Brake Light and Another Ride

I wanted to throw a brake light on Salty, so I could run him on the street. I never really thought about that when I made the seat/cowl though, so I needed a simple solution. Thanks to my previous experience doing a taillight for my rat bike project this spring, I decided to use a simple 9V battery as the power source. This way I don't have to tap into the lighting coil and worry about the rectifier with the stock wiring loom.

The end result is a 9V battery, a 9V battery holder, some wire, a stock rear brake light switch, and a pair of 1/2" push-in red lights. All the components are housed in the left side pod cover, and runs through the seat in plastic tubing to avoid and chaffing on the fiberglass. The lights simply push through a 1/2" hole I drilled in the bottom edge of the seat cowl, as shown below:



The lights are actually quite bright when viewed from behind.

After completing that task, I took another ride around the north part of town. I've learned a few things riding it:

-I need to move the pegs a couple inches lower, or a couple inches further back, or a combination of the two. I'm just too cramped.

-Having the bike geared so tall means that 2nd gear isn't that usable for putting around city streets. 1st is too short, 2nd is too long, especially for slower speed corners. I think I'm going to throw a smaller front sprocket on the bike, which luckily doesn't take much time.

-This bike is fun! It doesn't have the scoot of the rat bike, but being all hunched over and close to the ground makes it exciting, even at 40mph.



C'