DR650se Supermoto Done Cheap!!! Now I'm committed...

Now that I've started my project and posted it publicly I'm committed to finishing without spending much money. It's all in the title, "...Done Cheap!!!"

The whole idea is to put together a second set of wheels for my beloved DR650. What I'd like to do is add performance on the street and get back on the track for some occasional fun.
This way I can put my D606's back on my stock wheels and easily go from Dual-Sport to Supermoto+ in a matter of 20 minutes. I know, I know... the DR is no "Supermoto"... It's too heavy for a "real" Supermoto... I don't really care what the nay-sayers are preaching on the subject. I absolutely love my DR. It's cheap, simple, easy to work on, fast if you build it right, has great suspension if you set it up right, reliable, versital and just plain fun to ride... As far as the 650 class goes it's also pretty light. Anyway, that's the plan, To SM my DR for as little as possible.

I've been stewing on what course of action to take, and how far to take it... Do I hold out for 3.5" front and 4.5" rear? Should I go for spoked rims only or figure out how to rig up some 17's off a sportbike? How big of brakes do I want? How big of brakes do I need? How much am I willing to spend? How hard am I going to push this bike when it's done?
I decided for many reasons that for the DR650 and MY personal desires that I'd most like to go with a nice pair of Excels... a 19" up front and a 17 x 4.5 in back with SS over sized spokes and the works, 320mm front wave rotor, brembo caliper, and rear wave rotor and .........



Oh wait, I'm doing this cheap, so that's not gonna work. Better check Craigslist instead. Found a guy that's parting out a 1991 Suzuki GS500e. I've heard of this swap being done before so I picked up the wheels, front axle, front rotor, cush drive and a bunch of misc spacers for $75. That's what I'm talking about. $75 bucks and I'm off and running.

So this is what I'm starting with. Stock rims with BT45s for street use.


Or pull the wheels, spoon off the BT45's and on with the 606's... This pic is from before the headlight change too.


So last night after work it was time to head over to Deadbird's workshop. He's been collecting tools for a while now.... Our most recent find was a full sized, shop style bike lift. Thanks to Brad for the lift! It's now cleaned, painted and repaired. Thanks to DB (AKA: Mister Manners) for the shop and work!!!!! Couldn't accomplish this project in my tent-garage.

Pulled the bike in to the shop and put it on the lift backwards so that we could start working with the front. Pulled off the front wheel and set the GS wheel in place to see what it's gonna look like.


The axles are different sizes, the rotor is bigger... 310mm VS. 290mm,... The stock DR axle is too big for the ID of the bearings and the stock GS axle is smaller than the pinch bolts and threads on the fork legs.

Figured out that the early Katanas have a 290mm brake rotor (same size as stock DR) and it will fit on the GS wheel. This will be the cheapest and easiest way to solve the difference in size of the brake rotors. I know it would be nice to just buy a bracket to convert the DR to a 310mm front brake but nobody makes one! Damn it! So ebay is sending me a pair of 290mm rotors.. Cheapest I found was $25.00 but I had to buy both. Katanas had dual 290mm rotors and all the ebay sellers are selling in pairs so if any of you guys want to try this mod I've got a rotor for ya.


an idea of what the front will look like.


More to come...

Thats looking good,I was lucky finding a used set of buchanon built road wheels for my DR,We rode in a group ride together at Rio Nido last year.Ill be there again pretty fun weekend!Mine stops way harder with the 19" wheel on the front,different leverage with the smaller wheel.

I've moto'd my DR800. Stock hubs, new rims, new spokes.



The thing is, if you can get your hands on some 17" rims (DR800/650 rears) then you could lace the rim to a stock front hub......... Then there's no drams about bearings, spindles, spacers and disks. I did it to my son's TTR 250.
You can fit 150/60/17 to the rear and 120/60/17 to the front. A nice set of diablos would do wonders for your 650.

Shhhh...... Daisy naked in the sun......

I've looked down that road too... DR hubs and rims are way more than the 75 bucks I spent on the GS wheels. Thought about lacing the stock rear rim to the stock front hub and lacing a new front... But then I'd only have one set of rims when I'm done. The point is to spend as little money as possible and have two sets of wheels when I'm done.

I'll end up with my gs500 17's and my stockers when I'm done with the project.

I am making a tire size compromise... Yes, optimally it would have been nice to have found wider wheels from a different sport-bike but that would have doubled the cost. So I bought what was available for cheap. The GS wheels are only 3" wide in front and 3.5" wide in the rear. So I'll be running 110/60/17 in front and a 140 or 150/60/17 in the back. Not optimal for hardcore SM racing, but they'll do just great for the occasionaly track day; and for spirited road riding. The project is coming together but I've got to get some more detailed pics for you guys before I post mere details...

I came to the same conclusion, but with older Katana wheels. Check the bearings, I bet you could press in some different ones and work with your stock axle.

My DR with Katana wheels:


I was kind of bumming about tire availability of the 110 and 140, until I got a set of Pirelli Sport Demons, 110/70 and 140/70. Very nice so far. The wheels had come with Dunlop 205's (in 80 series profile) and handled like ass.

I used to do a lot of track days and some racing on my old Hawk GT so I'm pretty familiar with the tire choices for narrower rims... I'm thinking that I'll probably end up with the pilot powers in a 110/60 front and a 150/60 rear (the rear Michelins atcually measure out smaller that a 150). The rear profile may end up a little steep on the edges but I can live with that. OR I could go with the Pirelli Rosso's in a 110 and a 140 but they're bias plys instead of radials... Still trying to decide wheather to pinch on the 150 radial or ease on a 140 bias ply.... Both have a very sticky compound.

Yeah, I went with the Sport Demons because they should have decent mileage, using it more for an upcoming road trip and general commuting. Handles pretty good.

I'll have to send a link to my friend, who I could see being interested in following this write up..... Keep it up!

Is this http://www.advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=369856 any easier, more reliable, cheaper, etc. or just a different approach. Big fan of the supermoto on the cheap, I AM one cheap bastard.

1st generation sv650s front rim has the right bearings and right size rotor, just so you know. I used some fender washers to center the wheel. The brake rotor is the same as the gs500 but the sv wheel had 2 of them! I had a writeup on it at supermotojunkie dot com. I got the tm40 carb and rear wheel complete from procycle.us

What years of Katana wheels will work like the ones that you used? There is a set on ebay for a 03/04?

Not sure if those will work. I know that the pre 97 Katanas (3.0" front, 3.5" rear) work with some modification. Stands to reason that a lot of wheels *may* fit with modification, some are easier than others I'm sure.

I'm a slacker and bought my wheelset ready to bolt on (mostly) right down to the DRZ400SM housing (with 650 input gear) that makes the speedo read somewhat accurately.

I did have to do a bit of clearancing of the calipers so the floating buttons wouldn't hit it, same with the rear rotor. One of these days I'll get some kind of accurate measuring device and post some numbers. But I'm lazy.

That is badass!

So I was able to do a little more work on the bike today Snapped a few pics, and took some measurements to start thinking of a plan of attack for the rear.
Looks like the rear is gonna be a huge PITA but so far I'm still gonna give it my best shot.

The front is nearly ready to ride. Just waiting till Tuesday when the rotor is supposed to arrive. So here's a run-down of what we had to do so far.

As I said before, the inner diameter of the GS500 wheel is smaller than the DR... I decided to use the stock GS axle and cut spacers to center the wheel.

Here are the two axles. Pay no attention to the spacer on the stock DR axle, it's not used in any application... spare part. DR on top, GS on bottom.


Notice that the GS axle is longer and smaller diameter. We had to put it on the lathe and turn down the flange that was on the left end of the axle. That way it can recess in to the pinch bolts on the fork leg.





The flange of the left needs to recess in the the pinch far enough to get the stock GS axle nut and cotter pin in the right.


While putting it all together and measuring how far to cut down the spacers I noticed that the axle didn't center perfectly between the threads of the fork leg....
We had to us a piece of .04" shim stock to center the axle and keep the threads from getting mashed.


Next it was time to cut the spacers down to the right size to center the wheel and brake. It's nice to have friends with the right tools for the job.

The infamous "Mister Manners" at work...


Once the spacers were cut the work was finished... Bolted the wheel back up and checked the fit. Now waiting for the right sized rotor to show before the test ride.


Here it is so far.




The rear is a totally different story... but we did find bearing that will allow me to use the stock DR axle. The tough part will be lining up the brake rotor and chain. Looks like the wheel is going to need machining that I'll have to pony up some more dough for.




I've got another machinist friend of mine making some mach-up shims that we will press in to the rear GS wheel.... Don't want to buy $65 worth of bearings until we're sure we can make the wheel fit and center up in the DR's swing-arm. Measurements we took today are encouraging that it will all work out in the end. The rear wheel could be a bit more difficult.

I need to find a couple things... #1 is I need a rotor that's the same size as the stock DR but has the bolt pattern of a 91 GS500e.

I'm also looking for a 40 to 45 tooth sprocket that will fit the GS500 cush-drive... preferably a sprocket with some off-set. Anyone got something laying around their shop?

I did this conversion on my XR250L, using the same wheels you have. I made a front caliper bracket using nothing more than 0.25" plate aluminum and spacers/washers so I could use the XR caliper on the GS rotor. Looking at your friend's shop I'm sure you have more than enough tools to do it.

On the rear, the key for me was ditching the stock caliper and using the GS500 rear caliper and hangar. It floats on the axle and uses a torque link for reaction, so it completely eliminates any alignment issues on the right side. That let me set the wheel where it needed to be for chain alignment without worry. This complicates switchover from the GS500 wheels to the stockers because you have to change the caliper and bleed the rear brakes, but it isn't really that much more work. And for me, I only made the swap once or twice a season anyway.

Good luck with your project, it looks like it will be a good one!

On my DR350 I did the same ditched the stock caliper and used the gs500 caliper and hanger and made a mount for the block arm to use.

Did you guy use the rear caliper from a 98 and newer GS or a 97 and older? Which axle did you guys use, the DR's or the GS's?

Could you post some detailed pix of both sides of the rear? Did the chain line up OK? Thanks guys!

The front is complete! Left the camera at the shop though. I'm gonna give it a good test ride tomorrow since I didn't have my helmet and gear at the shop with me tonight. Not really in the mood to test-pilot without the goods...


Time to start the work on the rear... Anyone got any pix of how theirs is put together.