Keeping our Yamaha long term adventure sportster safe from harm...
WE WENT to see the good folk at R&G Racing yesterday, at their HQ in Hampshire. It was ace to see a great British success story in the flesh - developing new products, manufacturing them (much of it in Blighty), and sending giant boxes of top-notch bike accessories off round the world. The firm's engine case covers have become required fitting in BSB and also at Moto America, and its tail tidies, crash bungs, engine protectors and much more are really taking off in SE Asia and Australia.
So well done R&G. And to celebrate, we snatched some crash protectors for our long term 2018 Yamaha Tracer 900. We're obviously not planning on sending the smart adventurey-sporty-tourer up the road on its side. But it's nice to have insurance against the unthinkable... Yamaha's sent us the bike with some protection already - plastic case sliders and fork bottom protectors. But we wanted a proper set of solid crash mushrooms on the side there too.
This is one of R&G's more involved setups. Instead of just one bung bolted onto a frame mounting point, this kit uses a smart brace plate across two engine mounts, spreading the load and better-positioning the bung itself. It's a good-looking design, with a nice powder-coated aluminium brace plate, and a natty brushed alloy cover too. R&G still offers single-mount bungs though, which can go in the front or mid- engine mount point and are a cheaper option.
Fitting is almost as easy as a single bung though. Make sure you have the right plates for each side (they aren't totally symmetrical), and spacers (again different on each side) and get out an 8mm allen bit, 19mm socket and a 3mm allen driver for the cover plate screws. I'm (carefully!) using my DeWalt impact gun for speed here, but a ratchet will do just as well. A torque wrench is strongly advised for tightening the engine mount bolts too.
Start out by removing the two engine mount bolts here. They're tight so take care not to slip. Once out, slip two of the R&G M10 bolts through the brace plate, with plain washers under the heads. Fit the black alloy spacers at the back (small on the front, larger on the rear mount), start screwing them in gently by hand, then tighten gradually with your ratchet, finishing off with the torque wrench (33ft lb to save you Googling).
Now, screw the little cover plate on over the bolts. I sprayed a bit of multi-lube oil on the heads and into the threads beforehand, just to keep any corrosion away.
Next, put a plain washer and a star washer onto the M12 bolt, and slip that through the HDPE plastic crash bung, then the alloy spacer. Thread it into the brace plate carefully by hand, then tighten up with the ratchet, then torque carefully to about 30 ft lbs. Fit the little plastic R&G cover and you're done!
The other side is the same, just with the slightly different sized spacers and brace plate.
We're done! Literally a half-hour job once you get started. And our Tracer is now even more protected against the bad stuff out there. Smart.
This brace-plate R&G protector kit costs £230. The firm also sells single-bung installs for the front or mid engine mount point, for £70. More info HERE.
