Bandit 1200 S Project - Done, part II.

Here are a few pics outside, in natural light

Bandit 1200 S Lower Motor Mounts - DIY

The US Bandits did not come with a lower motor mount, but the unused holes in the frame always bugged me.

So I decided to do something about it :)

I bought some 10mm aluminum plate, played around with a cardboard to make a template, then cut the template out of the aluminum.

The engine mounts are a bit offset from the frame mounts, by 7.5mm on my bike, so I needed to make a couple of spacers to fill that gap (in the photo above, the two square pieces above the brackets). Drilled a couple of 8mm holes and one 10mm hole in each, got the proper fasteners from my spares bin, and smoothed the edges of the aluminum.

Once painted and dry, I installed the brackets in place.

Bandit 1200S Project - Done!

After a couple of months and a few setbacks, the Bandit is finally done. It started its life with me as a slightly neglected and slightly abused 2002 Bandit 1200S with about 9k miles on the clock. I say slightly abused because the original owner was not honest, and the bike did have some issues which I discovered only after i started taking the fairings off.

Initially, I only fixed what needed to be done: Tires, lubrication, signal sender, clutch cover plate, turn signals, broken choke tab, neutral switch sender  . . . the usual things one finds on a used bike. But from the start, the plan was to restore the bike over the winter, and make it better than new. After discovering the stupid things, I did nit trust it enough to take a long trip on it without going through every bolt first. So I decided to strip it down to frame and do it right.  Here is what the Bandit looked like after the first round of 'fixes'. 

And here is what we have today:

Work done:

Frame and various parts powdercoated mirror red
Tank and plastics painted suede white (Volvo) with red pearl in the clear, catalyzed urethane
V-Strom Handguards
Zero Gravity Sport Touring screen
Heated grips
Spiegler braided brake and clutch lines
New brake pads
Oil cooler lines replaced with stainless braided hose and AN fittings, Russel Performance (custom)
Shad side racks (modified)
RK Chain
Sunstar sprockets
Greased and repacked bearings, swingarm, etc
Custom made bar ends
Hardwired GPS and extra LED marker lights
Carbs rebuilt (stock jetting)
Valves
Brake calipers rebuilt
Forks serviced
12V plug installed in cockpit
. . .  and many other things I'm forgetting.

Plus, every bolt on the bike was torqued to spec, every lube point was lubed, and every fluid and filters were changed.

The various installments in this project, including the making of custom oil lines) are all listed under the Bandit 1200 tab on the left. Thanks for joining me on this journey.

Bandit 1200S rear brake service

Rear brake service on the B12 was done as part of the brake overhaul. As is typical with these machines, the pistons start sticking as soon as the brake dust builds up, and my pistons were no exception. So, before installing the new brake lines, I took the rear caliper apart, cleaned everything, and replaced the seals.

 

To split the caliper, remove the two Allen bolts holding the two halves together. But first, remove your pads by taking out cotter pins and sliding the slider pins out. These are often stuck and may need a little encouragement. It is a good idea to grease these pins with some brake grease before reassembly. I used graphite, but the copper grease also works well.   

The two halves apart. On the right, you should see a small o-ring between the matting surfaces. I reused mine, but it is available as part of brake kits. See how dirty the pistons are.  

Seals out, piston out, and partially cleaned.

After all arts were clean and smooth, I installed new seals, lubed them with brake fluid, and pushed the clean pistons back in. The two halves were bolted together reusing the stock bolts, and then I installed brake pads and grease slider pins.

Bandit 1200S side racks, Shad

On my previous Bandit, I had installed a full Givi setup with Wingrack and hard luggage. On this Bandit, thus far, I was able to get away with some inexpensive soft side bags. However, I never cared for the way the bags rested against the rear fairing, and putting any weight in them made the bags move around a lot.

After researching several side racks options, I decided on the Shad rear rack, knowing full well I would not be buying the Shad cases. All I wanted the racks for was to provide some support and attachment points for the various soft luggage systems I already own.

The Shad racks are probably the slimmest, least obstructive racks I had seen to date. The came with an extended arm for rear turn signals (and the signals themselves), which I did not care for, as they made the bike look weird, by stretching way beyond the frame. I cut these off with a saw, filed and painted the welds, and installed the racks.

This, of course, presented a problem as the racks interfered with the stock turn signals I wanted to keep. All I had to do was to make two hole lower on the rear fender, and relocate my turn signals down, using the stock hardware. A few minutes with a Dremmel took care of that.

 Here are the racks installed, both sides:

Bandit 1200S - wiring extra stuff

I spent a few days catching up on the small stuff that needed to be done, that is, wiring the heated grips through a relay, bleeding the brakes, et cetera.

The Bikemaster Heated Grips did not come with a relay, but I was not comfortable wiring them straight the the battery, so I decided to wire in a relay activated by the tailight (switched source). The wiring itself was easy - one wire to positive, one to negative, one to appliance, and a trigger wire. Routing the wires was more of a pain than anything else.

Since I was doing this already, I decided to wire in a 12V outlet. I snaked two extra wires thought the sleeve that houses the heated grips wires, and connected those to the same relay. Now I have a handy little outlet up front, was charging stuff or for running an air compressor.

Making the wiring as neat as possible: GPS hardwire, outlet wiring, extra marker light on handguards, heated grips . . .

I mounted the controller for the grips on the handlebars

Finally, it is starting to look like a bike

My painter surprised me, and delivered the tank and plastics today. Since I like to do all the wetsanding and polishing myself, I'll be busy doing just that over the next week or so. The paint is still too fresh to do anything right now. We went with a white base shot with red pearl clear, and four coats of clear over it, all in urethane. The red pearl is nicely subtle, but I think it will tie everything together.

And a quick mockup of the tank in place