Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/126243
".cl Iv The sections that are recessed in the back sid e of the partition ( to clear the m ot orcycle front wh eel holding brackets) were.boxed in a fter the partiti on was inst a lled . K Mart supplied th e pl a st ic molding used on the corners . It comes in eig h t foot lengths a nd isn' t too ou tr ageousl y priced.You ca n cu t it with a knife . . handy. . The front wh eel h olding brack et s we used were on sa le .. th ey're not th e best av ai la ble . T he loops on th ese aren't very strong, a n d th e partit ion e nds up absorbing most of th e force wh en the tie -downs co m p ress th e forks. St andard eye bolts with wash ers. lock washers and nuts ( not t he lag scre w type .. th ey d on't hold in sheet metal ) were used to hold th e tie d owns. The middle recessed sec tio n provided a g ood place to stash th e tool box . Small pi eces of I X2 inch strap are used to keep it from sliding around in the turns. Winnebago-style seat pads. along with your choice of carpeting and accessories complete the job . T he pads. obvious ly, are t he biggest problem -they have to be custom made. The seat back pad sh ould be three in ches thick and shou ld attach along th e top . preferably with snaps for easy removal for cleaning. The seat pads , one for each sectio n of the " L" should be four in ches thick and likewise be removable. The thin bunk sec tion pad also is fou r inch es thi ck . It sho uld be attached securely (with sna ps) to the fro nt edge .. th e edge away fro m the h inge. T he n , have a stra p m ade th a t will allow the edge near the hinge to drop down into th e co m p a rt m ent under th e seat wh en it's folded under. Otherwise you' ll run into a clearance p roblem with the seat/bunk support fram e. The hardest thing about this job is worrying about it . The editor who made this one knows very nearly nothing about working with wood . . didn't even ta~e shop in school .. but by taking lots of time and bemg careful, he found even he could do it . And it was worth it. The van now su its h is personal specifications and is a useful. specialized vehicle . Underneath 10 Dodge vans as they come from the fa ctory tend to be a little soft in the suspension department . And that's putting it kindly . To be more emphatic, when ours was pushed briskly through a turn . any coordination be tween the wheels and the body . seemed purely coincidenta l. The results were frighte ning . Let's clarify those statements. We're not saying that the trucks are dangerous. We're saying that a top heavy vehicle , like any van , should not be ex pected to handle well at speed when it's been given a typical American mushmobile suspension by its creators. Especially with six or eight hundred pounds of motorcycles and gear loaded in the back. We tri ed putting the test van int o an extreme handling situation: pitching it into a full lock righ t hand tu rn at various (rela tively slow) speeds. Check out th e before and after photos; th ey'll give you an id ea of what we're talking about although th e still pictures ca n' t actually tell it all . The " before" photo shows an out of control. van . The veh icle is sliding sideways on three wheels with the inside rear wheel well off th e ground and the front outside tir e rolled over, skidding along on its sidewall. Here's wh y. Vans are both front hea vy and top heavy. The front-heaviness helps cause what's called understeer. T he front wheels "wash out" to use a dirt riding phrase. The front end breaks loose before the rear end does .. just like in the picture. To make matters worse, top-heavin ess gets into th e act when braking forces tend to pitch th e van's weight toward the front increasing an already bad situation. In addition , th e weight is also thrown to the outside of the turn (a ny moving object resists a change of d irection) since it "wa nt s" to continue in a straight line. The result is a tremendous weight transfer to the area of the outside front wheel. In short. the sto ck set -up is inadequate in an extreme situation such as this on e . When th e photo was take.n, the van was tr avelling a t approximatel y 25·30 miles per hour. Imagine th e possibilities in a 55 mph swerve to avoid , sa y, a cement block th at 's just fallen off the truck ahead of you on a freeway. Now check out the " after" photo . And here's where th e picture is proven inadequat e to co rn pletely demonstrate what we're sa ying. • nIIIU•... W heels by Bart. tires by B.F. Goodrich. Tires Now , let 's backtrack and see what made th e difference . For one thing, th e sta n d a rd issu e " ri m protector" tires ha ve been replaced with B.F. Goodrich Radial T / A tires. The B.F.G.s are th e same tir e used b y the company in their racing effort . They take a sta nd a rd Radial T / A , from the mold and cut off approximately half the tread d ep· th to prepare it for racing. Obviously, the mileage is decreased , but so is heat build up .. an im port a n t factor in competition tires although not critical in street use . Otherwise . the tires are identical to production models. The Go odrich T / A tires co me in two styles : the raised wh ite letter style shown here and a narrow whitewall model called the Classic T / A. There are two differenc..s: the sidewall design and the warran ty. T he whitewall model comes with a piece of paper saying that it's good for 40 ,000 miles. The raised letter tire . a lthough iden tica l in quality . doesn't get th e sa me promise . Bu yers of raised letter tires . B.F.G figures . tend to wear out tires more quickl y th an th e whitewall crowd. They have a point. You ca n see that th e tires ha ve made a n obvious difference -- th e front outside on e , in parti cular. It 's not even close to being as distorted as th e stoc k tire. That's partly because it's a much better tire, full y capable of handling th e load put on it. And it's partly because th e load on it isn 't as great as th e one on the other tire. The degree oflean in th e van body is only slightly less than in the other photo. but what has happened .. the part that the still photo can't show .. is that the van has reached that degree of lean much more slowly and controllably. The driver is in control and, believe me, feels much safer. B,F.G. recommends their 50 seri es tire for vans since it's lower in profile -- the lowest . in fact . We opted for the 60 series. however, feeling that the sligh tly greater ground clearance would be helpful on the two-rut woodsroads that trailriders often d ri ve over heading for a gas check or a good riding spot, W e used LR60· I 5 size tire on back and GR60 · . 1.5 on ~he front: There's no practical reason for putting differ ent srzes front and rear. We admit to doing it just because it looks trick. While va nit y overruled reason in the selection of th e tire sizes no ~egative effec ts have resulted from having wide~ tir es on back. In fact. they seem to help since the in side wheel still lifts on a tight turn , and the one tire left puts down a bigger footprint. The B.F.G. s have a " block type" tread to co mbat aquaplaning on wet roads , a common tendency of wide tread width tires. Hi t a good puddle. and th ey'll still pull , but we haven't seen any tire. no matter what width , that won 't. They're available in sizes from BR50-13 up to LR60 -15. Unfortunately th ey don't come in 16.5 inch sizes for th e eight-lu g wh eels on the heavier du ty va ns. Wheels Wheels by Bart, an Atlanta area firm known for producing quality ra cing whe els, produced the chrome rim spoke wheels used on the project van . W e'd sta rt ed this project look ing for a different wh eel. absolutely opposed to jo ining the ranks of look-alike spoke wheel users. We'd finally decided on having stock wheels wid ened to eight inches up front and ten on back , and had gone down to talk it over with Bart and Johnny Hoek . We talked . walking amid stacks of super wide racing rims, and had it all worked out. Then johnny pulled his latest secret out of the back room . The ADDeO rear sway bar and mounting ki t is shown here .