More progress... Last week I got the Motorhead undertail with the clear alternatives integrated LED signals. I had the undertail laser color matched and painted. Last weekend I removed the tail section. It only took me about 10 minutes to strip it all off. Very simple.
I got the undertail back from my painter on Monday, but have been busy at work all week, bought a new car, etc... Here's the piece almost ready for installation.
I did mess a little with the taillight assembly earlier this week. I removed the stock assembly and wired the new LED assembly. Tonight I thought I'd spend about an hour re-installing everything. But, it never seems to go like you think... Here's a summary...
I drilled the 2 front solid mount holes, and the 6 bolt holes in the undertail at the pre-formed dimples to accept the supplied mounting bolts. I started with 6 smaller pilot holes, then enlarged to the proper size. For anyone trying this, I'd suggest two things. 1) If you already painted the undertail, use masking tape over the area to be drilled. 2) Drill your holes as far to the outside of the dimples as possible. As you will see, this undertail is a pretty solid piece and doesn't allow much bending to match up with the stock tail's mounting holes. So do yourself a favor and place the holes to the outside as much as possible. When mounting, I suggest starting with the two forward solid mount bolts, and leave them loose to allow the undertail to be moved a bit while installing the remaining bolts. Then find a way to muscle the stock tail to the undertail and line up the holes. It aint easy...
I installed the LED assembly in the stock tail bracket. But once I got it in place, I realized the tag light lower assembly and lens were still there. Here's what it looked like. It's not clean enough for me...
Since I want a clean look, I opted to remove the tag light housing on the bottom of the taillight assembly, and I also removed the tag light lens at the bottom portion of the clear alternatives lens. A dremel with a cutting wheel works fine. Just use a grinding stone afterwards to touch up the cuts. Then I re-installed the taillight/signal assembly. Here's what it looked like afterwards. Much cleaner... Also, notice the gap between the undertail and the stock tail. This was a 4 beer gap...
I began to install the 6 supplied bolts and clips to the stock tail and undertail. I could only manage to get 4 installed. The two center bolts simply would not mate with the clips, due to the tail section and the undertail not coming together. I muscled this around for a while and couldn't get it. I did manage to crack the undertail fiberglass about 4 inches on the front underside. Hardly noticeable but I hope it doesn't creep. I will attempt to try to match up the 2 remaining holes again tomorrow, but I'm not too confident... So here's what it looks like at the moment.
The most time consuming part of the undertail installation, was attempting to mate the stock tail piece with the undertail to line up the mount holes and insert the bolts. This probably took me a good hour or so. And I still have 2 bolts to go. Once the undertail is painted, this install took me about 3 hours. Again, at least one hour was muscling the tail around. Another 20 minutes was cutting the tag lens and tag light housing off. If the undertail kit had 3/4" wider lips around the piece it would allow more efficient fitment. Otherwise, I'm pretty pleased with it.
Now on my parts list is a new tag bracket. I wanted to keep a fender mounted tag, to keep the bike proportioned. But it may not be too possible unless I fab a bracket to hang off the rear-most tail bolts. So I'm looking at a black swingarm mounted bracket. Then I'll need wiring for a tag light...
Tomorrow I expect to install the Soupy's rear lowering kit and the Reaper front risers. More to come...
