Hey everyone, even the Hare Krishna guy 
,
There's a beautifully modified R18 with cream paint and a slick little toolbox tucked amid the left side of the swing arm. This one:
Now that's an attractive build.
Anyway, I've been pondering some sort of similar tool box set up for a few weeks now.
The rules, as with all my modifications are
1) must be reversible. No burning of any bridges. So no welding as was done with the alabaster beauty above.
2) must be clean and as simple as possible. So no clunky attachments or superfluous stuff.
3) must be beautiful. This is largely redundant because of #2 and due to the nature of the subject herself.
Part 1: The Box. The first hurdle was finding an appropriately shaped and sized box. I hunted around and found several options:
Harley
Norton
Or, from my very own garage, Moto Guzzi
Well, you go with the devil you know, right? I sourced a Guzzi box from a guy named Mark in California.
Needs to be painted, but no dents and only a little surface rust. Not bad for $40.
Part 2: Attachment. My initial inclination was to use bar clamps (intended for off-road lighting) to anchor the box to the swing arm itself. I got a couple and tinkered but the bars are weird sizes and it looked less than ideal. The next idea was to utilize the bolts for the rear brake. Yeah, no. The box would stick out too far and it wasn't long enough to not look weird. Hmmm.
I'll cut to the chase, the answer ended up being several pieces of cut and drilled anodized aluminum angle. Yeah. Lowly aluminum angle. I had some extra in the garage and realized that I could place a piece parallel with the bottom of the battery tray extending towards the swing arm. Practiced with some scrap then went to Menards and picked up a proper anodized 4'x 1"x1" piece. Cut to size, trimmed a bit to mirror the space, and drill two holes for the anchor points...
I'm making it sound easier than it was. On the 8th attempt, I got all the cuts and holes just right.
To keep the box from colliding with the brake line as the swing arm pivoted required raising it about an inch and shortening the aluminum angle so that it only extended back to the midpoint of the toolbox. At that point another piece of angle extends upward. Not super elegant, BUT it's all hidden behind the box.
And with the box...
Since the box is attached to the frame, there's no forward movement with shock compression so I could snug it up nicely. The various bits of the swing arm aren't hitting any part of any of it with repeated, and repeated, shock compression. It's actually not as close as it looks. And one really needs to hunt around to see any of my ramshackle erector set bracket, so thoughts of buying a piece of black anodized aluminum and redoing it seem unnecessary.
The only "issue" is that the door doesn't open all the way, but there's plenty of room for my tool roll.
[more coming]
,There's a beautifully modified R18 with cream paint and a slick little toolbox tucked amid the left side of the swing arm. This one:
Now that's an attractive build.
Anyway, I've been pondering some sort of similar tool box set up for a few weeks now.
The rules, as with all my modifications are
1) must be reversible. No burning of any bridges. So no welding as was done with the alabaster beauty above.
2) must be clean and as simple as possible. So no clunky attachments or superfluous stuff.
3) must be beautiful. This is largely redundant because of #2 and due to the nature of the subject herself.
Part 1: The Box. The first hurdle was finding an appropriately shaped and sized box. I hunted around and found several options:
Harley
Norton
Or, from my very own garage, Moto Guzzi
Well, you go with the devil you know, right? I sourced a Guzzi box from a guy named Mark in California.
Needs to be painted, but no dents and only a little surface rust. Not bad for $40.
Part 2: Attachment. My initial inclination was to use bar clamps (intended for off-road lighting) to anchor the box to the swing arm itself. I got a couple and tinkered but the bars are weird sizes and it looked less than ideal. The next idea was to utilize the bolts for the rear brake. Yeah, no. The box would stick out too far and it wasn't long enough to not look weird. Hmmm.
I'll cut to the chase, the answer ended up being several pieces of cut and drilled anodized aluminum angle. Yeah. Lowly aluminum angle. I had some extra in the garage and realized that I could place a piece parallel with the bottom of the battery tray extending towards the swing arm. Practiced with some scrap then went to Menards and picked up a proper anodized 4'x 1"x1" piece. Cut to size, trimmed a bit to mirror the space, and drill two holes for the anchor points...
I'm making it sound easier than it was. On the 8th attempt, I got all the cuts and holes just right.
To keep the box from colliding with the brake line as the swing arm pivoted required raising it about an inch and shortening the aluminum angle so that it only extended back to the midpoint of the toolbox. At that point another piece of angle extends upward. Not super elegant, BUT it's all hidden behind the box.
And with the box...
Since the box is attached to the frame, there's no forward movement with shock compression so I could snug it up nicely. The various bits of the swing arm aren't hitting any part of any of it with repeated, and repeated, shock compression. It's actually not as close as it looks. And one really needs to hunt around to see any of my ramshackle erector set bracket, so thoughts of buying a piece of black anodized aluminum and redoing it seem unnecessary.
The only "issue" is that the door doesn't open all the way, but there's plenty of room for my tool roll.
[more coming]
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