Bringing back my crashed Cat

[Reserector]

It's time to start a project thread to chronical the restoration of my 2003 YZF600R Thundercat that my son crashed back in May of 2018.

I bought the bike in June 2011 as a commuter scooter, and it has served me well. I commuted from Laurel to Bay Springs five days a week for four years before slacking off some. It saved me more that eight grand in fuel during that time, which means it paid for itself three times over. It has been super reliable. I've never even had the engine open.

30K on the clock when I bought it, and 123K when my son rear-ended a Kia on I-59. It's a crazy story that involves a rogue golf cart coming off of a trailer. But that's a story for another thread.

We recently acquired nearly all of the parts, mostly forks and plastics, that we need to bring it back to its former glory.
We've been running the engine about once a week to keep the carbs clean, and the battery charged.

I'm going to post the after-crash pictures and then go from there.

The subframe that holds the seat is tweaked to the right.
Forks are toast
Upper fairing stay is bent
Plastics are scuffed and broken.
Headlight tabs are broken off.
Left rider peg is broken.
Mirrors and front turn signal are wasted.
Frame slider is used up.
Rear tire is flat-spotted, but may be usable.




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[Hey Contevita]

Not going to be cheap to fix. If you want to save money on the fairing, you can buy Chinese instead of Japanese. Sure the OEM stuff fits 100% and is perfect match, etc. but it's costly. As an example, I paid $600 for my replacement fairing, the OEM was almost $3000.

As for the sub-frame and other underlying parts/mounts, get OEM. I got all the other parts from Partzilla. They're in GA and shipping was fast.

[Reserector]

I've already got another full set of oem blue plastics, and a few extra pieces. The only party's I haven't gotten yet are mirrors, turn signals, and new girl seals. I figure I'll freshen up the forks and add my Sonic Springs while I'm at it.

Yep, I'm pretty well set to get started once my eye is healed from surgery.

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[Reserector]

My new fork seals and fork oil came in the mail. I'm trying to get some other projects wrapped up before I start on this, though. This hot weather is not very inspiring, though.

[Hey Contevita]

Unless you want to ride that bike now, I'd save the work for cooler weather.

[Reserector]

Hopefully, that's not far away.

[Reserector]

Still waiting on that cooler weather.  LOL   Getting some other projects cleaned up before I start this.  I recently finished building a truck camper and used the parts from an old camper.  I finally got around to burning the remains of the old one on Saturday.

[Reserector]

Cooler weather is here. Still trying to get some other projects and maintenance out of the way so I don't feel rushed while I'm working in the 600.

My plan now is to knock out a major portion of the work over teh Christmas and New Year holidays because they are both four day weekends for me.
Doug is working now, but he will help me when he can. That will speed up the project.

[Reserector]

Making zero progress with all this rain.

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[Reserector]

Now that my trip to the Dragon is about a month away, I am somehow finding the enthusiasm to uncrash the cat.
I removed the old, bent forks not just because they're old and bent, but so that I would have a place to clamp The Replacements in order to loosen the top caps. I have new seals and new oil plus the upgraded springs to go in these ones.
However, when I tried to slide the replacements through both clamps, I found that the lower clamp was bent as well. More on the right side then on the left. I feel like I could press it straight by using the old tubes for leverage in my hydraulic press. But the easier, better solution was to order one on eBay for $20. Kind of a no-brainer.
That will be here in a few days, so in the meantime I will finish rebuilding the forks and mounting the new front tire. Once I get the front-end straightened out, I need to straighten up the subframe and then start mounting replacement parts back on.

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