"Slightly Skewed" Project update. Purists overt your eyes!!!

Warning purists should overt their eyes. After making several minor mods and never being satisfied, my 82 xj650 sat out in the yard for a year. One of my engineering classmates used to own a custom bike shop and wanted some one to ride with and asked me if I would, but there was only a half finished wreck of a motorcycle rotting in the yard. After some convincing and several Fridays in a single car garage later this is the point we are at.

Sorry the pics came out in reverse order.

 

Me LIKEY for the most part. Several GOOD ideas. Apes are too tall for me (that's just personal though)...

skillet
BTW in an open forum, putting up pics, you have to take the good with the bad...

 

Thanks Skillet for the compliment. I took that part down, very true and I should not have expected anything other in an open forum.
Thanks again

 

at first i was having a hard time with the muffler back centered on the wheel but i think i'am getting used to it.
how about a gel-cell battery under the swingarm where the center stand used to be?
can you get the electronics up under the tank ?

 

I had the idea for the muffler but I went back and forth for a good week and just went for it. There is a ton of room under the tank and I plan on moving most if not all the electronics under there to clean things up a bit. I hadn't thought about putting a gel battery under the swing arm, that would make for a nice open layout. Tuesday I'm taking a look at the possibility for that.

 

Re: "Slightly Skewed" Project update. Purists overt your eye

I nominate that as the "AMCwood header mod"....very innovative use and modification on the factory headers.....

 

Re: "Slightly Skewed" Project update. Purists overt your eye

i had some fun with your picture, never made one before

 

Re: "Slightly Skewed" Project update. Purists overt your eye

nice photoshop and animated gif work....but after starring at it for a while....i still like it long...

 

MY EYES!!!!
Just kidding

 

I'd put some kind of hanger/support on that can if you decide to keep it long. Othrwise you may put undue stress on the flanges where the header bolts into the head.
With mine being upswept the brackets are not too noticeable and I just adapted stock points on the bike for the supports.

 

Like the 2 into 1 pipe idea myself. Got any plans of putting gauges back into the tank?

skillet

 

Re: "Slightly Skewed" Project update. Purists overt your eye

Looks alright. I don't really care for the handlebars or the seat, but it's your bike, so do as you please and don't be concerned about what others think.
I'd put some type of gauges and LED indicator lights on the tank as long as you have the brackets there. Just a thought.

 

You read my mind Maxim-X, I am currently looking for an exhaust hanger. The handle bars..., well I never in my life would have thought about putting ape hangers on one of my bikes but when I sat on the bike with the handle bars off 16" was where it was comfortable so that is what got put on there. I have one of the acewell speedo tach indicator lights all in one combo thing that I plan on mounting to the handle bar between the clamps.

 

awesome bike, those apes are even taller than mine.

 

oh ya, go to thechopperunderground.com

they will love it over there, great choppin website

 

That looks the muts nuts!!

I’m not a big fan of hard tail frames as in my opinion you asking for bum and back pains (noticed the mono shock under the seat im guessing that helps) same for the apes, but its still one cool machine I like the paint.

Keep up the good work

Al

 

Re: "Slightly Skewed" Project update. Purists overt your eye

Alright its time for an update as there are a couple of items I am pretty proud of. First off the headlight mount. There were two threaded holes on the neck, can not remember what they were for originally but they made for a nice mounting point. A few inches of round bar, a rear suspension bearing race cut in half, and small piece of plate and I had a throw back to "The flight of the Navigator". If anyone even remembers that movie. Alright onto the next item on the agenda, the Acewell gauge pod was mounted using a piece of plate and mounting to the triple tree where there were two empty threaded holes, I think it held the original headlight support. OK, now my mod of the hour is the Acewell magnetic speed sensor mount. One of the disc bolts got drilled out and the loose magnet that came with the kit was installed some lock-tight, now the sensor itself was mounted to a modified sport bike rear wheel adjuster block. It got milled out, as well as the factory speedo drive got gutted. The two got assembled with low temperature aluminum repair rods( I can't say how awesome this stuff is!) . Kind of has an updated feel, using the old to make the new work. Then the cable got routed through the drilled out bolt hole that held the speedometer cable in place and up to the gauge. There is less than 2mm between the sensor and the magnet I couldn't ask for anything better. Hope you enjoy.

 

Re: "Slightly Skewed" Project update. Purists overt your eye

More GOOD ideas :wink: ...

skillet

 

This is turning out real nice. Keep it up

 

Re: "Slightly Skewed" Project update. Purists overt your eye

Another couple days and time for an update. First, the exhaust got a mounting tab to take the pressure off the front mounting points. Next the new intake. I got tired of the pvc intake and decided to make a new one out of aluminum tubing. The air inlets are yet to be drilled and the whole thing cleaned up a bit but the main body is cut and assembled using the low temp AL rods. The battery box got welded to the frame. Then the regulator and cdi were mounted under the mounting plate by cutting the heads of a couple of bolts and welding them in place and the coils were mounted. Now the wiring rats nest. I am using the min wire diagram that is on here somewhere. We are running the wires through the frame and handle bars so some holes had to be drilled. That's about it for now. Man this bike make me tired. The pics of the exhaust hanger and the beginning of the intake will be posted in a min since 15 is the max. I like pics, can you tell?