Plexi is indeed a great idea, more costly than cardboard, but if it could save even one plate done wrong, it is well worth it. Aluminium plate can be cut with ease using a saber saw (scie sauteuse en français) with metal cutting blades. A bit of oil will ease cutting an make the blades last longer.

Jean

Thankfully I can get small quaities of Plexi from work, so it costs nothing
It's good you translated Sabre saw for me Jean, I'd never heard of one! On this side of the pond we call it a jigsaw. I keep meaning you buy a bench top jigsaw and a pillar drill, but as I have access to a drill 24/7 10 minutes up the road at work I probably don't really need one but the jigsaw would be useful, up till now I've been using a hand held one which is right on the limit cutting 1/4" (6mm) plate. Although I've never tried using a drop of oil on the blade, another top tip Jean, Thanks

Webby

Nice to see this one back on the burner.

Maybe January for mine...

Thanks GPZ,
I look forward to seeing your finished bike, I'm sure it will be a stunner!
As for me, I aim to have this thing finished by September 2014, it's my 40th birthday present to me Of course it may get finished sooner, the risk with that is then I have to go out and buy another project for my birthday!
Out of interest have you trail fitted your outer engine plates?
After further research last night I think I figured out why the end of the left plate is lower than the right. It's to clear the rear brake rod.
As to why the right is not lowered to match the left, it looks like it's to keep enough edge distance from the swingarm pivot hole.
As I mentioned before, these things make you think

All the best

Webby

I have only mounted the engine in the frame, and mounted the outer plates to the engine; then, put the whole thing in a dark corner of the garage.

grandpaul wrote:I have only mounted the engine in the frame, and mounted the outer plates to the engine; then, put the whole thing in a dark corner of the garage.

I know the feeling !
You haven't noticed the difference in the height of the muffler hangars ? There must be something like 1/2" - 3/4" difference. They are only at the same height when they cross the frame tube.

Thanks

Webby

Muffler hangars won't matter to me as I'm going with either upswept scrambler pipes (on the left side), or 2-into-1 header, downswept, on the right side.

In that case I'd suggest that you use the outer plates, (they seem to add quite a bit of rigidity to the motor mounts) but cut off the rear sections. You could bolt them to the frame gussets using the existing holes, you'll just need to fab up a couple of spacers about 5/8" thick.

All the best

Webby

I was wondering why the Dresda plates I bought weren't drilled for the swingarm spindle. I assumed that would be one of the reasons for having them in the first place?

Hi GPZ,
When you ordered your plates Dave should have asked what swingarm and spindle you are using. When I ordered my swingarm he asked what rear hub I was using (for the wheel spindle diameter) and what plates I was using. This is because the swingarm can be ordered with two different spindle lengths, one for standard plates (like yours or Converta plates) and the longer one for plates like mine.
I hope this makes sense

All the best

Webby

I forgot to mention GPZ,
The plates would work very well (and look cool) with your swing arm spindle set up, although you would need to lengthen the spindle by about 1 1/4". It should be easy enough to drill the holes in the plates.

Webby

Yep, the blanks I have are long enough to go through the outer plates.

I started on the head steady last night, it was a bit of a PITA to figure out the dimensions. As many of you know it's easy to copy a bracket if you have all the hole centers, then it's just a matter of measuring your edge distance and joining up the lines.
With this there are only two holes to use as a datum, the rest is guesswork. I made 3 card templates before I was happy with the shape, followed by another in plexi.



Because of the tight curves in the piece I had to chain drill part of it, heres's the almost finished head steady. I still have to finish off the edges and drill the holes.



Webby

BTW, this is what it should look like when it's finished.
triton-last-t6357-90.html (Link to GPZ's TriTon build)