xj750 bratsyle bob (build thread)

hey guys. my room mate and i just picked up a 1982 xj750 midnight maxim as a project. looking forward to learning as much as i can from any and all of you, so feel free to offer any tips or comments. we've only had the bike for a week, so there's much to learn. hope you enjoy what we have so far. i'll apologize ahead of time to those of you who love your xj's stock.. this might be heresy.

ok... here we go! so i guess we start with the stock photos. here is how she looked when we got her home.



and of course the other side



if you look closely and have a couple beers you can see some potential under all that 1980's styling. the rims are cool, i like the tank, good stance. the engine is powerful and already blacked out... so... we start wrenching... this thing starts loosing weight faster than any fad diet!

to date here's most of what we've taken off, i don't think this pic includes the mufflers those things were heavy!.... we weighed it, it was a total of 55 lbs!



one of the mods we keep seeing in pictures is a conversion to a single disc front brake. i haven't found any tutorials so we just winged it. the rotor was just a matter of removing the bolts that hold it in place, and sliding the front axle out just enough to let it slip out. both brake lines from the calipers are connected to the single line from the master cylinder by one long banjo bolt. we removed the long banjo, disconnected the right side brake line and used the shorter banjo bolt from the caliper end of the discarded brake line. i hope that was clear... i didn't take pics of the process, but here's a crappy pic after we were done. it 's crazy, but the thing seems to stop fine. we'll bleed the lines of course before we take it out again.



finally we got a saturday to really get chopping. we pull the seat and strip it of it's cover and foam we marked it and cut it to fit so that it just fit on the rails of the frame. i keep saying bobber, but we're really inspired by the brat style bikes, which in my opinion is a really neat blend of cafe and bobber styles and i'm sure others as well. this seat will end up sort of cafe- ish. this next pic was the inspiration for the whole rear end of our bike. also check out bratstyle.com



here is our seat pan in the process of becoming beautiful. here's a close up of the before



here's an after. it's actually gotten smaller since then, we're going to finish the fender first and make the seat fit it.



before we're done we might fiberglass what's left of the pan for some rigidity ... we'll get to that later. TIME FOR SOME FRAME CHOPPIN! mind you, i'm an amateur welder and this is my first big customization of a bike. luckily custom carpentry crosses over a bit when it comes to measuring and cutting. being ballsy sure doesn't hurt. so we got out the band saw, the grinder, and welder...
here's the roomie checking out the stance after we cut the frame the first time



here we are with most of the rear end gone, tabs cut off, ready to start grinding it smooth and fab-ing up the rear fender.



here's a cardboard mock up...



making a rib/strut to support the fender




welded on...



here we are as we left it. what a fun time so far! can't wait to get some more time in.



looking forward to any tips/comments enjoy your motorcycle build porn!

 

Good to see you're getting stuck in, but i would keep the twin disc set up.
It might stop the bike at slow to medium speed, but if you were caning it hard i would want that extra brake as back up.
I'm sure Yamaha put it there for a reason. When i had my 750, and working as a despatch rider in London, by fook it came in handy. :idea:

 

I dont think anyone ever goes from 2 to 1. Likely, you are just seeing all the solo 650s running around. Why on earth would you want less stopping power?

 

you also might want to look at a little more frame support across the rear.

 

looks awesome switchblade. I have been thinking about taking one rotor off as well. Five or six guys around here have done it with no noticeable loss of braking power.. Now if your doin the ton and a cat runs out in front of you idk how it will affect the stop, but i hate cats anyways. But my build is not to do the ton its to cruise. none the less big risk of lost brake power.

 

Not bad! However, most modifications are intended to be upgrades over the original...don't understand why you'd want to downgrade your braking system. But hey it's not my life on the line.
Anyway just so you know, your bike is a 1983 model...not 82. They didn't make the 750 midnight maxim until 83. They did however make a 650 midnight maxim in 81.