I thought I would share a few of the bike mods we've made.
We started with a couple of 2004 Suzuki 650 V-Stroms. Both were used and pretty much in stock trim. Because both Dan and I have done plenty of touring by way of motorcycle. We already had a good idea of the kit we needed to add to the bikes for both convenience and protection.
For the Controls, we added heated grips and hand guards. The hand gards were a bit tricky in that they weren't really made for the V-Strom. We of course made them fit. We cut a slot in the bar wieght on the end of the handle bar. That moved the whole thing in about a 1/2 inch and that seem to make them fit alot better. The bar ends do two things. 1st of all they protect the brake/clutch levers in the event of a tip over or crash. 2nd they offer a little wind protection for your hands if it gets really cold. Hopefully we will not need them on either account.
The following picture
is the new accessory fuse panel we added. Most bikes don't come with any place to plug in chargers or anything like that. So we wired a 2nd fuse panel to power our stuff. We hooked up a relay so the entire fuse panel will shut off with the main ignition key. Pretty much so John with his 2 second memory will not leave stuff on and drain his battery! We have 5 circuts, one goes to the heated hand grips, one for our electric vests, one to the Zumo GPS, one to the Givi tail bag for charging the laptop and one to the tank bag for charging cameras, Ipod's, phone, batteries and stuff.
V-Stroms don't come with any bags or storage of any kind really.
We started by adding Jesse Aluminuim side cases and then went with GIVI plastic molded top case.
We decided we needed more storage and also want everything to be out of sight and reach. Things will go missing very quickly if they are in plain view. So we added two big PVC storage tubes. This is the same stuff used in your home to carry away your waste.. The plastic is easy to work with and pretty affordable. We made one 4 inch round tube for the right side. and one 6 incher for the left side. Bought some little cam locks for the lids and bingo! We have a place to put more stuff!.
We call it ToiletTech' "it carries your crap"
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