Cutting Off the Tail of a Monster

After nearly four years of ownership, I finally gave in and decided to cut the tail off of my Monster. I removed the original giant fender right away, but didn't want to do anything that I couldn't undo. Here's what it looked like just before I started surgery:

Last time I made a license plate bracket, I made one out of paper, then out of cardboard, then a prototype out of a fairly thin sheet of aluminum. Once I was sure I had it right, I made the part from 1/8" aluminum and was able to get everything exactly how I wanted it. I skipped a couple of steps this time and just made a paper template, then went to the final version. As you'll see by the narrative, this turned out to be a prototype after all, but a bit more expensive and harder to make. When I can find a proper piece of aluminum, I'll make the final version.

Here are the main steps that I went through:


I started by taking off everything on the back of the bike.	This is what the back end looked like before I started cutting.

Here is a top view of the two bolt holes that will hold the new bracket and where the light mounts.	I made a template on the computer with the desired measurements and checked the fit before cutting any aluminum. I just traced the outline onto the aluminum with a fine point marker and cut with a jigsaw. I may not have all the best tools, but they get the job done.

Here's the template and the cut aluminum part, before drilling and bending. You'll notice that I didn't add the bottom piece for the reflector. This is because I needed a 7" piece of aluminum and could only find 6". That makes this one a "prototype" and I'll be making another one when I can get a bigger sheet. It will have a place for the reflector - I want to be seen if my tail light ever burns out at night.	After drilling, I checked that the bolt holes lined up. They didn't quite, so I enlarged the left one until it did.

I marked where I wanted it cut with masking tape and started cutting with the Craftsman equivalent of a Dremmel tool.	The cutting wheel is only good for about 3/4 of the cut. The rest must be done with a hacksaw. I probably would have been better off just using the hacksaw in the first place. I had to go get a new blade with 32 teeth per inch to cut this properly. I also had a hard time getting it out once it went through, because the cut closed up.

It's cut off! No turning back now.	I had a hard time getting it to fit on the left. Eventually I figured out that the two bolt holes are not symmetric! I got my drill out and made a few more adjustments to get it to fit.

Once in place, I realized that the license plate can't fit up as high as I had wanted. I drilled two more holes to get the plate where it should go. This one is definitely a prototype now.	Here I'm checking the fit of the license plate.

With everything in place, it's right where I want it, except that it's offset to the left about 1/4".	Here's the finished bike. Well, finished except installing the rear turn signals and taking off the windshield.

All done. View from behind.	Finished bike from the front.

All done (for now).