Suzuki S40 / Savage - Ryca Scrambler Conversion

Alright. Finally looking like a bike again.

What a change already. Goes to show you that most of those ugly cruiser bikes are a rear wheel and set of long shocks away from not looking like garbage. It's kind of like how the R or "Roadster" Sportsters were.

Agreed - she actually feels a lot different just pushing her around. The front end still needs to come down, too, which should help even more.

Sorry about the lack of updates - I moved this past weekend and it's been a mad house (pun unintended). The bike is outside now... no garage in the new place, but there's a shed. Once I get further on the kit and organize a bit, I'll probably have room to put the bike in there, but for now it's a mess chock full 'a nuts.

I came home to a package from Ryca today. I ordered some blinkers (which order I jacked up) and I think I lost the fork boots. The guys at Ryca corrected my order after I e-mailed them, sent the package the same day, and gave me the benefit of the doubt on the boots, sending me a new set. First class treament - even after the sale.



Anyway - to relax a bit, I had to do SOMETHING on the bike - it's really driving me crazy not getting anything done like this after all this sitting around. The wife was good enough to walk to the store with the kids for some dinner, so I got the carb and jet kit and got crackin'....



Not quite sure what's goin' on with all the pieces, so I check out one of Ryca's videos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFFuF9QZ4IM
<iframe src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/rFFuF9QZ4IM?rel=0" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" width="420"></iframe>

So, the kit includes a bigger pilot and main jets, both of which I used. There's a bit if discrepancy on what they say to use in the video, what they say to use in the notes, and what they provide in the kit. I think it'll work out - I'm at sea level and it's cool out - but I may be on the rich side. I also raised the needle with some included spacers and adjusted the idle air screw.

Anyway, wife eventually came home and said nothing about the dirty, gassy carb on the dining room table... instead, I got a 22 fluid ounce prize - I think I'll call it a day.

Oh man, and that's a damned good* beer, too!

How big of a job was the jet kit? Are you a carb man, or is this new to you?

Lookin' good!








*Please don't start arguing beer with me. Seriously- to some people that's a fancy beer, to some people it's a bland beer; some like it, some don't. I hapen to be fond of it. I like beer. I suspect you like beer too. Let's have a beer and talk about bikes.

Ha - love the beer - it's a great regular. Glad to grab one with ya sometime!

Jet kit is a 10 minute job if the carb's already off and you're familiar. My air screw plug was already removed, which saved another 5 mins.

The YouTube vid made it really easy. The only thing tricky with carbs is making sure you don't over-tighten the brass bits and make sure the rubber on the top portion is seated so you don't pinch it.

Ok - put the bars yesterday. They need to be drilled for the controls, which have little nubs to keep them from rotating. I've ground down nubs before, but then they don't really fit quite right... they like to twist around and whatnot. I also now have to order a new throttle tube seeing how I broke the stock one trying to get a piece of the grip off.




I threw on the front sprocket and spacers - not yet tightened as I can't get the bike in gear. I put on the rearset bracket as well (which fit a little bit loosely) - no pic of that though.




Put the tank on to make sure the tail is sitting correctly. You can see the filter is temporarily on, but obviously the silicone tube will be cut to size later in the game.




Riveted on the seat latches. The one real gripe I have about the kit so far is the powercoating, which is very soft and scratches VERY easily. If the parts so much as touch another piece of metal - it scratches. I've seen spray paint hold up better - really annoying. Case and point, below are the rivets before and after, you can see that the powdercoating chips all around the rivets just from the light pressure of the very small rivets.






Ok, moved onto the fender. It comes as an almost full 180 degree semicircular, heavy monstrosity so that the builder can cut it down to size. It is so big, however, that to even get it to fit into the wheel well where she needs to sit, it gets a foot or so cut off. Fit again, cut another half a foot off - then measure once, drill twice (meaning I need to spring my tig out of storage, to fill an extra hole - :dog).

Ok, now with a proper fit, I break out the tail light. I don't mind it being made in China, but if you follow the politics of that region, you may find this interesting:




Here's the packaged taped up in place to check fit:




Drilled and mounted:




Got a nice amount of work in today. I'm missing a couple of things from the donor bike - which I hope are in a box in storage. I'll hope to dig those out tomorrow and get some more work in on Monday. I also need to buy fork oil and get crackin' on the front end: oil, springs, tube & tire, and blinkers... probably some other stuff.

Ok- busted the tig out of jail and went about filling a hole in the fender by filling; first time using the tig on 110V - I turned the amps down low and didn't have any issues. Works AOK for this light stuff.



And then flushing with a flap disk:



Obviously, the pinholes show that my welding leaves something to be desired. Stupid mistake really - oh well, moving along... now folks... nothing to see here...


Went on to build up the seat.



The seat features hartwell latches that will allow the seat to rotate up, allowing access to the battery box and glove box. I wanted the seat to be close to the tank, so with the test fit, I didn't get a lot of movement.




A little more black spray paint to cover up all the chips in the powdercoat and the seat sits until further notice.

Looking good, but I may send them an email about the powder coat job. I can see in the pictures with the rivets that it looks pretty weak. I'm sure they send all that stuff out so they will probably have a talk with whoever is doing it.

Tackled the front suspension.

Disassembled - new Progressive brand springs goin' up front!




Spacers installed:




And reinstalled with fresh rubber up front. Getting the forks back together was really, really hard.





Ran into two issues - the minor one being that the blinker screws were frozen in. A little penetration lube and an impact driver did the trick.



The major one being that way I had the bike up while the front wheel was lifted was not very good. I went for reinforcements and the bike fell over. Stupidly, the tank was on and got dented all to shit, which is not only annoying, but ruins some plans. I was thinking about brushing the steel and clearing over it, but that's out now. I'll see if a paint and body shop can do some magic.

I swear I'm not cut out for this some days.

Oh well - onward, ho.

Oh man, that sucks about the tank! Check with dent removal services- a lot of them are specifically not body shops, and specialize in making dents go away rather than filling it in. It's amazing what some of those guys can do with a mallet and some suction cups!

Duh... I just noticed the "new" Tempter as the 4 leading shoes of the GT750/550!!
Mmmm... A Savage Cafe with the same brake ?! (funny I have one somewhere!).

Anyway to make the kit looking more like this?
http://www.vintagebike.co.uk/pictures/1959-norton-manki-manx-suzuki/#.USMesIl5mc0

Yeah - they have a Cafe kit if you're into that.



You can choose what you want in the kit or buy parts individually, so you don't have to go with their tank and tail section and side covers. Do your own work for those and keep the battery down low (in the stock location) and you'd be pretty close.

I had a Savage for a few months in 2008. It was a very fun to ride bike. It was just too physically small for me. I bought my XT225 because I missed having a lightweight bike.

Well, I took the side cover, which needs to be cut if you're going to side mount the exhaust. I printed out a template, but it was too small, so I guesstimated. Always good policy.




I was going to get everything ready for paint, but then saw a tag on the front fender about test fitting and whatnot. It looks ready to go since it has mounting holes, but those are not correct, so I break out the drill (since the drill press is in storage... and now my hand drill sounds sickly, but I digress).



Work some magic:




And now I need to find someone for paint and body.




Now it's off to work (that is, my real job).

What part number PS shocks/springs does Ryca include with their kits?

Number on the shock says 444-4211 (which is a recent change I hear) and the spring says 1367 90/130 - not sure what any of that means though. You can buy the shocks through Ryca - not sure if you can get it cheaper directly through Progressive.



Anyhoo - a paint guy today told me the tank needs metal work - dents are too bad for him to deal with. Hmm...

Is that just a stock tank or is that supplied with the Ryca kit? If it's stock just score a used one off of ebay. Looks like they have a bunch and prices start around $80.

The stock tank is modified by Ryca for the kit to allow it to sit lower. Pieces are tigged in and the tank is pressure tested. If I can find a stock tank, I might able to tig in the section I need. I'll have to coat the inside though - you've seen that my tigging isn't up to snuff. Even as is, I'd feel better about the tank being treated and coated. I've had bad experiences with leaky fuel on my KLRE project.

Thanks for the info - I'm off to fleabay right now.

EDIT: You're absolutely right - there's plenty out there as far as stock tanks. I want to cut the portion that needs help out first though, and see if the dents will come out. Perhaps I can fix it enough to tig back in w/o needing another tank. It doesn't look hard, but I've said that before.