlar/carbon weave, bag and bake. Turn down the fork lowers to a minimum and do the same as above. Flute the fork lowers (lengthwise) with a ball-end mill in perhaps 12 places radially. Drill/ream a 13mm hole (laterally) through the upper and lower frame weldments that the dogbone and shock are affixed to. Drill the above out even larger and sleeve with a thinwall stainless tube. Make a fixture that affixes to the rear wheel which guides a hole saw removing rib material between spokes without disassembly. Machine/fab footpeg and misc brackets from (life-cycled) BMW F1 TI connecting rods. Machine a mag shock body copy. Kevlar (ribbed) bash plate. Water jet removal of material from discs. Fabricate kick start lever of 4130 tubing. Bolts of larger sizes made from Ti/BMW head bolts - such as dogbone/shock fasteners, etc. Ti Exhaust header. No tube that large in stock however so.... Middle exhaust of Hi temp (ceramic) composite. Ti axles Plastic screws for retention of no-stress small bits like the rear brake fluid reservoir. FIRE AWAY!!!

Darn..I like my pie! Actually, the bike is 10 lbs (4.5kg) heavier than me as it is - and that's with my gear on.

It appears that Subira has left the forum without a trace - no posts, nothing! Thanks for all the input so far folks

I'm that Steve guy from Michigan that worked for Mclaren. Bought a new 02 from you and soon after you set my pal Mark up with a minder bike at Duluth. Guys...I'm not going to do stupid s**t and spend a bunch of money. I will spend time though doing things that make sense. The bike will be torn down for winter service so I have months of playtime available. Please don't get the impression that I'm going to arbitrarily blow holes and such everywhere just to have everything break unloading from the trailer. If I wanted that I'd have bought one of those #&$ #&$'s. The other thing is I have a bunch of Ti material - nuts/bolts/tubing/etc, composite materials and piles of neat stuff left over from earlier escapades. Wouldn't want all that to go to waste now would ya? I'm not on a mission to duplicate the works bikes either. I would just like to know what they did (and didn't do) only for consideration at this point. That said...anyone have a print of the fork legs?

Don't have deep pockets but do have some Ti on hand, a machine shop at my disposal and some time. Also have a veteran finite analysis friend that can help with where to carve out some frame stock and another buddy who is a composite guy. Certainly not going to hit on everything - just the most practical stuff. I'll be sure to post some pics along with weight savings

I'm considering a weight reduction program on my 315r. It would be super to see photos of the things that were done. I did get a chance to look close at Dougies bike at Duluth but like a dummy didn't take any pictures. Martin... if your out there - is there anything you can share now, like the actual final weight and some comments perhaps? I also remember some talk/speculation about the frame being fabricated of thinner stock and 5th gear removed. Come on Martin - time to spill your guts!! Some items I remember: 1) Ti (probably) rear shock body 2) Rear wheel lightened between spokes 3) Misc brackets machined 4) Triple clamps - probably Ti 5) Ti hardware/axles perhaps 6) Header pipe - thin stainless or maybe Ti tubing 7) Bash plate of ??? 8) Carbon filter cover 9) Ti fork legs What about the swingarm - anybody? I did get the small works fuel tank from Subira awhile back and that's my starting point. Any info welcome, Cheers

Nice job of sharing Caravan_Monster. It will be valuable to many of us - thanks again!

I was initially under the impression that you were able to get at all the packing via the two window areas shown in the pics. Does your finished product have 4 windows, or did you go with two and leave some packing behind? Cheers to ya...

Excellent post Tom! Tidy workmanship as well - kudos A few questions for you: 1) On the inlet side patch, you took out some of the radius. Is this necessary? 2) Does the tube come too close in proximity to the body to use a disc for cutting in these areas? 3) What would you have done differently? Alternate locations perhaps? 4) Is there anything going on in there besides the tube? 5) How much time was on your silencer, and how solidified was the packing? 6) What shape was the tube in and is it captured in the same manner as the rear silencer? 7) Have you noticed a performance change at all? Thank you!

Corrections: 1) Concessions are back on - Sully has a trailer outfit of some kind showing up. 2) Hillsides are dry but standing water will surely be dragged everywhere. You will need a bath after this one. Cheers

I'm told that the nice folk that handle the concessions will not be able to support this event due to illness so it's BYOF. Sully will most certainly have the grill up after the event so bring something if you would like to stick around for the customary afterbash. Weather prognosis is spot-on perfect for trials and the hillsides should be tight and grippy having a chance to dryout after all this rain. Bring those boots Deb, we built one just for you!

I took a different approach to fix the problem about 4 years ago and it solved everything. I drilled a .060" or so hole through the three bolts (from the end) and tapped them for zerk fittings. No need to drill deeper than the center of the last bearing. Then I cross-drilled a similar sized hole (that lined up with the center of each bearing) which intersected the lengthways hole and cut a narrow radiused groove around the bolt at the same location as each hole. The last step was to drill a hole in each of the bearing sleeves making sure the hole lined up with the feed groove. A couple of occasional squirts with the gun lubes it all up and pushes any collected water and crud out right past the seal lips (where it came from) without displacing or damaging the seals integrity.