Centre Stand..

I am thinking of taking off the centre stand and using a race stand i have instead . It looks ordinary and the Banbit Is a bit porky .
Its handy on a trip so i could refit it beforehand along with screen ,rack,hand guards,air hawk.
Thing is i hate springs ,it should be easy to take off but does anyone know how hard it is to refit .Those springs look like they would need
a lot of tension to refit .

After looking at the centre stand from under-neath i carnt believe my eyes that the bolt that holds it in place has been pushed through from the
right hand side .Then the exhaust put on, stopping the removal of the bolt .This means removal of headers to remove centre stand .
Thats just plain dumb ,are they all put on that way ?
Its the bolt in the centre of the reverse C bracket.

It would be easyer to remover nut ,push bolt through till it hits exhaust and cut the head off nut with hacksaw . That should take an hour in that
position and a lot of swearing .Why couldnt they have just push it through from the L.H.S. so it could be widthdrawn.

I've heard of people taking them off but I didnt realise they had to de-header the bike first.
What weight saving do you think you'll get Gus? 3kg? Thats less that 1% bike and rider (most) so I'm callling it "not worth the effort". On a black Bandit you can hardly notice it anyway. Do they stand out on the pink ones?

It's on that way because the bike was built by an engineer - not a mechanic.

Its not pretty ,and seeing i have a race stand . The weight thing was just a bonus.Exhaust ,centre stand its going in the right direction.
There is no way i'm removing rad. and headers to do it though . Dont tell me i have to hold a hacksaw blade in my hand for hours .
The last time i had to do that was when i was in Long Bay Jail and it made a mess of my hands .

I swapped that bolt around when I had the headers off. If it really annoys you take to it with a hacksaw or angle grinder and replace with new bolt. Remember whilst it's apart to give it a clean and regrease everything.

In your case gus we expect you to cut off all things unnecessary and paint it

BTW the centre stand is too useful to take off I reckon. I fill the bike all the time on the centre stand, it also doubles as an anchor on soft ground so the bike doesn't fall over.

I'd put one on my 650 but she's a bit porky to go adding extra weight and $. Can I have yours Gus when you are finished with it?

BTW Gus, what chain lube do you use? I can't see any buildup on the frame anywhere. Or are you a clean freak like me?

Center stand weighs in around 5-6kgs all up (stand, bolt, bung, spacer, nut, springs) from memory.
Put washers between the spring coils while the stand is down to spot them compressing all the way. When you put the stand up the springs will be heaps easier to pull off. Keep in mind there are 2 springs on there, one inside the other. When it comes time to put the springs back on just pull the washers out once the stand is fitted and the bike up on it.
To get the bolt out do what reddog suggested, undo the nut, push the bolt as far across as you can and cut the head off it then pull it out as normal. Go and get a nut and bolt (get a locknut) from the local nut and boltery (about $3)


IMO not eating that cake tonight will give the same result and be more usefull

Maxima Chain Wax .Yep clean freak (bike only)
I loosened nut and tapped bolt through 5mm. Half an hour laying on back with bike on centre stand with rag around hacksaw blade cutting upwards
gave me victory.

I may put it back on in the future (with a new bolt from the L.H.S.) but at least now i can choose .
The supprising thing is ,the standard exhaust we all take off weighs 6 kg . The centre stand alone weighs 3 kg,a lot more than i expected .

Thats one large slice of cake Dhula . Will the heat from the cat melt the nylon in the locknut ,it will sit very close
Thank for the hint on the springs ,thats clever .

I like being able change from tour mode with screen ect to a bit more sporty in an hour or so.

What sort of clearance do you have between the centre stand bumper protrusion and the swing arm?

At least my guess on weight was right

That little bumper is (or was ) a home made job .Just a little L bracket with a bung attatched to the inside of that crome cover plate.
Your right 2Wa nice guess . 3 kg thats a fair bit to loose.

If we were so worried about weight we'd go on a diet or pick a sports bike over the Bandit. I think the centre stand is very practical and for most other bikes it's an optional accessory that you have to pay for. Unlike another bike I owned this centre stand also doesn't touch the ground whilst cornering which is a bonus

With that being said, if anyone has one for a 1st generation Bandit my mate Jimmy would love to take it off your hands as the previous owner threw it away.

I'll have to say if the next gen. Bandit gets heavyer i'll be forced to look elsewere .I think its on the limit now.

gus wrote:I'll have to say if the next gen. Bandit gets heavyer i'll be forced to look elsewere .I think its on the limit now.

GSR 750 Gus. The Bandit we know and love is out of date.

Removing the centre stand has another benefit - more ground clearance when you have a pillion.

But for me the advantage of having a centre stand out weigh (pardon the pun) the disadvantages.

95% of the time i use it i'm at home. I'm thinking push bolts through centre stand (no nut ,no springs ) lift bike up .Do the buisness , bike down,
pull bolt out .We'll see how long it lasts .

gus wrote:.We'll see how long it lasts .

Until the first time she rolls off the stand

To fit c\stand ( no springs or nut) and lift bike onto it = 20 seconds
To put bike back on side stand and remove c\stand = 11 seconds

Who says i have too much time on my hands .

Cameron 3 kg less, that has to be good for your quarter mile runs.

Here's what I did to my center stand, and there's actually a few more things I did to it that you can find out about if you click on the link below.
http://www.maximum-suzuki.com/forums/index.php?topic=74596.msg827056#msg827056

I use my center stand a lot and knew I was long over due to pull it off to clean and grease it, but to due so would require me to remove the pivot bolt which you cannot do unless you pull the entire exhaust system off, for the idiots at the factory installed the pivot bolt from the wrong side.

So I removed the bolt by removing the nut tapping the pivot bolt out until the head of the bolt was just touching the side of the CAT. I then carefully took a right angle air grinder with a 3” cutoff wheel and I cut the head of the bolt off. I then grabbed the threaded end of the bolt with a pair of vice grips and pulled the bolt out and removed the center stand.

When I got the center stand off I found that it was dry as a bone with no grease to speak of, but everything looked in good order. I had already purchased a replacement bolt and at first I was just going to clean the center stand and grease it up and install it back on my bike, but upon closer inspection of the mount I could see slight evidence that the pivot bolt had been turning in the holes in the mount that’s welded to the frame, but had not done any damage to the holes yet.

I also noticed that the lock nut was not that tight when I removed it as it appears that the factory tightens it down until the head of the bolt and the nut are just a little more than touching the sides of the mount, which I am sure is so that the two .180 thick mounting ears aren’t bent in against the center stand from over tightening the nut as there is about .020 + side clearance between the center stand and the inside width of the mounting tabs, and the factory service manual does not state a torque for the pivot bolt nut.

So I started thinking what could I do to keep the bolt from turning in the frame mount, so I came up with a special aluminum retainer that I machined up that is mounted with a 10-32 S/S SHCS into a hole that’s drilled and tapped into the left mounting tab. The block bears up against one of the flats on the head of the pivot bolt to keep it from turning and wearing out the mounting holes in the frame and it has a little step on the side that fits against the head to clear the bolt flange. The retainer also acts as a secondary backup to the lock nut to keep the bolt from coming out.

I then thought that it would be a great idea to install grease a fitting on the center stand so I could easily grease the pivot with my grease gun, so I clamped the center stand in the vice on my mill and drilled and tapped it in the center to accept a grease fitting.

I then put the inner spacer in my lathe and cleaned up the outside of it with a scotch brite pad and then proceeded to mill out a grease groove in the center along with drilling a 1/8” diameter cross hole through both sides to allow the grease to get on both the outside and inside of the inner spacer.

While I had the center stand off I also cleaned off all of the nasty looking little bits of welding slag from the factory using my air grinder and some tapered sanding cones, and then powder coated it in semi-gloss. It's amazing how much easier the bike comes up on the center stand when it's properly greased. It doesn't show it in this picture, but the curved spring plate has since been powder coated black to match the center stand.

I like the grease nipple idea.Wont 99% of the grease end up in the centre of the guide with the hole in it though .?
Would have thought a grove horz, and vert. might work but then i'm just a hobbiest .