1979 Honda XL500S – Front Guard
As the project has evolved, the stripped down look is fine but a little impractical, when living in an area, where inclement weather can happen at anytime. I have seen a lot of other similar projects without mudguards and have always wondered what they would be like to actually ride in the rain.
Finding parts for this project has been a project in its own right. I have quite a few bits and pieces that either didn’t fit or I just didn’t like the look of them. When I am finished they may be used for other projects or sold to recoup some costs. Recently a trader in Taranaki was selling three motorcycle mudguards on Trade Me.
They were in OK condition and after looking for some time on Ebay and similar sites and not finding something better, I eventually purchased them for $21.00. When I got them home, two of them were rear guards and the front guard was too small. After measuring and playing around with them, one of the rear guards looked like it might do the job.
I made up some brackets out of some scrap steel and welded them on. I needed some sort of spacers on the bracket bolts to get the guard to line up properly. I discovered that an old aluminium TV aerial part was the right diameter and it just needed trimmed to fit each of the bolts length.
Trimming it to a length I was happy with, took a long time, as once its cut off it’s pretty hard to put back on. It looks OK to me and will do the job in the meantime. Eventually it will get painted when the bike is ready to be stripped down again for final assembly.
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1979 Honda XL500S – Front Guard