New Motorcycle

Got a bike finally! Bought it from the photographer at our wedding. It's an FZR 600, same as my old one, except without all the purple (and in better shape).

1990 Black FZR600R: Vance and Hines full supersport system, 13k miles, new chain, new brakes, new black paint, engine and frame decently repainted silver, fairly new IRC Winner (I think) tires. Got it for $1400 dollars, I thought it was a pretty good deal. Especially since I sold my old FZR for $1400 dollars and it didn't even run.

I discovered a few problems with my bike before I purchased it, and a few more afterward. I gave a it a pretty decent look over, and got a test ride before I bought it.
As you can see above, the windshield was missing a few bolts, and the fairing bolts were all mismatched. Also, the fairing brackets from the radiator and the lower frame rails were missing, and had been replaced with a type of threaded rod, holding the two side fairings together.

It was terrible work, and had one side pressed up against the header pipe. I noticed when I got home and smelled melting plastic (Lo, and behold)!

Fixed that by simply taking the fairings off. I like it better that way, more like a naked bike, read: FZ6, etc. I have since bought all the fairing brackets and a complete fairing bolt kit in flat black (that took care of the windshield bolts, too).

Other things I did: replaced a few missing bolts around the fuel cap, brought the taillight in about 3/4 of an inch by reversing the mounting grommmets, cleaned the shit out of it, and repainted the header pipes with black header paint.

Also, had a 13k mile Yamaha service and the fork seals re-done professionally, as they were leaking whenever I pumped the suspension hard repeatedly. I requested that 20 weight Yamalube fork oil be put back into my forks to stiffen the front-end somehwhat. They called me when the forks were already off the bike and said they "couldn't find any 20 weight", so they were just putting 10 back in. No big deal, except that they had to order the fork seals, and I specifically requested 20w oil, so couldn't they have just ordered the right oil for me as well? I just thought it was crappy.

Then when I picked up the bike, they said that everything looked good except that my steering head bearings were going to have to be replaced soon, to the tune of $250. I was thinking, Couldn't you have told me while the front end was already off the bike, so I could OK the repair then and save some money? Oh well, take care of those bearings another day I guess.

The last thing I did was try to replace my cracked stator cover.
When I took it off, and tried to remove the stator from the inside, I stripped the heads of the phillips button head screws holding the stator wire to the inside of the cover... damn!
So, I went to unplug the stator from the wiring harness and discovered that the plug was all f-ed up and melted together with corrosion on the inside.

I ordered up the screws that I stripped out, and bought an Alden Grabit Damaged screw remover. It worked like magic, and pulled the screws right out.
Still, I had the problem of maybe having to buy a wiring harness and stator because of a stupid plastic plug.

When I started poking around on the FZR Archives forum, asking for plugs from non-functioning parts that I could wire on, someone suggested that I splice on a 4-prong flat trailer plug.


Having never soldered before, I bought a soldering gun and practiced on some old speaker wire for an hour before I did the deed.

I did the stator half of the soldering first, and used shrink wrap and electrical tape to make sure









the joint was sealed tightly from the elements. Then I attached it to the new stator cover with the new screws.

I did the other half of the wiring pretty quickly, and forgot to take good pictures of the joints. You can pretty much see whats going on though.














Afterward, I plugged it all in, replaced the stator and cover, tucked all the new and old wires away with a few zip-ties (I had to cut a few to get access to it all), connected the battery, and it fired right up.













Took it for a 35 minute ride and everything seemed fine, though I don't know how long it would take for signs to show that the stator is not functioning. I guess once the battery ran dead?

Anyway, so for now I am done, and my bike runs, and I need to leave well enough alone to let my pocket recoup.

Next are the the steering head bearings.

I would like to also do something about the huge stock front and rear tail-lights. I Think I am going to get Flanders' flushmounts for the front, and would like to integrate the rear, but am unsure of the process with a trailer light converter. I've looked at one, but am still unsure of how to use it in this application. Also, don't want super fast flashers on the front or rear, so need to figure that bit out.

Also going to cut the stock fender by about two inches, remove the licence plate bracket, and mount the plate directly onto the reduced fender to emulate an eliminator kit, just waiting on my Dremel.