And so there has been some changes to the Rat.. It's name for starters is now "No tension to Detail".. Also had a few facelifts.. you can see here..
All in All, total money spent on this build $317.94
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Here is a small list of some minor mods..
Starting from front to back..
1.) As you know, this beast is a bit heavy and the G's are famous for being soft in the front forks.. Instead of dropping major coin on new forks, I took the heavy duty Coil Spring off a strut I had in the shop, compressed it, welded it to a mounting plate then bolted the strut to the fork cross member/fender mount. Welded a knotch on top of strut and hooked it in the underside of the bottom fork tree.. It's now a perfect springer front end with 2" max compression even on the bumpiest of roads. Also, I removed the fronbt fender, cut the front side off, flipped it around and now the down side of the front fender is the front high side..
2. Mounted an Enduro Tracker type tire front and back.
3. Tossed the stock Bars and use a near straight motocross Bar.
4.) Our Oil/Air cooled beast has an awesome giant looking motor with big square top end and I wanted to show it off so I removed the stock tank and put on a 3 gallon rectangle Marine gas tank that is the same width as the frame. Now when you stand behind the Bike you see the bad assness of that beast sticking out either side..
5.) removed the stock headlight,Blinkers, Horn and Gauges and installed a super bright LED headlight and small Comp Tach, oil pressure/temp guage and No speedo.
6.) Dissmantled the 4 into 2 exhaust, cut the headers 6' down from the flanges and fabricated a 4 into 1 (note; I installed a 4" piece of flex pipe to each down tube for ease of re installation) Word of caution.. Be super careful when removing and installing the headers. They are bolted in, not mounted on studs and the heads are aluminum. Its super easy to cross thread and strip the damn threaded bolt holes in the head.. ( i stripped 3 of them and had to tap them) Pain in the ass..
7.) I DO NOT ENDORSE OR RECOMMEND THIS MOD.. I tossed the stock airbox.. Its like the trunk on a 76 Monte Carlo!!!! I'm still using the stock BST36SS Mikuni Carbs but Upped the main Jet from a 120 to a 122.5, eliminated the California emmisions secondary air filter crap. Then I fabricated an airbox made from a business cardshipping box (perfect size) It works great and was very easy to tune the airbox to match the atmospheric pressure of the stock box and tune the fuel screw for the mixture I like (slight rich).
8.) My exhaust is pretty much straight pipes 1 3/4" ID with wire mesh Pod Filters inserted midway inside the pipes for a bit of back pressure, sound softening. the end of the Pipe has a 4" resonating slip on from Autozone.. The sound is fucking awesome..
8.) I completely rebui;t the wiring harness, removing everything I no longer neaded AND made it about 3 feet shorter for easy hiding, more effecient design..
OK, now for the weight savings...
I cut off everything from the Downtubes back. then I welded in lightweight 16 guage 1"x1" angel iron for a seat bracket/battery/electronics. I set the seat about 6" lower than stock so My riding position is like a Bobber/cafe.. Wicked comfortable and about 3" above the completely exposed rear tire..