The little Bandit got some upgrades -56k warning-
07-02-2007, 09:15 AM
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The little Bandit got some upgrades -56k warning-
This is the Bandit 400 that originally belonged to Scr00zloose, I just missed out on him selling it, but luckily ProbeGTZ-ZE was kind enough to let me buy it from him a few months later. I'm not sure if skr00z was the one that modified it or not but when I bought it it already had a chopped subframe and a Ducati monster rear seat, as well as a M4 slip on. That alone really changed the look of the bike, and I loved its power, or lack there of, how I could actually run it wide open through a few gears and have some fun, but not be going quadruple the speed limit. The only things that I didn't like about it were the fact that the suspension and brakes which were probably crap when brand new, now had almost twenty years of wear and were now really worn out crap. So I continued in the direction I think skr00z was planning on going if he hadn't of sold it. If all you want to see is pictures just scroll through and ignore my details of what it all took.
First thing I did was brought the suspension into the 21st century. I started piecing together a gsxr front end, I had a matching white wheel laying around from an 01' 1000, and bought a set of forks/brakes/clip ons/triples from a 2006 GSX-R 1000. I had to press the bandit stem into the gsxr's lower triple for it to bolt up, using the 01 wheel w/ 06 forks and brakes meant I had to change the rotor, because the 06 is 310mm where the 01 is 300mm, or maybe the other way around I don't remember. Only problem is the 01 wheel also has different bolt spacing for the rotor, having run into this issue with a friend trying to reuse his old OZ wheels on his new bike I knew that a rotor from an SV1000 would solve the problem being both the correct diameter and bolt pattern. I decided to go with a single sided brake set up because this is how the bandit is set up originally and I kind of wanted to maintain that look, just with the updated suspension and braking components. I also figure with a radial master cylinder and a larger radial caliper, plus much larger rotors the one side gsxr 1000 brake alone would be a massive upgrade over what the bike had before. What I thought would be the toughest project on the bike actually turned out to be one of the most straight forward things I did to it. The only issue is the much larger gsxr lower tree doesn't have its bump stops in the right place for the bandit's frame, so at full lock it touches the radiator, my parking lot turning radius is just slightly limited by a few degrees, but there is no danger of the bars denting the tank or crushing my fingers. I also chose to not reinstall the gauges, I like the bare look of the front of the bike, and when your riding its just you, the rode, and the noises the bike is making, nothing in your way to spoil the fun telling you that your actually only doing 45 when you feel like your doing 90. I also removed the left hand clip on switch because again I wanted the bike to be very minimal, and just bolted on a fog light to the front, its a temporary solution, but ultimately it will look similar, just a pair of the same lights with cleaner straighter brackets.
On the first test ride I'm not sure what was more obvious, how much better the front forks were, or how they just exageratted how crappy the stock rear shock was. Also the gsxr front end made the front of the bike sit a little lower, so the bike would barely stand up on its kick stand. Being told that a GSXR rear shock was a fairly straight forward bolt on upgrade I thought this would be a piece of cake. I got a 2001 GSX-R 750 rear shock from a friend, but immediatly upon sticking it into the mount it was obvious it wasn't going to simply bolt up. Being about a full inch longer than the stock bandit shock, plus having a remote resevoir, and having a larger spring meant that it contacted the bike just about everywhere. I had to remove the coolant resevoir/overflow, replacing it with a McCormicks spice bottle, garlic salt to be exact, which I mounted at the front of the engine for easy monitering and refilling, the stock location makes it hard to see the level and impossible to refill without removing a lot of stuff. Then I had to trim a little bit off of the rear of the airbox to clear the shock's resevoir, had to grind some off of the bottom spring plate, the shock's bottom mount, and notched both sides of the suspension linkage, I also had to use spacers on the dog bones to get them to clear the shock spring. This raised the rear ride height enough so that the bike sat perfectly on its kickstand again, and looked more agressive. The rear brake also seemed to barely work so I replaced the rear rotor with an EBC contour wave rotor, new pads, and added a gsxr plastic cup style fluid resevoir, and drained the brake fluid which appeared to be mud. Riding it was immediately obvious that the bike felt much much better, you would think the stiffer suspension would make it more harsh, but its actually way smoother over bumps, I guess the suspension being so much more modern can cope with things like potholes where the stock stuff would just bottom out. With the stock shock you felt like you were sitting on a mushy pogo stick, but now it feels nice and firm and planted. I also swapped out the square cruiser tires on it for some nice sticky round rubber, a pirelli supercorsa front, and metzler rennsport rear(same tire, different name on the side). As stock the bike just drops right into the turns, so I was a little afraid that with the more round race tires it would feel unstable, but the opposite was true, it actually takes more to initiate turn in now, I can only assume that its mostly caused from going from a 110 front tire to a 120, probably also has a bit to do with the change in suspension geometry the forks and shock caused, I imagine with some playing with the suspension I can get it to turn in a little quicker, but it does feel very very stable once leaned over now, where as stock it kind of felt like it would just roll right over the edge of the tire with little warning.
Someone previously had painted over the stock red frame and swing arm black, but it was obvious that they did it without removing a single part on the bike, with lots of red still showing and overspray in many places, so I pulled the motor and repainted it, used Yamaha YZ silver on the engine cases and head, satin black on the valve cover and engine covers, the peg mounts, radiator, and probably a few other parts I've forgotten, and Honda CRF magnesium on the clutch cover and starter motor, sanded the rusted stock header and painted it flat black. I stripped and repainted the swing arm gloss black, and just repainted over the frame which was already black and in pretty good shape. Also took the time to change the oil, the spark plugs and one broken coil, which were some worn out autozone crap, looking at the coolant I wouldn't be surprised if it was the same which was put in it originally the day it was built in japan, and all what was once bearing grease had long since become something resembling red Virginia clay. It was kind of sad to see that someone had not taken care of such a cool rare bike, but also felt good to bring it back into good shape with a little TLC, and I'm not picking on skr00z or Probe here, they just owned the bike for a short time each I believe, this appeared to be neglect stemming much further back into the bike's history.
The stock pegs were these giant rubber cruiser looking things, so I replaced those with pegs off of a SV1000, also replaced the shift lever with one just slightly shorter from an SV1000 as well, this was all direct bolt on replacement.
First thing I did was brought the suspension into the 21st century. I started piecing together a gsxr front end, I had a matching white wheel laying around from an 01' 1000, and bought a set of forks/brakes/clip ons/triples from a 2006 GSX-R 1000. I had to press the bandit stem into the gsxr's lower triple for it to bolt up, using the 01 wheel w/ 06 forks and brakes meant I had to change the rotor, because the 06 is 310mm where the 01 is 300mm, or maybe the other way around I don't remember. Only problem is the 01 wheel also has different bolt spacing for the rotor, having run into this issue with a friend trying to reuse his old OZ wheels on his new bike I knew that a rotor from an SV1000 would solve the problem being both the correct diameter and bolt pattern. I decided to go with a single sided brake set up because this is how the bandit is set up originally and I kind of wanted to maintain that look, just with the updated suspension and braking components. I also figure with a radial master cylinder and a larger radial caliper, plus much larger rotors the one side gsxr 1000 brake alone would be a massive upgrade over what the bike had before. What I thought would be the toughest project on the bike actually turned out to be one of the most straight forward things I did to it. The only issue is the much larger gsxr lower tree doesn't have its bump stops in the right place for the bandit's frame, so at full lock it touches the radiator, my parking lot turning radius is just slightly limited by a few degrees, but there is no danger of the bars denting the tank or crushing my fingers. I also chose to not reinstall the gauges, I like the bare look of the front of the bike, and when your riding its just you, the rode, and the noises the bike is making, nothing in your way to spoil the fun telling you that your actually only doing 45 when you feel like your doing 90. I also removed the left hand clip on switch because again I wanted the bike to be very minimal, and just bolted on a fog light to the front, its a temporary solution, but ultimately it will look similar, just a pair of the same lights with cleaner straighter brackets.
On the first test ride I'm not sure what was more obvious, how much better the front forks were, or how they just exageratted how crappy the stock rear shock was. Also the gsxr front end made the front of the bike sit a little lower, so the bike would barely stand up on its kick stand. Being told that a GSXR rear shock was a fairly straight forward bolt on upgrade I thought this would be a piece of cake. I got a 2001 GSX-R 750 rear shock from a friend, but immediatly upon sticking it into the mount it was obvious it wasn't going to simply bolt up. Being about a full inch longer than the stock bandit shock, plus having a remote resevoir, and having a larger spring meant that it contacted the bike just about everywhere. I had to remove the coolant resevoir/overflow, replacing it with a McCormicks spice bottle, garlic salt to be exact, which I mounted at the front of the engine for easy monitering and refilling, the stock location makes it hard to see the level and impossible to refill without removing a lot of stuff. Then I had to trim a little bit off of the rear of the airbox to clear the shock's resevoir, had to grind some off of the bottom spring plate, the shock's bottom mount, and notched both sides of the suspension linkage, I also had to use spacers on the dog bones to get them to clear the shock spring. This raised the rear ride height enough so that the bike sat perfectly on its kickstand again, and looked more agressive. The rear brake also seemed to barely work so I replaced the rear rotor with an EBC contour wave rotor, new pads, and added a gsxr plastic cup style fluid resevoir, and drained the brake fluid which appeared to be mud. Riding it was immediately obvious that the bike felt much much better, you would think the stiffer suspension would make it more harsh, but its actually way smoother over bumps, I guess the suspension being so much more modern can cope with things like potholes where the stock stuff would just bottom out. With the stock shock you felt like you were sitting on a mushy pogo stick, but now it feels nice and firm and planted. I also swapped out the square cruiser tires on it for some nice sticky round rubber, a pirelli supercorsa front, and metzler rennsport rear(same tire, different name on the side). As stock the bike just drops right into the turns, so I was a little afraid that with the more round race tires it would feel unstable, but the opposite was true, it actually takes more to initiate turn in now, I can only assume that its mostly caused from going from a 110 front tire to a 120, probably also has a bit to do with the change in suspension geometry the forks and shock caused, I imagine with some playing with the suspension I can get it to turn in a little quicker, but it does feel very very stable once leaned over now, where as stock it kind of felt like it would just roll right over the edge of the tire with little warning.
Someone previously had painted over the stock red frame and swing arm black, but it was obvious that they did it without removing a single part on the bike, with lots of red still showing and overspray in many places, so I pulled the motor and repainted it, used Yamaha YZ silver on the engine cases and head, satin black on the valve cover and engine covers, the peg mounts, radiator, and probably a few other parts I've forgotten, and Honda CRF magnesium on the clutch cover and starter motor, sanded the rusted stock header and painted it flat black. I stripped and repainted the swing arm gloss black, and just repainted over the frame which was already black and in pretty good shape. Also took the time to change the oil, the spark plugs and one broken coil, which were some worn out autozone crap, looking at the coolant I wouldn't be surprised if it was the same which was put in it originally the day it was built in japan, and all what was once bearing grease had long since become something resembling red Virginia clay. It was kind of sad to see that someone had not taken care of such a cool rare bike, but also felt good to bring it back into good shape with a little TLC, and I'm not picking on skr00z or Probe here, they just owned the bike for a short time each I believe, this appeared to be neglect stemming much further back into the bike's history.
The stock pegs were these giant rubber cruiser looking things, so I replaced those with pegs off of a SV1000, also replaced the shift lever with one just slightly shorter from an SV1000 as well, this was all direct bolt on replacement.
07-02-2007, 09:19 AM
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Re: The little Bandit got some upgrades -56k warning-
Replaced the stock passenger peg mount assembly with a race bracket I had laying around.
Used a tail light off of a 02 R1 with the cover removed and the backing painted black, just had to cut off the top mounting tabs and drill new ones through the back tabs. Then had a Vortex keyless gas cap from my 05' 1000 that I thought would look cool, just had to drill and countersink new holes to match up with the bandit's tank.
And thats pretty much it, people really don't know what a Bandit 400 is when they see a stock one so this should really have people guessing. Its a blast to ride, only thing else I'd like to do is dial in the suspension a little better, rejetting, thinking about BMC pod filters but not sure, I'd like to chop the can and make a high mount out of a 636 mid pipe I have, do something nicer with the headlights, and just clean up a few things, I got so tired of working on it and just wanting to ride that I left the wiring a bit messy. Can't wait to get it out to a track day, I hear bandit 400's aren't really competitive in the FZR 400 classes but I'd also like to try to race it in some small bore classes just for fun.
Used a tail light off of a 02 R1 with the cover removed and the backing painted black, just had to cut off the top mounting tabs and drill new ones through the back tabs. Then had a Vortex keyless gas cap from my 05' 1000 that I thought would look cool, just had to drill and countersink new holes to match up with the bandit's tank.
And thats pretty much it, people really don't know what a Bandit 400 is when they see a stock one so this should really have people guessing. Its a blast to ride, only thing else I'd like to do is dial in the suspension a little better, rejetting, thinking about BMC pod filters but not sure, I'd like to chop the can and make a high mount out of a 636 mid pipe I have, do something nicer with the headlights, and just clean up a few things, I got so tired of working on it and just wanting to ride that I left the wiring a bit messy. Can't wait to get it out to a track day, I hear bandit 400's aren't really competitive in the FZR 400 classes but I'd also like to try to race it in some small bore classes just for fun.
07-02-2007, 12:35 PM
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Re: The little Bandit got some upgrades -56k warning-
i'm jealous. all the cool stuff i wanted to do to the bike. glad to see one of my old bikes being built nice and proper!
looks awesome man. now i wanna ride it
and yeah, i DID NOT paint that bike, frame or otherwise. all i really did to it was fix the cdi ($5 in radio shack capacitors), do the monster seat swap (which was never finished before Probe picked it up, i hope sometime along the lines the rear mounts were finished), added the pipe, and swapped the stock bars for the f3 bars. i only got to ride it once, i had big plans for it, but some financial issues came up, and i had to let go of one of my bikes. i couldn't see myself (at the time) getting rid of my 954, so the bandit got sold. i never really got a chance to go thru the bike as thoroughly as i wanted to. glad it's coming together well for you.
looks awesome man. now i wanna ride it
and yeah, i DID NOT paint that bike, frame or otherwise. all i really did to it was fix the cdi ($5 in radio shack capacitors), do the monster seat swap (which was never finished before Probe picked it up, i hope sometime along the lines the rear mounts were finished), added the pipe, and swapped the stock bars for the f3 bars. i only got to ride it once, i had big plans for it, but some financial issues came up, and i had to let go of one of my bikes. i couldn't see myself (at the time) getting rid of my 954, so the bandit got sold. i never really got a chance to go thru the bike as thoroughly as i wanted to. glad it's coming together well for you.
Last edited by skr00zloose; 07-02-2007 at 12:44 PM.
07-03-2007, 01:47 AM
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Re: The little Bandit got some upgrades -56k warning-
That is a very pretty bike. Maybe one day my 500 could be as cool. I have always wondered what it would be like to ride the 500 with a different front end and rear shock. I also heard you could put f2 wheels on an pre 94 5hundy so you can put radials on but have not had that confirmed.
07-03-2007, 07:15 AM
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Re: The little Bandit got some upgrades -56k warning-
