June 27, 200719 yr Do they make Carbon fibre bash/skid plates?Could you use a carbon fibre bash plate/skid plate?Probably the cost would be to prohibitive.Just thinking about the weight savings.
June 27, 200719 yr wouldn't be strong enough! Carbon is not very puncture resistant and wouldn't last any time what so ever. What you want is a titanium one Edited June 27, 200719 yr by barrybaines
June 28, 200719 yr Is titanium the stuff that sparks real nicely when it hits a rock? That would be too cool to have a skid plate made out of that stuff. sparks everywhere.
June 28, 200719 yr Certainley is Zippy! I thought I should expand a little on the reasons a carbon bash guard would be no good to..... As your bash guard makes up part of the frame structure once it would have taken a few hits from rocks the resin within the weave will have all but smashed to pieces leaving you with in effect a very expensive sheet of soft fabric sagging under neath your bike! Ally ones that come as standard are fairly light and to be honest strong enough to be drilled out like the after market ones you see for the 4rt etc. or infact if you compare the 2007 Beta ones to all previous models you will see they are drilling to save the extra 5 grams! Only down side I have found to all the drilling is the amount of extra crap the makes its way in and around the engine. Now Ti would not only spark but looks bloody nice is about twice as strong as steel (weight for weight comparison) so you could, money provided have a very nice looking sparky bash guard at very little weight. All this said what do the top guys use? I reckon they are on Ally ones! If you really must loose that extra gram leave the packet of crisps in the cupboard
June 28, 200719 yr Don't care about the weight just want sparks everytime I hit a rock. Night time trials??? that would just be the dog's B*****ks as they say across the pond. (gosh I hope I got that phrase right) Wonder what the cost would be? Edited June 28, 200719 yr by ZIPPY
June 28, 200719 yr hhhmmmmmm, think I will stay with the stock ally skidplate. At least that is what the missus is telling me.
June 28, 200719 yr Wouldn't be much good down here in the Midlands, we only see one rock a year... and that's always the same one!
June 28, 200719 yr Certainley is Zippy! I thought I should expand a little on the reasons a carbon bash guard would be no good to..... As your bash guard makes up part of the frame structure once it would have taken a few hits from rocks the resin within the weave will have all but smashed to pieces leaving you with in effect a very expensive sheet of soft fabric sagging under neath your bike! Ally ones that come as standard are fairly light and to be honest strong enough to be drilled out like the after market ones you see for the 4rt etc. or infact if you compare the 2007 Beta ones to all previous models you will see they are drilling to save the extra 5 grams! Only down side I have found to all the drilling is the amount of extra crap the makes its way in and around the engine. Now Ti would not only spark but looks bloody nice is about twice as strong as steel (weight for weight comparison) so you could, money provided have a very nice looking sparky bash guard at very little weight. All this said what do the top guys use? I reckon they are on Ally ones! If you really must loose that extra gram leave the packet of crisps in the cupboard Firstly totally agree with everything thats been said on this post but sort of connected. I remember the early Ossa MAR having a sort of plastic bash plate. Light and durable plus could be moulded to fit. Probably was polyurethane so not as daft as it sounds.
June 28, 200719 yr H &D Racing currently have a carbon/kevlar bashplate in development at this very moment for the 4rt and so will soon be able to let you know how it performs!!
June 28, 200719 yr I immediately thought of the Mk1 Ossa too and how everyone replaced them with an alloy guard. The Fantic one was OK but had two frame tubes to back it up. CF sumpguards can only be of (weight/performance) advantage to the really good guys who have a factory to replace the smashed casings anyway so no problem.
June 29, 200719 yr Titanium has around twice the density of Aluminium, so to make one just the same weight it'd only be around 2mm thick. Biggest problem with the ones on the 4RT is they seem to be made of very soft aluminium. Others, including Mitani seem to be made of dural - a much tougher alloy
June 29, 200719 yr I remember some lad's in our club talking about how they would use plastic shovels as skid plates on their SWM's just heat them up a bit to mould them in place. Good point to using the shovel, was if you ended up to the axle's in **** you could always dig yourself out. In parts of the US they would make you have spark arrestors for the sparky plate. Edited June 29, 200719 yr by Ishy
June 29, 200719 yr I think the works bikes get down to much lower weights by removing gears that arent used in a section, like 5th and 6th on a Beta, much smaller petrol tanks (like the flat 4rt one or Ragas GG which has the base of the standard tank removed) and titanium bolts and various other bits.
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