chmorro wrote:Louis,
I love that bike! Saw your bike on Chopcult.com and thought to myself "I wish I could find this guy so I can ask him some questions about his bike". Small world of us Kawi 800 guys! Anyways, what bars are you running on your bike? Are those Biltwell Frisco bars? Also, what seat bracket are you running to get your seat down so low? Also, what sort of air intake are you running? And finally the obvious, that I think most of us 800 guys are wondering, how were you able to mount that sporty tank on the 800? I've got an '02 800 with the full BCB kit on it, minus the front turn signals. My tins are currently at paint, but I'll post pics of mine as soon as I get it back together. But I really want to try out those bars and change my tank out! Thanks Bro!
chmorro
chmorro,
Hey man, thanks for the compliments on the bike...
The bars are the "Frisco" bars from Biltwell... those guys are great and the ones that contacted me about posting on chopcult.com
As for the seat... I found it on Ebay, from a guy that used to make horse saddles. The back half of the bracket is from BCB but i didnt use the springs or anything. (the bike is a soft tail ya know, you really don't "need" to have springs haha) I just used the brackets to cover all the electronics etc. Then I used the stock cross bar that stays on the bike to mount the back. I made the front bracket and that is mounted where the stock tank rear bolt hole is. That way the seat is mounted as low as it possibly can be.
That air cleaner is from a 70s Iron Head HD but i had to make a rubber intake to mount it straight to the carb. i removed the stock air box from under the tank.
The sporty tank took a bit of work... I removed the gusset on the backbone of the frame where it splits in the back by the seat so the tank would come down over the frame. Also there are several brackets under the tank for the air box and the thermostat that you have to shave off. After that the tank will slip right over the back bone of the frame.
To make it all possible though, I had to delete the thermostat. I made a hose that has a "T" fitting so i can still fill the coolant and have an overflow. But the coolant runs straight through from the radiator. The bike just takes a few minutes longer to warm up.
I shortened the rear fender a couple of inches and lowered the bike 2" front and rear.
Made the pipes myself using part of the stock pipes.
It was a really fun build and the parts from BCB made it all work. Cant wait to see some pics of your bike on here as well.
Thanks.
Louis
