Oz / Kiwi Suzuki DR650 Adv Riders Sign in Here please

Removing it completely; we have Vapors, but they need to be fitted where the speedo is: mounted over the bar clamps, you can't easily see the Vapor in an ADV helmet. As the Vapor is smaller, more accurate and offers about ten times the info that the mechanical speedo does, I can't see a reason to retain it. With the Vapor, a Garmin, charge-points and switches for lights and heaters, it's getting a bit crowded!

Another thing - what's the go with a decent horn? The standard one's like a mewling kitten, so I stuck on a Stebel but six months on - it's cactus. All 3 of them in fact. And I had a Stebel air-horn thingo on another bike - and that lasted about the same time. What's a good one that fits?
This "blank canvas" is beginning to need a lot of paint!

At least yours makes a noise

Stay young

I've made a different type of speedo eliminator that uses another seal like on the disc side. The spacer has a lip on it that sits behind the seal lip holding the spacer in. Much easier to assemble the front wheel like this.

Mine are similar, but I have a lathe too

All my machined bit's have been made on company equipment. Now I've got my own machinery, I've got no time to make bike parts or even ride my bike !

I recommend retirement, big day tomorrow planned, about 600 kms. Head north at 06.00 to meet up with a mob and lead them to the coast for lunch and return, then home. then a casual ride with the missus, on her KLX, on Sun, then there is next week....., hmmmm

Just starting a RMZ250 front end transplant onto my DR. A big thanks to all who post up their experiences here & elsewhere. Guys like Bergdonk, Auscanvent etc have been very helpfull at guiding my transformation. So far 08 dr650, safari tank, rest pretty stock. Next few weeks exhaust & carb mods, RMZ250 front end transplant, electrical gadget power supply, footpeg lower etc. Will post up some pics soon. For all those guys who post up their build threads a big thank you !!
Andrew

looking forward to the results.

So they are all getting along fine, but the little guy in the middle doesn't know what is about to happen

What type of screen is that on the dr?

ok, just went out to the shed. The screen is a Kappa brand. The mounts look generic as if they would fit any bike.
It rattles around a bit on the bumpy stuff. I'm not sure of it's effectiveness as a windscreen as I have never had one before. Still a lot of wind at 120 kmh.

A bit of progress in the shed. Forks off, RMZ bearings shagged, so new ones coming. Will pull std exhaust off tomorrow, picked up a cheap Remus carbon off a GSXR on fleabay during the week, so will see how this goes with Gordon's jetting recommendations & few favours from some tig welding buddies.

Andrew

I ran with my stock speedo drive for a few years - gears and all -just kept it greased and sealed. The vapor came with a plug to push in to the speedo cable hole and seal it off. Only recently, went to VSM elimnator just because.

Took my Vapor off, because it was smaller, hard to read, and wouldn't clock up accrued kilometres beyond 9,999.9

I did the full reset several times, by the manual, and it just wouldn't work.... not worth the money and effort.
It now resides buried somewhere in the back of a cupboard, the next time it sees light of day will be as it hits the bottom of the rubbish bin.

And you can install them with the stock speedo in place I believe.

Crowding was an issue for me too, as was windscreen shaking around due to flexible plastic cowling its mounted to.

I have solved both issues, short of going to a full blown rally fairing.

My cowling is tilted forward through the use of short brackets. This gives more room behind the dash for wiring and bits and pieces and stops the brake line from hitting the screen etc.


It started off as simple bracing from the handlebar mounts to the top of the windscreen which firmed it up nicely. I bought the vapor up from where it was mounted (stock speedo mount) up to where it was more easily read without having to drop the head all of the time and I played with auxillary power points. The Garmin still handlebar RAM mounted and the ignition was a pain to get to.


Then it progressed to making a dashboard to attach to the braces to make somewhere for USB, 12volt, Garmin, vapor plus whatever else I want to add. The ignition raised up (still with steering lock attached to give it height) and bolted to original indicator dash light mounting point. Stock indicator, neutral and high beam light dash eliminated and LEDs placed on dash with separate left and right indicator light (not that it really matters), neutral (red) and high beam (blue). The original mounting bracket I used when the vapor was attached to the stock speedo mount was utilised behind the dash to keep the wiring up and out of the way of the ignition. A guide was made up to go behind the dash to guide the brake line away from the dash and wiring during compression of the suspension.







Garmin now mounted to the dash and can easily be run off the USB if I ever want.

Still got plenty of space for other stuff yet, switches etc as I need.

EDIT: Homemade screen too. Lip at the top bent upwards to deflect air. Works Beautifully.

Should have gone to Specsavers?
The standard POS odo only reads up to 999.9km, so the Vapor is ten times better. Plus it has a tacho, ambient and engine temps, max recorded tell-tales, temp & shift lights, a clock, a stopwatch and a count-down. The stocker is a badly-lit, inaccurate speedo, restricted odo, and...? nothing.
When you get to throwing it away, throw it my way: that way I can replace the inaccurate & limited gauges on something else in my shed!

My sentiments exactly. I have had 30,000 plus hassle free kms from my vapor and I wouldn't give it up for quids. If it shat itself now, well, I have had value for money already and would buy a new one in a flash.
Ockrocket- you just had a bad one-should have hit trailtech up about it IMHO.
FWIW, I have my temp sensor on the upper oil Banjo which (to me) gives a more consistant temp reading, closer to oil temp rather than head temp from the spark plug. It just involved filing the sensor ring a bit larger and installing it in place of the brass washer at the banjo. Some say, it's not close enough to real temp but I say, it sets a normal from which you can monitor. For example, If your head temp was to rise to such a dangerous level where you should shut it down, you would also notice a dramatic change (rise) in the temp at this point also above what is normal for your bike under the conditions it is in (high ambient temps, slow speed, stopped, high revs, whatever).
Just be careful with the routing, it is only just long enough to be able to turn the bars full lock to the left without snapping it (especially if it snags on something). I am on my second one cause mine did once and they are not cheap.( available from MX1australia)

The other variance to trailtechs installation is I have wired my tacho in to the coil wire rather than wrapping it around the plug lead, for no other reason than it is tidier and never needs to be disturbed (plug changes etc)

Original speedo goes to 99,999.9

The Vapor was installed on the bike by the previous owner, so no recourse to put in a claim for a replacement.

Speed and engine temperature adjustments could be done ok.
Accurate by GPS for speed, unknown accuracy for engine temp., but I just adjusted the warning light settings so that they weren't always coming on 2 minutes after the bike was started.
Ambient air temp. was off by 3 deg. compared to my mercury thermometer.

I've gone back to the stock speedo, strapped a waterproof watch to the crossbar pad of the Renthal bars, use my phone in a Ram X Mount as a GPS, and if I want ambient temp. I can just mount one of those kitchen thermometers on the bike.

I'm happy with old school low tech. on my bikes.

Out with old, in with the new