Maintenance & Technical > KX500 Aluminum Frame Conversion (AFC)
'09 500AF build
Curtin388:
This is the best motorcycle build I have ever seen jbernard your work is amazing mate! Thank you everyone for all the great tips I am currently doing a 2009 kx 250f frame with a kx 500 engine this chat has helped me tremendously thank you all
jBernard:
Thanks for the kind words guys.
Sorry for the massive delay. The frame/engine mount alignment issue REALLY took the wind out of my sails for a bit. Very discouraging to have something that is starting to look like a complete bike then have to go back and chop it all out. A few guys said to just take a larger drill and drill out the thru holes to compensate for the misalignment. While this would probably get me going, I dont like to do things like that and decide to chop it all out (except for the yoke) and do it BETTER than I've ever seen done.
Actually took a while to find someone local that could help me out on the cheap and had some burrs and a high hp compressor to dig out all the old frame rail pieces from the yoke and bottom part of the frame without destroying it. Finally got that done.
Then I ran into the issue of how to find out the actual angle of the bent tubing. If you can imagine. being off a couple degrees on the bend, then measuring 6" down the line and its off a LOT.
Thought about getting a cheapie digital protractor/angle finder. Would cost me 100$ and not sure if it would do the job, so ended up getting the tube 3d scanned with a Faro Arm to get the angle figured out.
Here's where i am now. Have to figure out the dimenisions for the offset piece since the width between rails at the yoke is different than the width between rails at the lower frame junction. This was another cause of this crap in the first place. if the tubes are bent and 'toe'd' in to fit the angle, then when you put a motor mount on the rail thats square, it is then OFF angle to the engine.
Here's how i'm going to solve it. have 2 piece CNC rail system. 1 solid piece from yoke to right behind the bottom mount, then an offset stubby piece that does the bend into the lower frame section. Should work perfect.
I've gotten a bit done, and fixed, and bought, so I promise an update very soon. Big things on the horizon.
And a teaser pic of a trick part i got my hands on as well....
jBernard:
Hey all. A few more updates from this last week of getting to work on the 500 a bit...
So I had originally bought some Applied 20mm KXF clamps for the bike before I had the A kit. When I got ahold of the AKit it came with some used PC clamps. they were pretty blasted from sand and anodizing was worn off a good bit, so I sent them to get stripped and re-ano'd. Well, turns out, there were a ton of hairline cracks in the bottom clamp. So those had to end up being scrapped unfortunately.
I had that HPSD adapter welded onto the bottom of my Applied clamps by this point, so I ended up sending them back to Applied to hopefully be able to get them bored out to A Kit hole dimensions.
They were barely able to do it (way the clamp bolts are close to the hole) but pulled it off, then sent to get anodized. Got them back and have been battling ever since with the fork fitment for some reason. Both clamps by themselves slide over the tubes fine, but when going thru the stem and both clamps, it takes some forcing to get the forks to slide thru the top clamps. Knew something was up here. Thought they may have misplaced a clamp and sent back a different offset mix-matched or something. Turns out, there was a little weld on the bottom of the lower clamp when i put the HPSD adapter on, and the guy working there at the time didnt check to make sure the clamp was flat in the mill before boring. So it added another angle to the offset basically, just enough to mess things up when you tried to put it thru the top.
Figured out the issue, Applied was awesome dealing with me, super good guys. Re-made me a lower clamp and we did a different take on the HPSD design as well, pretty trick. Bolt on design vs weld on so saved me a trip to the welder.
Now after another HPSD top bracket revision, forks fit up perfectly, new bottom clamp, and HPSD is fitting perfectly with enough free play on both ends.
The fork tubes are weird sizes at the flange near the dust seal. Had to have Kevin @ Tamer Holeshot Devices send me a handful of tube clamps to try and test fitment. Turns out one off an older KTM fits up pretty well. Test fitment on the stock fork guards just for kicks. I'll be making some out of carbon fiber for this project.
Looks like my measurements on the frame rails turned out to be spot on. maybe .008" off but that is PLENTY close enough for this. You can see in the overhead shot where i put the bend in to reach out to the different width near the swingarm receptacles.
This is good to go, going to put in the weight relief recesses like I did on the Yoke on the inside of the rails, then get this thing sent off to get CNC'd. I'll have to wait till i get the frame rails welded in, before I can make the new top and bottom engine mounts though, as all 4 are different 'widths' to mate up to the engine cases perfectly.
Still working on getting the front and rear brake caliper adapters modeled up, as its a pretty fair amount of work, but getting closer.
Thought that just running the brembo rear caliper and using the stock nissin rear master cylinder was a bit half assed, but the issue is the bolt pattern spacing on the two master cylinders is different.
Shaved the stock mount off the frame, measured up a new one that fits the brembo, and test printed the adapter, fits perfectly. Should be pretty easy to tack on, then not use any filler on the face, and smooth it out so it looks stock.
Playing around with an idea for the front cable stay, rather than the ghetto looking white plastic loop that comes on the bike.
Made this up real quick, Wanted a cable stay that mimic'd the lines of the front number plate, sort of like how the KTM design is done. I got close on this initial one but it needs to standoff a bit more from the clamps. Should be an easy revision. I also put a recess on the back of the part so it snaps in tight fitment to the triple clamp bolt standoff, this keeps it from twisting.
Got a few new parts in. Lightspeed CF chain guide, and Yoshimura factory edition axle blocks in matte black.
And a cool Yoshimura stem nut as well in matte black.
CRF Killswitch
Probably my most adventurous aspect of this bike may be the subframe. Wanting to do a carbon fiber design, and use the air filter style off a KTM since its so amazing and minimal.
Got in a '14 125SX airbox, and chopped out the filter/intake/boot. Plans are to mesh this design in with the CF subframe so its 1 piece, and using a KTM rubber boot design as well.
Thanks for the continued support and I'll be posting more updates as soon as I can.
Taylor
Foxx4Beaver:
diggin that front cable stay/guide! 8-)
jBernard:
ha. thanks!
when I get to a final version i'll get it printed on a high end machine in nice plastic, will look like a off the shelf part, and in black of course and not blue!
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