I put a military surplus box on my back rack and bolted it to my rack via the 4 bolts that go to the passenger hand grips. First test ride the fender bolts "the two that go through the rack and middle of fender" rattled loose. Put locktite on them and they broke. Was thinking of drilling the box and putting longer bolts through the box and some rubber in between to help with vibration. Thanks for any help or ideas.
I use large 30"x12"x12" aluminum tool boxes as tail boxes on both my gen2 KLRs. I put quite a load in the box and ride long distance dirt road routes with lots of bumps. I broke three sets of the stock 6mm vertical bolts holding the rack down.
The solution is to replace the 6mm with 8mm with 78% more cross sectional area. On one gen2 I drilled and tapped the nuts to 8mm. On the other I just knocked the captive nuts out of the "U" bracket that holds them and put in an 8mm nut with a lubricated bolt through it to hold it in place. Then I packed the "U" bracket with JB Weld to hold the nut in place. When the JB cured I unscrewed the lubricated bolt. This left the nut firmly and perfectly in place with room for a bolt to screw a little past the nut in the bracket. The bolts are 35mm long, but all I could find at the hardware store were 40mm. So I cut of 5mm with my Dremel and all is good.
I think the drill and tap method is better, but both worked for me.
Hi there. So I am part-way down this route - just waiting for the jb weld to set on my nuts!
I've M8x35 allen-head bolts...…. So I have had to drill out the holes.....
I removed the collar from the top part of the rack - so the first hole the bolt passes through.
On the underside of that rack is a plate with 2 "tubes" and these sit down into holes in the top of the fender.
And there are collars that sit down in those holes.....
From the parts diagram here
- oops, had a url here but I need more posts for it to stick!
Its on the kawasakipartshouse site under fenders (mines a 2014....)
the collars are 92152B
Unfortunately, these collars were not on my (2nd hand) KLR, so I don't know if these are meant to be metal/rubber/ hard plastic....So my question is - what have others used here?
Thanks pdwestman.
This makes perfect sense.... but then I would need to drill out the hole on the collars to 8mm - out from 6mm?
My measurements indicate this will leave a width of approx. 1mm either side..... hopefully not too fine for me to make a mess of it!
I was taking the approach of rubber washers to pack the top part, which would leave about 3mm of hole where the bolt has no side support.
But I want to do this only once...… so keen to get your feedback on the idea of drilling out the collar - if this is the best way to approach this problem, that's what I'd like to hear!
Well, ive looked at this issue again, this time with my glasses on! It must be a 3rd party rack as I now see a few changes compared with the parts diag …. mine has the grab-rails and indicators connected to the bottom section of it.
And critically for my issue, underneath the bottom part of the rack - the metal frame - there is a metal strip with 2 long "collars" welded here. So the most logical setup for me to maintain metal-to-metal is to just widen the holes through the mudguard so these "long collars" sit down onto the bracket under which I've JB welded the nut.
This is the page I've been looking at, along with the /seat one.
Now I'm back to thinking that this rack may be standard.... Looking at the /seat diag and the RHS grab rail, this shows that it bolts up into the bottom of the carrier sections. If I add the rear indicators onto the grab rail, then my rack does look like the same..... except for this
"underneath the bottom part of the rack - the metal frame - there is a metal strip with 2 long "collars" welded here".
(This bit is not a home job, it's definitely manufactured with the rack)
Looking at the /fenders diagram, from the bolt above the carrier racks.... follow the line down through the second carrier. and the welded "collar" protrudes about 10mm from the base of that. Its OD is 14mm & ID allows for an M8 bolt.
Yes the oem 'under-rack' has a black metal strip with attached collars. And using a dental mirror I believe that I can see silver metal collars down inside the recessed pockets of its Red outer fender.
Hi pdwestman - thank you for the time you are taking to work through this with me.
So clearly I do have the oem rack.
With regards to the collar that you can see - I have removed one of the racks short top bolts and the collar underneath it - this collar fits perfectly in the bottom part of the fender hole that you are looking into.
This really does not make sense to me - the OD of this collar is 10mm, ID is 6mm and depth 3mm.
The welded collars that sit down into this hole have an OD of 14mm and ID of 8mm.
If the intent is to have metal to metal all the way through, why have an extra collar? Just enlarge the hole in the fender for the welded collar to sit down on the bracket directly. The current system places an oversized solid collar onto a very small one and raises the whole thing another 3mm.
Am I misunderstanding something here?
It's almost like Kawasaki realised they had a problem with under-strength 6mm bolts so welded collars that take 8mm bolts underneath the bracket, but then didn't finish the job......
The 10 x 6 x 3 collar traps the plastic fender & allows metal to metal rack mounting, but the clearance of the 14 x 8 vertical spacers allows easier fitment of everything with production line tolerances of all the various parts.
If you ever mount some of the various skid-plates, center stands, pannier racks, crash guards and you have spend time hand filing various holes into egg-shaped slots in order get the mounting bolts started without cross threading, you'll learn to appreciate a 'little clearance'.
Sorry for the delay in the update, but I've been rather preoccupied with fire over the past few months.....
So I did try drilling out the collar but failed miserably - I'm just not equipped for such fine work...… give me a hammer and chisel and I'm more at home.
So I ended up drilling out the fender hole to 14mm etc....
Thanks again pdwestman for your help on this one....
I was able to drill and tap to an M8. The toughest part was finding an M8 bottom tap. I ended up starting with a through tap and then grinding it down to a bottom-like tap to get the last bit of threads. It worked.
So I've just bought a second KLR - for a friend coming over in a few months for an outback trip.
Its a 2017 with 7000km.
I have read that a possible cause of these rack bolts braking is that they are not kept tight enough.....
Is it worth me undoing the bolts on the new bike (they are very firm) and retightening with some blue/red locktite?
I just drilled through the bracket holding the rack/rear fender and through bolted with grade 8 hardware. I run an ATV box and haven't had a problem since. Kida like the Eagle Mike drill through kit after I sheared those as well!
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