The Bionic Subframe

(This is my post from the FJR Forum. I thought it was worthwhile documenting it here too.)

On my way to the Superior RTE (ride report linky) my rear subframe broke. This is the part of the bike that supports the seats, saddlebags, and topcase. I was using a Garauld support rack and a Pelican 1550 for the topcase. This setup has been fine for 10K street miles. What killed it was 12 miles of rocky washboard up and back (24 total) to the Ancient Bristlecone Pine forest. Once we got back to pavement, my riding partner noticed my topcase bouncing way too much. We took a closer look and saw broken metal. Made it home with some good straps, took it apart, and here's the carnage. The entire piece broke off completely, as well as the two mini gussets.



I vent my frustration.



To reattach the tail lights, I tied a knot in the end of a rope, ran it through the bolt hole, and tied it to the part of the frame that didn't break. Bodywork is back on, and now I can ride to the welder in safety. This shot also shows the blank space above the taillight assembly where the luggage support is supposed to be.



Update as of March 29

I spoke with Garauld. He says he doesn't sell a 5 point mount unit. He also reminds me that the rated weight for the rear rack is 7 lbs, per the sticker underneath the passenger seat. Gary offered to buy back my unit, which I thought was great. However I opted to keep it and reinforce the subframe instead. I weighed my Pelican case - the base weight with Star Traxx unit mounted is 17.2 lbs. I might have had 2 or 3 lbs of contents at the time of the incident.

I have a subframe from a salvage yard on its way to the fabricator in Sacramento. Today I removed my existing subframe and put it back on again, just to get familiar with the procedure. Next Saturday I'll ride up to Sac. While he works on the new subframe, I'll take off my old one. When he's done, I'll install the new one. I bet the whole deal won't take more than half a day.

Update as of June 7 - It's fixed!

Yesterday was welder day. Though actually, John Van Dyke is more than a welder, he is an artist with metal. He's also a cool guy who tells great stories. He's just the kind of gearhead you want to hang out with for a day. His shop is really cool, filled with all kinds of big metalworking machines that I cannot name today. He started with the concept used by Ignacio's repair, but made it his own. He fit and refit the subframe reinforcement plate until it was perfect - punching, grinding, smoothing. Most of his time was spent forming a piece of 3/8" plate, but he did grind the Yamaha frame as well.

Here he is grinding a bit of the frame to get the plate to set down closer to the joint with the main frame.



Here's the finished plate. Check out all the angles and notches. It fits perfectly.



This plate fits the subframe in front, rather than from behind.





Before he could tack it into place he had to remove any paint from the welding area. Here he is at work in the bead blasting machine.



This is what the bead blasting operator sees - the view through a hazy window. The bead gun shoots invisible glass pellets at the work object.



Here he is tacking the plate into place. Warning to reader: Put on your welder's mask before viewing this photo.



Next he made some gussetting arms to lay alongside the central rib of the luggage mount, which is also the passenger seat support tab. These are shaped like a triangular L.


Here they are in place on the unit, prior to being attached.



Everything now fits and is ready to weld. While John is busy at the welding table, I wander around the shop and take some photos. Mixed in with the fabrication stuff is some bike stuff. John told me about his barn at home with 32 bikes in it. The upstairs is like a Guys Den, with couches and big screen TV. His buddies come over and watch MotoGP at 4 AM.







John's shop is a regular Saturday hangout for the neighborhood gearheads. Here's one of the kibitzers getting a closer view of the master at work.



And now we have the finished product.



Rear view.



Top view. Notice the difference in thickness between the frame and the reinforcing plate.



One final shot.



On my ride home from the shop I thought of the old TV show, The Six Million Dollar Man. In the opening credits, Steve Austin is in a fiery rocket crash. In the next shot he's in the hospital and they show the doctors saying, "We have the technology. We can rebuild him. We can make him better." That's what happened with my subframe - though it cost slightly less than $6M. Only slightly.