Lower headlight for cafe project?

[Guest]

Does anyone know how to lower the headlight for a cafe project? I'd like it to look more in line with the body, rather than upright like a cruiser.

[salty_monk]

Make some new offset arms from the forks to carry it lower. The hardest thing will be getting them to look good. Some of the GS headlight brackets are shorter than others, you may be able to run one of the shorter ones with an additional spacer on top. There are also generic ones that clamp on that would probably allow you to move it lower. Lots on Fleabay...

You'll need to be careful that your fender can't touch the bottom of it though depending on how low you go & also note that the wiring might not stretch that far & need re-configuring.

[Grimly]

Some of the aftermarket ones allow themselves to be clamped upside-down, lowering the light.

[Guest]

Thanks! I didn't even think about fender clearance, but I'm not looking to go too low, just more in line with the tank and the lean-forward look of a cafe racer, instead of the stock upright position.

[LAB3]

Make some new offset arms from the forks to carry it lower. The hardest thing will be getting them to look good. Some of the GS headlight brackets are shorter than others, you may be able to run one of the shorter ones with an additional spacer on top. There are also generic ones that clamp on that would probably allow you to move it lower. Lots on Fleabay...

You'd probably do well to look at brands other than Suzuki as well, those bracket/tube combo's where a pretty popular way of mounting a headlight across the board.

[Gorminrider]

You could easily make some brackets by bending 2 pieces of stock steel strap around the stanchions...1" wide or so? They'd need some holes drilled to clamp to stanchions and hold headlamp ...and some paint, but that's about it.

[Guest]

google "crappy motorcycle headlight mount"
on amazon $12

[Guest]

+1 Ya you can just mic the forks to check diameter then google/Ebay/Amazon shop headlight brackets. Lots to choose from and some look pretty decent for a good price.

[RustyTank]

Some of the aftermarket ones allow themselves to be clamped upside-down, lowering the light.

I was thinkin the same thing Grimly. This can work great.

[bwringer]

A smaller headlight, like the one from an L model, might be somewhat more lower-able.

Following a violent deer attack, my KLR is wearing a donated chrome headlight bucket from a GS650GL. Works quite well with an H4 LED. You can see the fairing of a normal KLR to the left.


As you can see, there's very little space to work with there, so a larger headlight probably wouldn't have worked. As it is, it's nearly touching the fender, and it's very close to contacting the instrument pods.

I'm using a really cheap set of generic headlight brackets. Something like this; there are better and more expensive/flexible options, of course:

https://www.amazon.com/Headlight-Brackets-Motorcycle-34-46mm-Universal/dp/B00V2ZTEPO

Dime City has a nice selection of headlight buckets, mounts, etc.

https://www.dimecitycycles.com/

[Guest]

What's the guy in the red and black jacket doing!!

[salty_monk]

That’s Bwringer, the bike must be still running well as he’s not peeing on it....

[bwringer]

What's the guy in the red and black jacket doing!!

That's Scott -- his bike is the desert tan KLR650 to the left.

And he's just, you know, admiring the view. It was a scenic mountain top meadow.