8-28-09
R80ST+sidecar

I got started mounting the brackets for sidecar on the BMW R80ST. They came from Dauntlessmotors.com and were very well made and simple to attach. This is the front, lower and upper mounts.

This is the rear lower mount. I had to remove the center stand as this bracket uses the same mounting holes. 

The upper rear mount I used an original BMW sidecar mount bolt. I had to ream out the hole in the Works shock as well as the bracket. This is a very strong mounting bolt that is used on the old /2 bikes.

Here are all the bike mounts in place.

This is what the mount side of the sidecar looked like.

This is the front mount that I needed to cut off as per directions.

A good old hacksaw with new blade mace the job easy.

The pipe was a little out of shape from the bending but I pounded it back in more or less round shape before I did the next step.

The pipe needed to be cut into a step shape to accept the pinch bracket.

Pinch bracket welded in place. I am not a pretty welder but I am confident it will ‘hold’ ok.

The rear lower bracket needed this reducing sleeve. After testing it I needed to add more shim material to give it a tight fit.

The rear top mount was lengthened 7” to make it long enough to reach the top mount bolt.

All the mounts are now bolted up. I gave the sidecar about a ¼” toe in and leaned the bike out, oh, about that much. The sidecar wheel leads the rear wheel somewhere around 15% of the wheel base. I looked at my other sidecar and found that the sidecar axle came to about the front of the rear wheel tire. That is about where I have this sidecar wheel too. The front top mount just bolted up.

All mounted up.

With the cover off and ready to ride. I took it down the hill and up the highway to the neighbor’s driveway where I turned around and came back to camp. I only had a tee shirt on and now helmet. I decided to check everything over again in the morning and also check the grease in the sidecar wheel too before I really tried it out at any speed.

The wheel was actually fairly well greased but I cleaned the bearing anyway and greased them with a good quality wheel bearing grease I have used before and trust. I went over all the bolts and gave each another tug just to be sure……. I would hate it to fall off while I was going down the road……….

Out on the road I was waiting for the normal ‘head shake’ that sidecar rigs do usually at low speeds. I sure didn’t notice any shake either under acceleration or when slowing down. I am almost sure that there will be a shake sometime but so far I have not found the place where it wants to do it. Maybe I am just lucky or at least lucky so far. I took it up to increasing speeds and it seems really stable. The most I finally worked myself up to was about 75 mph, which is what I consider MY speed limit for this outfit. The tug seems to have plenty of power and the brakes seem sufficient. I think I have about the right lean-out of the bike too. The bike needs to lean out to counteract the drag of the sidecar. Too much lean-out and the bike will want to turn left and too little, right.

I will have to drive this a few miles to find out what it likes and doesn’t like. Gee, sort of like a woman eh? I have never thought of sidecars that way, but makes sense...........