Tag Archives: surf rack

UPDATE to Board Support Up Front

1 Jun

Duct tape repair. (Have to look closely.) Temporary, and unnecessary, as it turns out.

It didn’t take long for the PVC contraption (see Board Support Up Front post) to fail, cracking after just 8 hours or so in the saddle. Here we are at the Old Mill in San Quintin applying a duct tape repair. As it turned out, it was never needed. In just another couple of hours the support broke off completely, slipping away from the duct tape. The event went unnoticed, though, as the problem solved itself.

The support was never meant to work on its own. It was there as much as an anchor for the bungie cord as anything else. When the contraption broke off, the hose-clamped piece stayed in place, which was all that was needed anyhow, as the Carver racks in the back fully supported the surfboard. All that was needed up front was the bungie cord to keep the nose in and out of the wind. This photo shows the remaining mess that worked great for the rest of that trip, another 2,000 miles, including hundreds of off-road riding, at speed.

All that was needed in the first place was an anchor for the lower bungie cord hook.

So what started as the biggest concern – keeping the front of the surfboard supported and out of the wind – turned out to be a non-issue. Very good news.

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Test Run

6 Mar

I loaded up a 6’8″ in a canvas Julie Bag for a test ride. I cruised on up the the newly opened Deus Ex Machina on Venice and Lincoln to show the crew there what they had helped inspire. (There was an article on Deus in The Surfers Journal that showed one of their surf rack modified bikes.) I was surprised at the reaction. The moment I pulled up they all piled out to check it out. I showed them around the bike, making lame excuses for my prototype PVC mount for the front, but they seemed pretty stoked. They took some photos. Much better than this one of the DR back in my little garage, board in rack. How did it work. Excellent-ly. 😉

Yes, bad photo. But this isn't the right board bag, so the good shots will come later. You can see the PVC poking out under the nose. That's been painted black. The bungie up front attached to a tie wrap that goes through a small but convenient hole in the frame behind the triple clamp.

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Board Support Up Front

6 Mar

A big concern has been how to support the front of the board and to keep it from hitting the front wheel or fender when turning, and to make sure it doesn’t get caught on the front brake cable. Since the racks are on the rear, they are only holding the back third of the surfboard, so wind and bumps will cause the front of the board to move around. Probably a lot. The DR650es has an oil cooler with a frame extension for protection. It’s a perfect place to mount some sort of stabilizer. For now, and maybe forever, I cobbled together a support piece out of PVC. Here’s the piece for mounting to the frame.

What's difficult to see here is how I cut the PVC to mount onto the frame tube.

Yes, working at night. I ended up putting a piece of neoprene between the PVC and the frame tube to keep the PVC from cracking and to give some shock absorption. Hose clamps are used to secure.

 

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Surf Racks Mounted

6 Mar

Mounting the Carver surf rack to the Manracks tail rack was almost straightforward. As you can see in this pic, one bolt looks different from the other. The Carver rack mounting bolts are LONG, and would drill into the fender, so I replaced the left side bolt with a shorter one, about 3″. Not seen here is that I put a third bolt in the center. That one is even shorter. It’s a solid mount.

You can see that the Carver surf racks clear the DBz luggage racks nicely. That was a relief.

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Carver Surf Racks

6 Mar

OK, down to the good stuff: Surf racks on a motorcycle. I checked Deus Ex Machina rack, but you can’t buy it without buying the motorcycle attached to it, and at this point they’re only doing street bikes. I also checked out the Surfer Peg rack, but again, it’s street oriented, and needs to attach to the frame. That’s not inherently bad, but it would require fabrication that I’m not quite interested in. Primarily, though, it’s the street focus that steered me away. I settled on the Carver Racks, even though they’re not for motorcycles – bicycles and scooters, but not motorcycles. What I liked, though, is that it could be bolted to the rear rack.

When putting the racks together I encountered a small problem: The rubber tubes were too long, so the pieces wouldn’t fit together without a bit of cutting. I called the guys at Carver in Hawaii. They were a bit surprised, but were good with the mod.

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Big Day – Rack Arrived

23 Feb

Tail rack from Manracks. The foundation for attaching the surfboard racks, as well as a place for luggage, probably the largest bag (the DBz Flat Top Duffle).

Big day, because the tail rack is the key component needed to getting this SurfMoto thing going. The surf racks bolt to it, and once the surf racks are on I need to make sure the DBz side luggage racks fit along with the new pipe. All good stuff; it’ll work out. This is the ManRacks rack. It weights 1.5#, so with the savings from the DG pipe With everything installed I’m currently at a net weight savings of 6#. BUT, I haven’t installed the surf rack, and that weighs 7#, so that puts it at a 1# gain…until the hand guards and luggage arrives. I can remove the foot pegs, for maybe a pound or so, but there’s not many more places to cut weight. Except from my own body.

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