Got the road fairing fitted up and the bracket drilled.

Lights (thanks again Scoobs!) fitted in and wired up nicely. Managed to set the control boxes on fire so a friend (auto spark) helped me make a nice little circuit. Lights are powered from an Ignition positive, through a normally closed relay. When the starter button is pushed in the relay engages and disconnects the lights so they're off whilst cranking so I get full battery power for starting the engine.

Rode it to Hull and back (50 miles) yesterday, seemed pretty good. Good wind protection and such it seems, will only get better with the belly on it!

Mirrors are AMAZING. Actually have something more than elbow in them whilst riding
My only worry is that the mirrors are fixed at the mount and they roll on a ball join at the end of the stem - this means if I drop it, there's a good chance the mirror will crack my top fairing, rather than the mirror folding in like it does on the ZZR.
Planning to go flat black I think with the paint, and have blue accents.
Thinking of putting some of these on it

Nice amount of adjustment, hopefully the higher mounts on the J fairing will retain the brilliant visibility! and obviously they should fold up if I drop the bike

Time to find more blingy blue bits!
Some ****** levers will be on the list along with Thai rearsets!

 

Can't wait to see the finished product.

 

glad you got those headlights sorted steve .......looks good mate keep up the good work

 

Well done Steve, got them ramair ducts here if you want them and front mudguard.

 

Thanks Rick!
Funny story actually Mark. I managed to set one of those Chinese control boxes on fire! Ended up sacking them off for manual wiring.
Quite clever how its wired - ignition positive goes to the ballasts through a 5 pin relay. Goes through normally closed contacts and the relay coil is connected to the starter button so lights are on with ignition but off when cranking. Connected the high beam live to the solenoids and earthed up via the sidelight earth

Shaun, hopefully be over to see you some time once I get the lower bodywork on and get the rack back on. Think I told you, I've got a mate with a lathe and a press who's planning to help me get them J forks on my bike, just need to find the money for the uber expensive front wheel!!

 

Ok Steve just give me a shout

 

front wheels are readily available .......g and j wheels are the same .....


Kawasaki ZX6R ZX-6R ZX 6R Ninja 02 'A1P' Front Wheel - Read Description | eBay

Kawasaki ZX6R G J A1P ZX9R 98-01 Front Wheel F-1385 #28372 | eBay

ZX6R G1 G2 FRONT WHEEL AND TYRE 1998 1999 KAWASAKI | eBay

there is a few to start off with

 

I know they're available Mark, its just the price that's holding me back.
Need to raise funds to pay for a KOSO clock first though, currently running with no clocks!!!

 

oh right i thought you said .... G or J front wheel - rare as hens teeth!
only trying to help :O

 

thanks mate
Realised they're just a bit harder to find than rear wheel, not as hard to find as I thought.

Early next month any good for you Shaun?

 

Had some time on the bike today.

Tidied up the wiring mainly - moved ballasts under the ram tubes and such
also wired up the angel eyes and my main beam solenoids.

just needs paint now

 

I miss my E such a cushy bike

 

Got big plans for my E, no intention of leaving it behind

New bracket from China came today, quality is absolutely brilliant! Absolutely bang on straight as well (was expecting slight warp / bend at least!). Really impressed for the price.

This year, J forks, swingarm, and wheels.
Next year, 636 forks, swingarm, and them nice multi-spoke wheels!


EDIT: forgot to mention, once I have some money I've got an engine being shipped from the other side of the country (costing me £10 + £50 for delivery). Planning to switch the top end off it (bent valve) with the top end of my old engine (crashed in October and smashed main casings). Once I get it set up and running I plan of boring it out and fitting ZX6R pistons to make it 636 (or 637, will have to check the maths)

 

Before my MOT I fitted my new bracket to the bike and took the chance to finally tidy the electrics up.

This is what I kept from the original top fairing bracket:

Basically chopped the tubular parts coming out both sides off, then chopped the tube out of the top. I also hammered the bottom tube a bit for more clearance.

Once it was chopped, offer up the new bracket (2005-2008 ZZR 600 J - USA model).
Fitted the butchered bracket to the bike's headstock mount. Then put the new bracket inside (it's a squeeze) and fit the whole fairing.

This bracket let me fit the J model fairing, with the much improved dual headlight, and mirrors you can actually see something other than elbow in!
The fairing is fairly secure without additional points to mount to as the left side sits tightly on the generator cover. I chose to use an M5 allen bolt through the side of the fairing into the hole in the frame that the little trim panel normally connects to. This made the right side as solid as the left. Unfortunately I cocked up, and now have an extra 5mm hole I need to fill in in the side of my fairing - D'oh! Easily fixable anyway.

I mounted mine as I've said above, and it went through the MOT today!

I have fitted a Koso DB01 plus- currently on offer for £100 at Buy, Digital Motorcycle Speedometers by KOSO, Drift Gauges, online UK

Wiring up was easy enough, haven't set my fuel sender up yet though. Jon at Digital Speedo's will happily change the magnetic sensor in the box for a speedo drive type pickup for no extra cost if you call him - I chose to have the magnetic type because I plan to extend the wiring to the back of the bike and pick up the speed from my rear wheel. In the box there are brackets for either M8 or M10 caliper bolts; I had to use both bolted together with some washers to get my magnetic pickup lined up with the disc bolts (pictures to follow at some point).

Planning to do a little video guide thing with the Koso clock at some stage - will also show how to change the settings and such in case anybody else fits one!

Tempted to get an Iridium screen

Would really pop against matt black

 

Story on Photobucket if you prefer a quick version without any reading

As some of you know, I smashed my bike up back in October last year. It's been gradually recovering and becoming what it is now over this past 6 months. It looked like there was little hope at first when I came home from hospital and looked at the wreckage.

(if you look you'll see the main crank cases are damaged, click picture for more photos - unfortunately due to several breaks in my wrist and the sizeable hole in my elbow I couldn't get it out of the garage to get better pictures.)

But thanks to pure luck and the help of certain individuals;

The bloke who stopped and helped me pick the bike up and waited until my family arrived
My Dad, the mrs' Dad, and KTMAndy, who came out to help recover the bike at gone midnight
Mum, for the lift to A&E
Hodgy, who gave me a lift and got a mate with a van to pick up the ZZR 400 I bought a matter of hours after leaving hospital, and then proceeded to regularly come round and help me with the bike.
McIron, who collected and dropped stuff off for me and lent me a drill
Gazzer, who gave me an M5 tap, tap wrench, and got my rearset welded up nicely
Scoobs and Crazy1 of ZX6R.com, who sold me the awesome head light and the race fairing / bracket / mirrors respectively both at VERY nice prices
and my Mrs, Frankie, for putting up with all the time I've spent on the internet and in the garage!

Just over 2 months later (between boxing day and new year) I had a new engine,

and the bike was in a condition in which it could be ridden.

Just to be sure, I left most of the fairings off for a shakedown run - didn't want to bolt it all back up and then take it all off to fix something! As it happened a couple of coolant pipes needed tweaking so it paid off!

After the shakedown and tweak it ended up like this

All in one piece, everything there, just a mismatched belly panel - the reason being that the top and side panels had both been rubbed down already when I bought the 400.

I paid £150 for the 400, a week later 3 guys came along and dismantled it and took the airbox, carbs, engine, exhaust system and loom - let it go for £130 since they did labour and didn't mind cheap price because of what I paid.

The frame is sat in the back of my garage, the forks are on my 600 (temporary, you'll read why shortly) because I traded Moppy my adjustable forks for his ZX6R F forks to help him out.
The bodywork did a temporary stint on my 600 whilst I developed the J fairing mountings.
Whole bike in parts (minus engine etc.) up for grabs! PM if wanting anything.

This is where we stand now - beautiful machine!

A 1996 N plate ZZR 600 E4, with a '99 engine, a ZZR 1200 rear shock (did this about a year ago but it's still a mod!), Fireblade Nissins and braided lines (again, been on since I got it, but still a mod), R&G Crash Bungs (BARGAIN for £25 delivered BRAND NEW on eBay!!) ZX6R J model fairing, Bi-Xenon Projectors in the headlights - the proper and ONLY way that you should fit HID bulbs, modified ZX6R J air intake - resonators removed from the ram ducts, apparently improves throttle response and also gives a nice intake noise, and a KOSO digital dash - DB01plus, bargain and currently on offer at £100.

I really like the little dash - it's also a nice touch that rather than choosing one backlight colour (i.e. a red one, blue one, or purple one) one of the buttons toggles through the three. I'll probably do a little video review of it some time in the (hopefully not to distant) future.


Overall, this project has cost me a fair amount of money, but this has been far outweighed by the wealth of knowledge I've gained from doing it.
I thoroughly believe that it's worth throwing money at the bike you have and making it what you want, and enjoying doing it, than worrying about it's value.

The bike is far from finished, but now I've reached a point I'm happy to leave it here for now until I'm in a better place financially - but that doesn't mean I can't plan ahead!!!

At the moment, I'm awaiting delivery of a blue/black carbon hugger, and set of engine casing covers - excited about these to say the least!
At the moment, the right footpeg on my bike is damaged; a new pair of pegs is £20 upwards, or adjustable rearsets from Thailand are £52 - very tempted! Especially as they're available in a blue Anodised finish! Planning to fit a load of anodised / carbon blue bits as cash allows.

That'll be the easy mods out of the way. As you can probably already tell from my fairings, I like to do things that are different or difficult and, wherever I can, prove people wrong!
Short term I'm planning on ZX6R J forks (off Crazy1) as it'll be an upgrade, but after that the big mod I want to go for is ZX6R or ZX10R USD forks and multispoke wheels.

Would love a set of those powdercoated in the blue that the ZX6R J's came in!

I've been doing my research and it seems that the undertray on the E will cause me issues if I put a wider wheel on it, so I'm thinking of using a J swingarm with an ER6 rear wheel - that's the one in the picture above; looks the same as the ZX wheels but uses a 160/60-17 tyre like the E which means no clearance issues! It's also MUCH MUCH cheaper to buy than a ZX wheel. I'm still doing my research about spacing and such but pretty sure it's a viable mod.
Still doing research about the front wheel, 636 forks are cheapest but the wheel is EXPENSIVE. ZX 6/10 USD forks are popular on the ER6 as an upgrade so I might be able to use an ER6 wheel and discs. If I did use ER6 parts, there's also a chance I might be able to add ABS (not that I particularly need it, but I think it'd add troll points; an N reg bike with ABS?!?))

Obviously a fork swap to USD forks will also mean new calipers! Haven't looked into it yet, but I reckon Kawasaki might be fitting good brakes almost 20 years on from the advent of the E! If not I'm sure there'll be something else to skip over to!


Thoughts / Opinions / Questions anyone?