Rear Fender

Hey guys, was sitting in the garage lookin at my 82 xj650 the other day and was wanting to change the fender when I start to put it back together. I was wondering what some of you custom guys are using for a rear fender other than the stock chrome one.

 

Tom, are you talking about a maxim or a Seca? The maxim seat can be refitted with a Harley bobtail fender, takes a bit of creativity, but I have one that I put on my 700 maxim whenever I swap it over to the "pseudo-bob" attire.... Takes about 45 min to do that, but allows me to have two different schemes for it ----

For the Seca, there are a lot of people who have cut the rear plastic fender ...... I'd recommend swapping it out rather than cutting it . If that's what you have, and are interested in swapping for something else, get in touch with me---- who knows what I might have.

Dave

 

Sorry its a maxim, Hogfiddles any pics?

 

http://xjbikes.com/forums/index.php?threads/since-theres-no-gallery-yet.47733/

 

Right now I just sanded the chrome off and painted it black. Little by little all the chrome will be gone someday .

Also removed the stock light and added a old-school ford-style one using the existing mounting holes...




If you don't want to do that then a midnight maxim black fender will fit. I put a midnight black front fender on too and that looks good - it's actually shorter than the chrome one.

 

Noticed from the pic that your pipe on #1 cylinder is turning blue. Have you checked your plugs for a possible lean condition?
That usually happens because of the carbs running lean or aftermarket pipes that are single walled, cheap chrome job or thin pipes.

 

yeah I fixed it. That photo is a six months old. Thanks man.

 

Okay. Bike looks good BTW, like the tail light.

 

finally someone with the same color as mine.. sadly the forest green has to go
Almond on the way

 

Haha - you seem happy to see another green one so - why you want to change it?

Have to say Almond is probably my next choice though.

 

What accent color did you choose, Black or Root Beer?

 

I have a midnight maxim and was wondering how to pull this look. thanks for the ideas. where did you get that rear light by the way? I like it.

 

Thanks - glad to see someone else has taste!

I found it on [edit] http://www.billetproofdesign.com but actually was cheaper to buy it via their store on Amazon at around $70.

http://www.amazon.com/Chopper-Licen...3?s=automotive&ie=UTF8&qid=1415565727&sr=1-43

There's other places that resell them for $200+ for example.

http://allmotodepot.com/categories/view/124

 

thanks! another question what size drag bars are those? did you have to raise it any to avoid any steering problems?

 

So here's a long reply to a simple question...

Those are 29" measured in a straight line from tip to tip and are 7/8 diameter.

Dropping the bars down on these bikes isn't as easy as you might think, there are a number of things you have to deal with.

It's been a while but here's what I remember and how I fix them...

1) Yes the hand controls did hit the tank on the left side and the bars are angled straight down. I didn't raise them but instead I added a stopper in the form of a hose clamp to the steering stopper on the tree. This was temporary until I got round to welding something to it but it's still there and works fine. This reduces the turn radius by about 1/2 an inch on that side and a little less on the other, but it's not noticeable and hasn't caused me any problems. Vary rarely do you use full-lock. It does stop the steering lock from working though but I don't really care about that - I'm planning on changing the ignition to RFID anyway and I don't leave it anywhere shady.

2) The Front Brake lever comes with a built in ressy - this is designed to be level on the sudo chopper bars so it's at a crazy and potentially dangerous angle on the drag bars - no bueno - on the drag bars there's also not much room so even if you get another unit the same with a flat ressy it's still a problem as the banjo connector to the brake line is directly above the front forks. To solve this I bought a brand new Nissin front brake with separate ressy. I also switched out the clear plastic ressy for a sleeker all black one just to keep everything as black and retro looking as possible. Obviously the brake line needed to be replaced too with a shorter one - I went with 34" line that works well.

3) With the bar-end mirror on only one side and the weight so close to the forks I get a steering wobble if I take both hands off above 20mph. It's not very bad but I'm in the process of added a counter balance ( just the same bar-end without the mirror) to the other side that should fix it but I need to drill out the throttle sleeve to do this and it hasn't made the top of my list yet.

4) Cables, cables, cables --- the stock speedo and tach cables should be the same length almost if you plan on swapping out those factory gauges like I did however for some reason on my bike the tach cable was super long - I think the PO must have swapped it out for something else. The problem cables are the throttle, clutch and the choke. All of which need to be considerably shorter. I toyed with a few options here and getting Motion-Pro to make you custom cables is one but very expensive option. Else you can cut your original cables and re-solder the ends but this is a PIA and frankly if you're going to the trouble of doing this it's best to get new cables that aren't 30+ years old. After lots of trial and error I found that the throttle and clutch cables for the XJ750 SECA are a good fit. Got new motion-pro ones for around $20 each.

For the choke (yeah I know it's not really a choke per-se before you nazi's jump on me), I think it was for a 550 Seca but not 100% sure on that one.

4.1) Now annoyingly for the throttle you'll find that the XJ750 cable has a slightly different end to the outer sheath hard curved piece that fits into the casing of the throttle housing meaning that the stock thumb rest / cable clamper doesn't fit - I just used a dremmel to widen it and then super-glued some spacers to one side to make it fit right. Not a big deal just needs some MacGiver'ing!

5) The electric cable from your controls are now also way too long... If you keep the same headlight or same bucket style you can just pull the slack into the bucket but I didn't. What I did with the electrics is another story but all my connections are under the tank now and I kept the stock length for that.

Sorry for the essay - I think that's it.. just trying to pass on what I learnt in the process of doing this so I hope it helps. PM me if you have specific questions.

 

thanks again! just weighing options on where to go with this project!