DHM 1125 - The Dead Horse
2008 Buell 1125r
Let's skip the bull**** and move right to the meat and mashed potatoes. Long story short, I lowsided the 1125 off the side of a mountain.
Luckily (I still have no idea how), I emerged relatively unscathed and with very little damage to the bike considering. Through this I have been EXTREMELY impressed at the overall durability of the bike and the foresight and ingenuity of the engineering team that designed this motorcycle. The bike was not only designed to go fast and do it well, but it was also well engineered to wreck well. For the most part. lol.
Came around a sub-90 degree right turn at a pretty good, but comfortable pace. The turn felt great, just like it had the 10/12 times I had gone through it earlier, but suddenly I was sliding. I'm still not sure what caused it. Hard contact on the right side, slid across the other lane just past the apex, luckily no oncoming traffic. I'm still on the bike at this time. Then we slid off the side of the road, over the shoulder and off the side of the mountain over the ravine. The drop off from the road was very steep; you could hardly climb up it. Myself (still on the bike) and the bike were now upright swan diving off the side of the road straight into a fallen tree, the front tire hit and the bike flipped forward throwing me off and forward, I landed further down the hill and slid into a tree with the bike right behind me. Luckily I was not smashed. Eventually we both came to a rest about 20-30ft vertically down from the roadway. I'm honestly completely surprised I even survived let alone walked away with minor injuries. I was wearing full gear. Luckily.
Damage at first glance:
- Snapped front forks and steering stem.
- Boogered up the lower steering head bearing. Luckily the steering head and frame is all still straight!
- Broken left upper subframe mount
- Fairing stay and front end destroyed.
- Clutch cover gouged and ground
- Broken left side K bracket Radiator mount.
- Mangled oil cooler
- Exhaust crumpled. I'm pretty sure that the exhaust saved the engine from being thrashed by the front wheel being rammed into it. Kind of neat how everything worked out to protect the engine and frame.
- My front wheel was completely broke in multiple locations and the rotor is bent to hell.
Ride safe guys, and for the love of god people, wear your gear.
The Aftermath
Photos of the wrecck and the initially obvious damage.
Fixed the upper left subframe mount. Drilled 2 spot holes in either side of the fissure equidistant from the threads and outer diameter, turned down a thin rod to allow plenty of room for the solvent to fit into the drilled holes along with the rod. Bent the rod in an arc to match the curvature of the mount. Cleaned break surface with rubbing alcohol, the break surface was plenty rough enough for adheration so I didn't have to roughen up the surface any. Firmly applied JB Weld Steel putty shaped, pressed, and set. This stuff is great.
So the footpegs I ordered were junk. They didn't even fit. Had to take down the OD a bit to get the radius to flow smoothly when the pegs bend back. The threads were not even correct for the supplied bolt. Instead of paying for the return shipping I drilled out the threads, bored out the inside of the adapter housing enough to press a nut into, epoxied it in place and sourced a new bolt from my garage collection. Vioala, Le footpeg de fit.
Decided to just re-use the oem subframe for now. I'll get it on the road first and then do the extensive stuff later. But now I just need to ride. Mounted up the sibframe and turns out mine is twisted about 1/8in clockwise. Not a problem though.
To fix it I welded 3 mounting points, sans the off point, identical to the frame points onto a large metal plate, attached the subframe, ran a long pipe through the end of the tail, twisted counter clockwise just past the return point, release, and repeat as necessary. It fits now.
I originally jb welded my k bracket back together but I pulled it back apart and am going to have it TIG'd. With all the vibration going on there and the leverage that point will have against it, the jb would probably release in a month or two. I'll have to take it to a friend as I don't have an AC TIG setup at home. Not a problem though.
Got all the wiring together and the power back to the bike. Turned on the ignition and got a theft error.... Not sure what is causing it. My guess is my cluster is ****ed beyond the visual and it is sensing it has been tampered with. Not what I was hoping to see. Eventually the theft eror readout disapears and it goes to the normal readout except instead of 0 for the speed i get three dash's (---) ). Not sure what that means either. Maybe something with my speed sensor is not correct? Not sure. I haven't checked it yet.
I snagged a new 09 cluster for a good price. We'll see if that helps anything.
Ok so a little update, been moving among a few other stressful situations at home so things have been delayed. BUT. I managed to procure some very interesting parts and have decided to take this in a slightly different direction. Here in the mext week I will have an entirely new workspace and should expeditie project finalization. This is getting very exciting. The project will not be 100% before the end of the season but it will be presentable and functional by Oct 10th. Finishing touches and a few in depth things will wait until the snow falls. I just want to ride the damn thing now. Lol
The suspense is killing me! Ah!
Finally got time to work on it a bit today.
Showa BPF forks fitted and installed. Forks are a direct swap with 1125 showa 54mm cartridge forks, xb wheel is not compatible with the bpf's without modification. New bearings arrived today for the xb wheel to fit on the RX axle. I'll have to make some spacers as well.
So far,
Reassembly
1190rx front suspension
1190rx front wheel
EBR rotor
HMF muffler
Modified tail section
Firebolt fairing stay install
Radiantz LED tail light
To come, have the parts, just need the time,
1190rx upper race fairing
Dual vertical projector headlights
1190rx Airbox cover
1190rx subframe
1190rx SBK tail
Modify HMF muffler (9in shorty)
1125 factory side fairing install
1125 flexi-glass belly pan
ZX14 Nissin M/C's
Clean and re-finish
And probably some other stuff I forgot.
Got some little stuff done. I'm going through to make sure everything looks as clean as I can. I want this bike to look and function like it came this way from the factory.
I repaired the busted EBR airbox cover I had purchased late last year. To repair, I clamped both sides of the fissure then cosyed the interior of the fissure with 6600 epoxy. Then clamped the clamps to bring the fissure together and ran a bead of pla over the backside of the fissure. I cut a small 1x1 ABS and taped it over the crack. Working quickly to the epoxy doesn't completely set until I was done, I drilled 2 holes through the ABS plate on either side of the crack. I continued to drill 1/32 into the airbox cover. Just enough to make a dimple for the epoxy to set hold Then coat the abs with the resin and place over the fissure, dump large amounts into the holes drille and pack it with a flathead driver, build up the epoxy around the edges of the plate. Place a piece of paper over the assembly and clap tightly. Allow 24 hours to set.
Got the base layer color on it. Hotbodies pieces should be coming in for the tail and upper fairing. I still need to repair my side fairings and get them together.
To mount the airbox cover, I used runner spacers and tapered aluminum washers I turned down for the front mounts. The EBR airbox is much steeper than the buell cover thus the washer assembly.
For the rear mounts, I will be making 16g steel brackets that I will attach to the interior of the cover and bolt onto the airbox itself. I will also attach the cover to the WSBK tail on the overlap.
For the firebolt fairing stay to fit, you have to square out the bracket that attaches to the frame. Nothing a grinder with a 4in wheel can't handle. For the 1125 gauge cluster, I first made a template out of some wood I had laying around. Then lining it up how I wanted it, I used the template to drill out the mounting holes. Stepped up a few sizes and enlarged the holes. Got the dremel out and cleaned it up, elongates the holes to allow rotation of the cluster for fine tuning orientation. Using bumper coating, I painted the stay black. Then using large washers and rubber mounts, the cluster was mounted. The cluster itself is roughly 3/4in vertically spaced from the fairing stay. Using some high density foam and superglue I filled the gap around the outer edge of the cluster.
Hot bodies stuff came in! Some cutting and trimming later....
Pulled the front end back apart, double checked steering stem and lower bearing. Looked good.
I will be utilizing this strange rocket ship doohickey I found. Bonus points if you can guess what it is!
A few add ons. More cutting and measuring will be required for the upper fairing fitment. Those damn pesky pods are always in the way. Sheesh.
Tail tidied and wiring harness routed.
Updates. Upper fairing officially fitted and installed. Windscreen modified and refitted for better clearance. Needed a different throttle routing to be compatible with the MC's. R6 throttle didn't work out, so working on something else. Seat pad fitted, paint prep beginning while I wait for the necessary parts to button up the controls.
Decal drafts done. These will be on the tank, maybe smaller ones on the tail.