Rat engineering: Homemade "clip-on" handlebar

[Nath]

A few days ago I crashed one of my bikes, a 1988 Honda Bros400, going over a speed bump a little too fast (60mph ). I lost control and got thrown off the bike before it proceeded to slide 50yards up the hill on its side, luckily avoiding hitting anything. Whilst I was lucky, the bike still sustained a little damage including a snapped handlebar which prevented me from riding or pushing it home. Today I made a replacement handlebar from some scrap steel.

https://homepage.ntlworld.com/steven.coy/images/handlebar/handlebar1.jpg
My raw materials. A bit of scaffolding, a length of 7/8ths steel tube I'd found at the back of the garage, and an old homemade shelf bracket - Basically a length of 6mm flat bent at a rightangle.

Spent a few hours working away in the garage and managed to weld something together pretty much the same as I'd had planned in my head. Used a 10mm thread as I was a bit worried about the thickness of the scaffolding requiring a fair force to clamp it round the stanchion. Welded a nut onto my steel flat rather than messing around with a tap. Had the anglegrinders out a little bit, but also used a hacksaw and file for half of the work to save getting grind dust all over the garage.

https://homepage.ntlworld.com/steven.coy/images/handlebar/handlebar2.jpg

https://homepage.ntlworld.com/steven.coy/images/handlebar/handlebar3.jpg

https://homepage.ntlworld.com/steven.coy/images/handlebar/handlebar4.jpg

https://homepage.ntlworld.com/steven.coy/images/handlebar/handlebar5.jpg
The finished product! Not bad eh?

https://homepage.ntlworld.com/steven.coy/images/handlebar/handlebar6.jpg
You can see that the homemade clipon points down at a slightly different angle to the 'proper' bar, but I couldn't feel the difference sat on the bike.

https://homepage.ntlworld.com/steven.coy/images/handlebar/handlebar7.jpg


There ya go, not bad for an afternoons work starting with a few bits of scrap steel. Still need to cut it to length once I've got all the controls on, and possibly weld up the ends to stop water getting in. I may try and attach the bar end weight off the original clipon which I found in the middle of the road after my crash. Then just paint it to stop it rusting up.

Should look pretty tidy once all the control are on, and I dare say this bar will not snap in half as easily as the other one did!
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Hard livin', hard luck.

[Gazdaman]

When I read the title I thought "oh god, this is going to be shoddy".

Saw the first pic, thought, "wow, this is REALLY going to be shoddy".

But it's fucking quality mate! Seriously well done. I'd keep that on there, looks fine.

Nice one

Gaz

[Klause]

I remember our rat conversations at Portugal faro. You certainly live up to your conversation ideas.

Planning on more trips at all? Believe im doing France and Italy with R4nger next summer.


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Current bikes: 1960 Triumph 5ta x2, TTR600RE, KTM200EXC, Cagiva Elephant 900ie.

[colin1]

glad u r ok

not sure u shd trust your welding skills with something as critical as a handlebar

i liked your ammobox racks, but if they fail, u are ok

if the welds on your handlebar fail, u are fucked

i dont know enough about welds to know if those ones are good or not

also, one bar is a different weight from the other which i reckon will fuck up the handling

if you are determined to keep your home made bar, i think you should make another for the other side that will be the mirror image of the first

was going over the speed bump at that speed intentional or not ?

[quacker_boy]

Those welds look really done Nath, so i'd actually say ignore Colin that'll hold up for a long time.

For a bodge job, that is FUCKING impressive mate

I'm sure one's longer than the other though
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wizzzard wrote: Imagine God just stopping by, tidying your front room up and then quietly letting himself out again. Statisticly more likely to happen than Korn being on here.

[G]

Nice work.

Note 'sticky out bits' that don't snap/bend aren't always a good idea - as they may bend or snap something else.

A lot of racers use Harris clipons; which use a replaceable aluminium (I think) rod for the actual bar along with a more heavy duty fixing to the fork leg. Whle the bar may be more likely to bend, it's a pretty cheap bit to fix and ensures nothing more expensive goes.

[jon_nsr]

just go buy one
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1999 GSXR750

[mr.z]

I did wonder what you ended up doing tom will be pleased to hear your makeing use of the scaffold

Looks like a damn fine job though there..

follwing from what g said, one thing might be worth doing is drilling a hole through the end closest to the clamp, that way if it hits the deck it'll snap and not fark your forks? you've allready proved you can make a new clipon but new forks would be a beearch..
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>RidingSkills<->Tech Tips<->MyBikes<

[Nath]

Yeah, I can definitely see the logic in parts that are designed to break in a certain way, but I wouldn't have though this steel clipon should break in anything other than a big big crash which would do lots of other more serious damage as well. Not really possible for the clipon to damage the stanchion either.

Colin, I think you need to understand a little bit about metalology. If you cut a steel bar in half then weld it back together, the weld will be the strongest part of the bar. Everyone always talks about welds "failing", but how often do you see this? The last two broken frames I've seen posted on this forum from serious crashes did not snap at any welded joins (Gaz's Bandit and Andy's SV650).
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Hard livin', hard luck.

[G]

It shouldn't be a big problem, but the clip-on can quite easily 'pinch' the fork leg - as it's above the slidey bit it won't really compromise the bike.

Suspect it can also help to bend/twist the yokes as well, though.

[mr.z]

I had a go mig welding once, it was like a pidgeon had been fed laxative and slowy pressed in a vice..

The two pieces of flat bar welded end on end took 2TONS of force before it went and it wasn't the weld that went!.. and this was an abismal mess of a weld, not a pretty one.. pretty amazeing..

The breaking.. i dunno, the only thing i was thinking is the force being transfered through the yokes, could potentially crack them maybe.. dunno.. much like your pannier/wall incident probably not gonna be a problem though..

Alternatively just stop bloody crashing (allthough i'm amazed its not a weekly thing in notts)
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>RidingSkills<->Tech Tips<->MyBikes<

[palmer]

[kawashima]

What I am always surprised to read BCF is you have so much skill and facilities . Most of japanese riders ask bikeshops. Most of us don't have bike garage either. Many of you have skills as high as bike shops . I wonder if bike shop can do welding...
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2020 Touring Serow 250
,past 2012 YB125SP, 2008 TDM900 2005 W650, [url=d], 2002 LS125R, 2002 CB400SF, NS50F, C50 / Trip to UK(2009), Hokkaido touring(2013)

[gixerboy]

Here are some I made:

https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v106/gixerboy1/anoclips.jpg

[colin1]

[palmer]

colin you anorack

[Cillit-BANG]

[colin1]

he said i needed to understand a bit about metallurgy.

my point was that i know more about metallurgy than him as i studied it for my degree.

i dont think i know more about welding than him, but i do know that there is a difference between a good weld and a bad weld, and why.

its the quality of the weld that is important.

Maybe his welds are great, but he hasnt been welding much longer than i have been selling steel.

If he is confidant in the strength of his welds, fine, and no one has said oh my god that weld looks shit, so maybe its fine.

However when its such a critical bit of the bike, i dont think he should leave it to chance, but then i think he said that he was riding one of his bikes with no brakes for a while, so maybe he likes to take chances.

[Nath]

"Leaving it to chance" - Utter rubbish. I'll tell you how to tell the difference between good and bad welding. You put what you've welded together in a vice and attack it with a gret big hammer, if it breaks apart then the welding wasn't much cop was it.

Maybe I have only been welding 6months, but I've made quite a few bits for my cb550 and have put them through the most strenuous use possible. You've admitted you know nothing about welding, yet still try to preach. Let me let you in on a secret, you say it's the "quality" of the welds that are important, but that is totally incorrect. It's the nature of the join that matters, even if you can produce a fantastic quality weld with great penetration it counts for shit if you actually join the two pieces of metal together in a stupid way. Take a standard cross shape, if you weld two pieces of steel flat together like that you can have 4 seperate runs of weld - Even if your welding is beyond shit you will still struggle to ever break apart the two bits of steel since that is an inherently strong joint.
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Hard livin', hard luck.

[colin1]

what you say makes sense, and i like it that you test your welds with a hammer

i wasnt preaching, just saying what i thought

oh and palmer

[Nath]

Two weeks later, and I finally found the time to finish off my handlebar and get it on the bike.

I decided to use the old bar-end weight thinking that this would be the key detail that would determine whether the bar looked like a bodge or like a professional replacement. So I welded up the top end, then cut the bar to length and welded a nut inside for the bar-end weight to screw into. Sprayed the exposed part of the bar, stuck my controls onto it, and jobs a good'un.

https://homepage.ntlworld.com/steven.coy/images/handlebar/handlebar8.jpg

https://homepage.ntlworld.com/steven.coy/images/handlebar/handlebar9.jpg

Total cost of handlebar: £0.00
Had to buy replacement switchgear and brakelever off eBay for almost £30, and need to spend another fiver on a replacement lid for the brakefluid resevoir. But all in all not too bad a cost to sort out the consequences of quite a bad crash. Unfortunately there are now too many things "wrong" with the bike for it to ever be a good condition standard bike again, so I suspect it will probably get the full-on rat treatment at some point next year
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Hard livin', hard luck.

[Jenks]

or sellll to meeeeeeeeeeeeee
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1978 MZ TS 250 1 Supa 5
1992 yamaha fzr1000 exup
1998 aprilia af1 sintesi

[colin1]

does the handling feel any different ?

it is nice that you get stuck in with all this stuff, even if it does make me a bit nervous

i tend to have this daft idea that some things should be left to 'professionals' when in my experience, they are often worse than a novice with a bit of advice from the internet

[palmer]

I agree colin.

Even if i could weld realy well, id still rather have a 'professional' do the work. Then if it fails you can have a go at him

[feef]