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Streetfighterkz's non-Kz streetfighter


Streetfighterkz

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I've posted this build on a couple other forums but for some reason haven't posted here..until now.

I bought this bike back in September.

It's an '89 Gsxr750 that was sitting since around '93-94. The odometer shows just a hair over 9400 miles although when the original owner raced it he disconnected the speedo cable so actual miles are slightly higher.

I am now the 2nd owner, as far as I know. The previous owner included a box of goodies that include the passenger seat, original header, a bunch of other stock parts, as well as a spare rear rim and a FOX racing shock.

The bike had all fiberglass race body work and a Storz steering damper. It's also fully safety wired.

I think I did well for $700. I have since sold off the front race fairings for $300 and a few other parts here and there so to put some $$ back into my pocket.

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I spent a couple hours hanging a few parts back on it as well as installing a battery and hooking up disconnected wires. I used an IV bottle to fill the carbs and proceeded to crank it over. Within 10-15 seconds, the bike started!! I have to give the PO credit as he drained the tank, the carbs, placed oil in the cylinders, and put fresh oil in the crankcase when he stored it.

I was worried about the engine making noises since he low-sided it and could have starved it of oil. But the bike must have shut off before any damage was done as it's super quiet.

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v39/Streetfighterkz/Gsxr750/?action=view&current=P9230010_zps3e4b348f.mp4

I've also found my inspiration for the build in an issue of Streetfighter Mag. I don't want to build the bike exactly the same but I LOVE the overall style of it.

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I started to think about the overall design of the bike. I obviously don't want to copy the Twisted Synergy bike but want to reuse some of the basic design ques. There may be a few tweaks but below is what I'm shooting for. It has a custom tail made using a Kz750 Twin tail as a base, trimmed down Zrx fairing and an Airtech race belly pan with a DanMoto GP exhaust. I went through 15 or so revisions before I got the paint scheme to look just right.

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Back in Decenber, I went on a holiday shopping spree. I shouldn't have spent the money but too late now. I opened the boxes quicker than my actual Christmas presents.

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Shown is a '92 Gsxr750 front end, a '94 Gsxr750 swingarm and caliper bracket, and a Zrx1100 headlight. Not shown is the '92 Gsxr600 5.5" rear rim, '01 Gsxr600 gauge cluster and a Zrx1100 fairing and windscreen which had not arrived when the pic was taken.

I did play around with the headlight and the frontend to see how close I can tuck in the light to the fork legs. I didn't realize how big the Zrx light was from the front.

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Continued below...

Later, Doug

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I started by cutting the ignition hoop and lugs off the top triple using a combo of a hacksaw, 4" angle grinder, and a bandsaw. Then I used a small belt sander to smooth out the rough bandsaw cut. After that I cleaned up the sanded area with a mouse sander.

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I started the bar riser installation by drilling the first hole for the riser just by eyeballing it. I tried to get it as far to the outside as the inner ribs would allow. Once the first hole was drilled, I drilled the second one, again just eyeballing it.

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Since I could get a feel for where the bars would be I was able to start on the gauge mounting bracket. I came up with a rough idea using a cut up coat hanger then bent up some 1/4" round rod. It may be a little too much but it's what I had.

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I contacted a powdercoating company about 15 minutes from my house about coating my upper and lower triples and my gauge bracket. They quoted me $40 plus tax. So I dropped the parts off Tuesday and got a call Wednesday saying they were done. (Less than 24 hour turnaround.)

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So I headed to the garage and installed the bar risers and gauge bracket.

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Continued below...

Later, Doug

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I bought a newer Gsxr600 wiring harness on eBay. I took a gamble that it had the front sub-harness since the description was very lacking. The chance paid off and the harness came with all the connectors I needed.

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Here's the newer front harness of the 600 and the light harness and gauge harness from the 750 and my wiring diagrams.

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After a few hours of unwrapping the harnesses, cutting out unnecessary wires and stripping the speed sensor and associated wires from the main harness, everything is pretty much ready to be spliced together.

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Moved the wiring project onto the dining room table.

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A little soldering and some tape and here's the final result. The first pic is the adapter for the stock harness to the newer cluster. The second pic is the trimmed down and rewrapped front light harness.

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I took the gauge and harness adapter to the garage and plugged them in to see what would happen. All the indicator lights function properly. The turnsignal light doesn't flash as there are no turnsignals hooked up. Also, the lowest light on the left is the low fuel level light. I don't have a fuel level sensor so I've disabled it so it won't bother me. The only other issue is the "CHEC" in the bottom lower right of the LCD. There is no solution for that as far as I've found so I'll just have to live with it for now.

[ame]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v39/Streetfighterkz/Gsxr750/9D3D871B-1136-48B0-8E07-AAFC9CE88AD8-6855-000004AE853E2C53.mp4[/ame]

Continued below...

Later, Doug

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A buddy of mine was cool enough to lend me a 180 tire so I could mount it on my "new" rim for mock-up.

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I cleaned up the arm and linkage in the parts washer to clean all the chain lube and crude from it.

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I ordered new bearings and a few other missing parts for the swingarm so several weeks had passed before I could finally install it. It was rainy out and my garage is a disaster so all I have is the one pic of the new swingarm installed.

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I was expecting just a bare ZRX fairing and OEM windscreen. When I opened the box inside was a slightly rashed and slightly cracked fairing, the small vent, and a ZG tinted windscreen for one heck of a deal.

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I simply threw the fairing at the bike and took a look. The stock clip-ons are going away and that will allow the fairing to tuck in closer. The tank is out being repaired so I really can't get a sense of proportion yet.

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I still need to have new seals and my RaceTech springs installed in my USD forks and I can swap the frontend in.

Continued below...

Later, Doug

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With a little help from my shop class teacher, I was able to make a speedo drive delete spacer from some 6061 aluminum. Since I'm running a digital speedo, I though it'd be nice practice to make one.

I came up with the design based off of the basic OEM speedo drive dimensions. It was a fun little project and will clean up the front end a little bit.

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There are a few things I left out but that pretty much brings me up to date...

Later, Doug

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With a little help from my shop class teacher, I was able to make a speedo drive delete spacer from some 6061 aluminum. Since I'm running a digital speedo, I though it'd be nice practice to make one.

I came up with the design based off of the basic OEM speedo drive dimensions. It was a fun little project and will clean up the front end a little bit.

A46E85AA-247E-447A-AA51-4AA66F60DC12-449-0000007E73647165.jpg

59980F34-36F3-4967-A454-702C895C8A14-449-0000007E77CEF5DA.jpg

9D791ECC-9EB9-4471-8534-209DC559DD3D-449-0000007E7C184BD3.jpg

There are a few things I left out but that pretty much brings me up to date...

Later, Doug

Nice work! :bow: Some day I want to have the equ/know-how to fab parts.

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Thanks for all the compliments so far guys.

I don't have much to report in this post as spare finances are drying up.

I did disassembled my forks to install new seals and a set of 0.95kg/mm springs from Racetech. I grabbed my homemade 2" PVC fork seal driver only to realize after disassembling everything that it's too big to use with my USD forks. (I've only used it on conventional forks so far.) So what did I do...ordered a proper tool from eBay. Later on, I found out that 1.5" PVC pipe would have be close to perfect and much cheaper than the tool I already ordered. Oh well, now I have a set of forks in 20 pieces in my house...

I did spend a little money and grabbed a Zrx fairing bracket and headlight from another forum. I already had a headlight assembly but the seller of the bracket didn't want to separate the pieces. At least the headlight should fetch decent money on eBay to recoup some money. Initially I was going to make my own bracket for less but after looking at the OEM bracket, I'd definitely rather modify the OEM to fit the Gsxr front end than start from scratch.

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Later, Doug

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Using my Kz900 as a base since it has a very similar front end setup, I was able to mockup my Zrx fairing using the stay. I'd like to tuck it in closer but the bracket is hitting the fork tubes in multiple places. Even if I modify the bracket, the headlight plug only has about 1.5" before hitting the steering head tube. I still have to modify the bracket to fit the Gsxr triple clamps.

Here's the view from the seat. (I have an inner Zrx dash panel coming in the mail to help fill the void behind the gauge cluster.)

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I had two fenders that I wanted to mock up. The blue is the original Gsxr fender style and the black is an early 2000's Gsxr fender. I personally think the newer fender's lines match better.

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19DC5233-6DE7-4E33-BDF8-7E5BBCDB0A6B-5518-000004294460D00D.jpg

Later, Doug

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Received my fork seal driver and was able to start reassembling the forks. The stock Gsxr fork springs are rated at 0.736kg/mm versus the stiffer Racetech's (0.95kg/mm) meaning that there was no way I would be able to compress the springs to reassemble everything without help.

After some brain storming, I came up with this setup from items I already had in the garage.

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The first fork took about 40mins to reassemble, the second was about 15.

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I pushed on both fork legs and they felt the same so I must have did something right.

I'm really wanting to swap the front end this weekend if I can find the time.

Later, Doug

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looking good.

check your rebound clicker on the fork top. make sure it has the same amount of adjustment as it did before. thats something some people doing forks on their own forget. there is a certain way to put them back together so the rebound adjuster has the correct amount of adjustment.

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check your rebound clicker on the fork top. make sure it has the same amount of adjustment as it did before. thats something some people doing forks on their own forget. there is a certain way to put them back together so the rebound adjuster has the correct amount of adjustment.

I wasn't thinking and didn't check the amount of clicks before disassembly. I did check it today and each one has 12 or 13 clicks.

I checked the OM and FSM and neither one says how many clicks there should be.

Later, Doug

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Sunday I was able to get into the garage for a couple hours. I removed the old steering bearing races from the head tube and installed the new bearing races. I then installed the triple clamps and fork legs. I held up the fairing and headlight assembly to confirm my suspicion that the headlight was going to interfere with the fairing stay lugs. Since I don't plan on ever going back to a full fairing, I got out the hacksaw and files. I did cringe when I started cutting the lugs off but the feeling quickly passed.

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Here's how it sits. I ran out of time to button the rest of the front end up and the spacer I made needs a little more machine work as apparently I messed up a dimension and the wheel jams when the axle is tightened. OOPS!

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Later, Doug

Edited by Streetfighterkz
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I didn't have enough clearance on the backside of the flange so the flange hit the speedo drive part of the wheel before the inner bearing race hit the spacer causing the lockup. I thinned the flange on the wheel side 0.070" which should give me plenty of clearance. I also turned the OD of the flange down 0.200" to match the wheel hub better.

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Later, Doug

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Got to the garage and mounted the wheel with my modified spacer.

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I mocked up the newer front fender on the Gsxr. I'm going to have to trim the rear mounting tabs and make a bracket for the front. It should be fairly straight forward.

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I started reassembling the front end. I mounted the calipers, a Bandit brake line setup (as the SS lines I have are meant for clip-ons and way too short), and I mounted the steering damper.

I again held the fairing up to check for clearances since the steering damper is side-mounted.

Straight ahead is good.

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To the right is good.

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To the left........ uh oh! It's kinda hard to tell from the pic but the fairing is offset at least an inch to the right and the steering damper rod is still hitting the fairing.

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I have a couple options. I can either ditch the fairing and go with something narrower, ditch the steering damper or come up with another setup, or keep the fairing and lose the steering damper on the street/ run a flat number plate and damper on trackdays.

I'm leaning toward the latter. It should only take 15 mins to swap everything and for as often as I plan on attending trackdays, it shouldn't be a hassle.

Later, Doug

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