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Hi, Mike! I was wondering about the ABS version, too! It's a totally different process to make up the body, so it would be like doing a whole new sidecar. I've only ever seen the fiberglass versions. What's very interesting to me is that the upper half of the body was done in a female mold...

Wow, I missed seeing you last reply here. As far as buying from DMC, can't go wrong there! Jay has nothing but great hardware and advice. Yes, a bit pricey, as all of them are, but he has put a LOT of engineering into everything he makes and all of his installs have many years of experience...

WooHoo! Big step forward. Please post pics of your progress, and anything you do to improve it!

Martin, I ordered the parts you listed to do the air-shock setup you did. Thanks for the info. Now, to see about doing a sway-bar setup, too! Thanks!

Today I mounted the new LED lights across the back of the sidecar, plus one on the right front corner in place of the reflector. Then I decided to take a little test run. Not knowing if my alternators were working, I loaded two T-105 golf cart batteries in the sidecar for ballast, but to also...

Randy, Here's a pretty good writeup of how to basically set up a sidecar to the bike. He uses the 8-10" rule for wheel lead rather than the 15%. 8-10" is fine for earlier Gold Wings and such, but longer bikes and shorter bikes need a percentage value applied. Some installers also use a 1/8"...

COOL! Thanks for posting that! Should make a nice rig for somebody!

This rig has taught me the truth about the old saying that we never know sweet until we suck a lemon! My '83 Voyager and Motorvation Spyder sidecar from the '80's was a wonderful rig and took me all over the 'States, but I never realized how soft it's rigging was against that big bike. Well, my...

Randy, There are three basics to setting up a sidecar for the first time. To start, the axle of the sidecar should "lead" the bike's rear axle by about 15% of the bike's wheelbase. Second, the bike needs to be set at about a 2 degree lean away from the sidecar to compensate for road crown...

There's a two-fold purpose to this. First, it does vent any overflow under the car rather than have any of it run down the side of the tank from the vented cap as the fuel expands on a really hot day. At best, there will be some sloshing that will make some fuel come out the cap's vent hole and...

And now the last part of fabricating the mounts. The upper front strut. The difficulty in making up this strut and it's mounting points on the bike and sidecar was getting everything to work together to allow the actual strut to go through the existing heat vent holes in the fairing lower...

This part is especially for Caddypat. Although your pics gave me lots of ideas for making up the mounts, I couldn't find the correct forged, flat-top u-bolts that I needed to make up the same kind of mounts you have on your Voyager. My Terraplane also has different mounting requirements than...

I kinda skipped over a stock Voyager part that had to be modified before installing the upper rear strut. The strut mounting point on top of the right saddlebag crash bar has already been seen in previous pics, but that one is the second version. The first version didn't allow much clearance...

OK, so the two lower struts are made and in place. The sidecar is now solidly positioned to the bike. Now it needs to be solidly connected to maintain the correct lean angle of the bike. There will be front and rear adjustable length upper struts. I started with the rear upper strut. It turned...

The front lower strut also needed a revision after the first try. It had a slight angle downward tilt forward after putting it in place. I cut it off and re-welded it perfectly horizontal. Since the lower-rear strut permanently locates the car fore and aft, the lower-front strut needed to be...

Now it was time to make the first strut to actually connect the car to the bike. The first point to consider in aligning the two together is to place the car's axle about 15% ahead of the bike's rear axle. In this case it worked out to be about 10". This is not a terribly critical dimension, so...

The next step was to make up the front-lower mounting point on the bike. Since the right crash bar over the engine's side cover has three struts that bolt to the bike's frame, I decided to use it for the base of the mount. I cut half way into the junction of the three tubes making up the crash...

The next step was to fabricate some basic parts to be used in the struts. I made up some two-bolt clamps that would allow up/down and fore/aft rough adjustments on three of the struts. These clamps are made from three parts (first, second, third and fourth pics), welded together, then saw-cut to...

This may be a little (LOT!!) long, so I will break it up into smaller sections of how this build went together. The sidecar and the bike are old enough now that nobody makes mounts for them. I had to make up my own, using some of the inspiration from how a previous sidecar was mounted to my old...

BTW, an aluminum screw-on cap on an aluminum filler neck is a bad combination. Aluminum is rather "gummy" against itself and is very sensitive to getting the threads timed and aligned right before screwing it on. I don't let anybody touch my tank because of that. Most folks will just think it...