As you can see I’ve been working on the seat area of the chassis on our Sportster based bagger. Keeping the heaviest parts of a bike low and centered in the chassis will make it handle well and have an exceptionally light feel. You’ll notice the battery is set up under the seat running lengthwise from front to rear, and the oil tank will be one of the next things that’ll be fabbed up, becoming part of the forward area of the swingarm – tucked neatly under the battery area. You can’t get it much lower than that. The battery box serves as a structural member of the chassis by attaching it to the gussets just ahead of the shocks, absorbing some of the rear weight and transferring it to the backbone.

 .

You can see here how low the seat will be with the top of the seat rails just 21 ½ inches off the ground, and you can also see that we’re getting the seat height down there without slamming the entire bike & causing a ground-scraping ill handling bike. From earth to the underside of the bottom rails we’ve got 6 ½ inches of clearance. Pretty close to stock height on most bikes.

You may have also noted the swingarm is now much beefier using 1×2 box tubing and we’re running a 1 inch axle in this bike as well because when its done it’ll have a 100 cu. in. S&S engine for power – Axle bending power! Right out of the box the S&S engines are rated at 115 Horsepower at the rear wheel so EVERYTHING has to be built to withstand that kind of stress. The rear wheel is something I’ve had collecting dust up in the storage area for a while. It came off of a drag bike & is extremely lightweight. Its got a 170mm tire on it now but will get a fresh 180 for final assembly. The power will be transferred from the engine to the rear wheel through a 151 tooth belt commonly used in the V-Rod, so you know its gotta be tough as hell.

 

These images give you an idea of how well a 6’ tall fat ass fits on this modified H-D chassis. That’s one of the best parts about this build – it can and will be duplicated. In fact, its not really a ‘build’ – a better description would be ‘conversion’. You could start with a bone stock 883 Sportster, punch it out to a 1200 using an S&S Hot Set-up, have our Pro-Tour ‘S’ kit installed and you’ll be set. Its still an H-D so finding insurance isn’t a problem, no final inspection, just a slick clean conversion on a proven – rock solid chassis.