One of those Ratte days ...

Ever have one of those morning when you jump out of bed bright eyed and bushy tailed all eager and ready to carry on with where you left off on yesterday's work, then when you go out and take a look at it you realise that you just hate most of what you actually managed to get done the previous session ?

That was me this morning. I looked. I pondered, then I put on my beret, pulled the cork out of a bottle of red with my teeth and took a swig, cut myself some cheese with my belt knife and ate it off the blade, then put on my best French accent and stomped around telling myself off saying things like "merde, sacrebleu, what waas ayee thinkin, thees is sheet. non, non, thees will not do at all, escargot but this rat weel not, now feex it beforrr I taunt you a second time".

I took a look at the tail-light cluster, slapped my forehead and said "non, non, you eediot". I looked at what I was doing with the rear-guard and proclaimed "your mother wears army boots and your father sucks elderberries, you silly canigit".

I decided that the only thing I had done right was the bit of bar that the tail-light was bolted to, and the removal of the air-box and all. Sigh. So, back to the drawing board. First I decided to remove the tail-light again, turn the bar it was mounted on slightly, then raise the rear-guard up to meet it. I drilled and bolted it (yes, I did remember to put some rubber spacers inbetween the bracket and the guard). I had to turn upsidedown the mounting I had made for the battery end of things but same holes worked, so all cool. Back to a fixed guard rather than swingy one.

Okay, that looks a bit better. Note that the shocks and exhaust is off at the moment. The plan to trial a Hard-Tail look and feel rather than head straight away for shorter reach shocks. Next was to rebolt the tail-light cluster back to the mount bar I made yesterday, this time use some rubber spacers and put a third bolt into the guard at the top so the thing can't fall/be pushed forward. Deem it a case of removing temptation. Heh. The two holes in the guard to the right of the light are for bolting the seat back on. Yep, that means all my clever bending and bracket making yesterday was in vain. Sigh.

What else does Der Ratte need ? I'll give you a hint. The Best boats are made of this stuff and apparently witches who weigh as much as a duck are made of it too. Give up ? WOOD ! Yes, not only have I added MORE plastic to a motor cycle, I have now also added wood. You will see it better a few pics down. It has been incorporated as a base for the battery to rest on.

What are you looking at in this next pic ? Ah, a bit of Ratty cleverness I hope ! I've replaced the stock airbox with these pod filters, but what to do with the engine vent that usually feeds into the airbox ? I figured "why not split the feed up and direct it into each pod ?" What I did was drill a hole in the center of each pod and thread a couple of outboard engine fuel fittings through from the inside (with an o-ring on each) then push it into some suitable hose and then clamp. Lurking to the lower right of the photo you can see a white T junction. This is on a hose that connects up with the engine vent. See where this is going ?

Next you can see the pods now clipped onto the carbs and the twin hoses being fed by the T junction and the hose leading down from near the guard then across near the bottom of the battery and back to the engine. I've relocated the indicator relay to up under the seat on a bracket using the twin square thingumijigs mounting point. The other mounting point is the new earth. The regulator is now bolted direct to the guard. The starter solenoid is mounted on the side of the battery strap/bracket. And there is The Wood. :)

Next is a look from the other side, providing a better view of The Wood, the regulator, the pod and engine vent feed, and how I've secured the battery. I basically bolted the original battery strap thingo to a stainless steel angle that formerly was the wet end mount point for a boat echo sounder. All the holes were in the right places - ie, regardless of where the holes were, I compromised to use them rather than try and drill new ones and destroy more drill bits. Anyway, this lovely bit of stainless steel has been secured by four stainless steel self-tappers into the bottom of The Wood, and the original battery thingy first bolted with nylocs to a bit of mild steel bar, then that bar nylocked to the stainless steel ex-echo sounder bracket.

Why did I put the whole thing on The Wood ? It actually acts as a sled to give access to the battery should it need removal as there is not enough room to swing the door open on the original thingy. The sled is merely secured with two bolts (and nylocs) to the metal tray underneither and I reckon The Wood looks much better than yet more metal, and I'm sure the battery will be healthier on it.

Oh well, there went the light again. Sheesh, where did a day and a half go ? Here is a last shot before the side covers go back on again. "WTF ?" do I hear you exclaim ? "You do all that and then put the covers back on ? Anyway, how can they go back on with the pods and the fact that the top mount points have been removed ?"

Why ? Coz I'm not quite ready for Der Ratte to go nekked yet. I want to get it lowered and re rattle can matted first. On the lowering side of things, I did bolt on a bit of tube with holes at 9" centers to see what Der Ratte felt like when that low and that rigid.

It was scary. To start off with, it was a LONG way down from off the center stand, and the side stand was useless - it wanted to push the bike over rather than hold it up. I liked the sitting position, but even without riding it, it was painfully non-flexible. Worse than that, LSCP, (the gorgeous girl who has been my Life Style Choices Partner for the last six years) didn't want to go pillion and see how it was. Not a good sign. Like I said, scary. :(

I still want to do it though, so I think I'll just have to bite the bullet and go for some shorter shocks. The default ones are 13" centers, so I guess a 4" drop is too far. Maybe an 11" will be the go ? In the meantime, I adjusted the defaults to the sloppiest/weakest/lowest they can be. I was even considering taking to the springs with an angle grinder to drop them a bit more, but there is no way back from that kind of mod and it doesn't help with the UP bounce. sigh.

And here is the final short for the day just prior to me slinging the saddle bags back over again ... making it look like I hadn't done a damn thing for the last day and a half. Heavy sigh. See, the side covers fit just fine with the pods ! How did I put the covers on ? Simple, the bottom bits went into their usual slot, and the top bits I just cable-tied to the top frame. Chuckle.

End result ? Cosmetically it virtually looks just like it did a couple of days ago, but it smells far worse due to a liberal dosing with good old fish oil in preparation for some more rattle can matt black. No doubt my neighbours hate me again for that. Heh.

Anyway, what a Ratte of a day. How was yours ? Accomplish much ?

regarDS