drttrkderrick
Grasshopper
A couple of months ago I was given a Windjammer fairing and trunk that a buddy had taken off of his old goldwing. A couple of weeks later he offered me a set of Vetter saddlebags with mounts that he had also taken off his wing. A couple of weeks after that he gave me yet another vetter trunk that is in my shed for now. The trunk that I decided to mount on my 1983 Suzuki GS650GL had no lenses for the lights & wiring that had been chopped & hacked. I already had 2 3" led lights from a previous unfinished project so I ordered 2 more. Since these are not just a larger than factory light but a different type & design of light entirely I had to cut a piece of sheet metal to pop rivet into the inside of the trunk to mount the lights to. These are dual function lights so I wired the center 2 into the tail lights & brake lights and the 2 outer lights into the tail & turn signal lights. I installed resistors into the turn signal circuit so they would work properly & mounted them to the existing rack that was on the bike. While I was working on the lights I got rid of thr stock tail light since it was no longer needed & replaced it with a simple 3/4" white light mounted to a piece of angle steel to illuminate the license plate. Next up was mounting the saddlebag mounts & the saddlebags. The mounts were super easy. I got a slightly longer bolt for the rear pegs & attached thr mounts on the inside of thr rear peg bracket then used a u bolt to mount them to the the existing rack. The 2 cross bars that I got with the bracketry were not wide enough to install so I will be making up something to take their place this week out of aluminum flat stock. Now it was time to mount the saddlebags into their mounts. I had to get new lock cylinders all around for both the locks that lock the doors as well as the locks that are meant to hold the bags into the mounts. When I put the bags on the left side would not stay in the mount no matter what I did so I just used a nut & bolt. Now on to the right side. I installed it into the mount, turned the key to lock it into the mount and shook & pulled it vigorously to make sure it would stay in place & all seemed great. Fast forward to this morning while on my way to work at 5:45 am. I pull away from a stop sign, shift into second gear & hear a weird crashing sound behind me & to the right. I look into my mirror & see my right saddle bag laying in the middle of the road. Turned around & retrieved it. Now just like the opposite side last night I can't seem to get it to stay locked in. Ugh...I don't have time for this right now! Good thing I carry things like straps with me. I was able to strap it to the bike to get me to work & back home. Thankfully the guy that I got them all from gave me a spare lid for the bags as well that I'll be swapping on at some point. The next step will be to mount the fairing & some led lights that I have for it, hopefully this weekend .
