Installed my motodynamic tail light and fabbed up my own FE.

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pajkrubi

New member
Well I installed my motodynamic tail light today and while I was at it I fabbed up a fender eliminator using the metal "spine" from my factory snow shovel fender. I still have to get a pair of the LED license plate bolts and wire up so I have a light for the plate. I don't have a bunch of extra cash and I prefer to make my own stuff anyway (getting it from being a jeeper) so I wasn't going to pay for a FE. I was gonna go the route that a lot of people went and get some thin sheet metal and bend it, paint it and bolt it up. Then I got to looking at the metal frame inside the factory fender and saw that the factory plate holder was a little piece of metal that was bolted in place and got to thinking. I cut off all but a small tab of metal from the frame, bent the ends in, marked it for the plate holder, drilled the holes, painted it and bolted it all up.

Here's the pics I took. In the pics I still hadn't painted the brackets so just ignore that. They're a nice flat black now. I could have made the bends a little prettier if I used my friends bench vise and I could have cut the points off the tabs but it's all covered and I was kind of rushing it. You can see it anyway once the tag is on so who cares? 

Here's the piece I cut off the frame and bent in.







Here they are mounted up.






Here's the tag holder mounted up to the brackets.






And all finished up!






So what do ya'll think? Opinions? Anything I missed? Oh and I LOVE the look of the tail end now!! Oh and don't mind my messy porch. I don't have a garage so this is where the bikes stay and get worked on. LOL It's fully enclosed so it's as good as a garage I guess.
 
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Banky2112

Banky2112

Just plain crazy...
Nice DIY job!
As a suggestion, maybe look at plugging the two holes that got left under the fender.

Usually you get a plate that goes over them then your FE would go on just as you did it.
 
MotoZen

MotoZen

New member
I like it a lot. How hard was the install for the Motodynamic? I'm thinking of ordering a smoked one as soon as they have them in stock.

Sent from my other favorite addiction (Galaxy S3) using Tapatalk.
 
Bajaedition

Bajaedition

New member
I would suggest getting one of those led strips with 4 leds on it and using it for a plate light
they like to pull you over for no plate light and then they want to do the search thing, major hassle

MotoZen
I had my motodynamic installed in about 20 minutes. then I took another 20 cleaning up the wiring instal. I think that and my FE was a total of 45 minutes, which included going to the tool box 3 times
 
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pajkrubi

New member
Banky2112 said:
Nice DIY job!
As a suggestion, maybe look at plugging the two holes that got left under the fender.

Usually you get a plate that goes over them then your FE would go on just as you did it.
Click to expand...

I didn't notice any holes?? I reused all 4 bolts that held the original bracket up and those were the only "holes" I saw.

MotoZen said:
I like it a lot. How hard was the install for the Motodynamic? I'm thinking of ordering a smoked one as soon as they have them in stock.Sent from my other favorite addiction (Galaxy S3) using Tapatalk.
Click to expand...

It was pretty simple actually. There's a real good write up that shows a lot of the steps written by one of the members here.

Here's the link: Installing integrated brake and sequential signals on Fz8



Bajaedition said:
I would suggest getting one of those led strips with 4 leds on it and using it for a plate light
they like to pull you over for no plate light and then they want to do the search thing, major hassle
Click to expand...

I'm getting a set of the LED license plate bolts and wiring them up.
 
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fz8kansas

Guest
Nice holder!
I was looking at mine the other day and I was thinking of using the original mounts and plate bracket to make a plate holder. I was going to try to use the original plate light. I think that once it is tucked up under the tail it may not look to bad. Right now it is too cold to work in the garage but if winter will get back to normal temps I was going to go down and start taking it apart.
 
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pajkrubi

New member
Their may be. I'll have to check it out tomorrow. I'll let y'all know if their is any. I need at least one small hole anyway to run the tag light wires up through.

Thanks for the compliments guys. This bike DEFINITELY looks world's better with a fender eliminator!
 
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NoNine4me

New member
The Motodynamic taillight is a good investment. The stock single-filament bulb is useless. I was rear-ended the first month I had the bike, a nice solid little love-tap. Put on the MD as well as an LED light bar across the bottom of the plate and visibility is drastically better.
 
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pajkrubi

New member
Yeah the stock tail light is definitely lacking. This thing is incredibly bright! It seemed a lot brighter when I installed it and it was still daylight out but when I went out to look at it again at night it was unbelievable!
 
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pajkrubi

New member
Banky2112 said:
I thought I saw two holes behind your plate. In line with the frame.....
Click to expand...

I just got a chance to go out and look and it does have one real small hole right up behind the tag. It's the most rearward hole in the pic and is a lot smaller than it looks in the pic (I can't get my pinky finger in it). The other one just forward of it is just an indent in the plastic.

It's kind of a good thing though because I'm going to use that to run the wires for the tag lights up through. I'll either find a grommet that fits it or just use a dab of black silicone around the wires once I run them up through. It's actually small enough though that once a pair of wires go up through it I'd have to be riding in a torrential downpour for even a few drops of water to get splashed up through there.
 
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