genya061
1982 seca XS 400 RJ
I need one of those boxy tanks. Please let me know if you have one or know where I can find one.
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xs400 custom tank build
- Thread starter tbakic
- Start date
Saw a NOS at Stafford yesterday, £65 and was unmarked
tbakic
1st cafe project underway
ok so i started making my gas tank by hand, sick of waiting for CAD guy lol. here is a pic of the stock tank bottom(skeleton i like to call it) and my two sides
basically i make the sides out of cardboard and then traced them on to a sheet of stainless and the plasma cut them out/used a shear machine. Then i traced out the top and cut that out too
here it is upside down so u can see the inside and i also tacked the top on and one of the two back plates
i then found a weld in gas tank cap/bung i liked and got the dimensions i need so i can cut my hole for the bung in the top, and started welding my new stainless pieces together
im not sure what kind of metal the stock skeleton on the gas tank is, i didnt go to school for welding so i didnt take any kind of metallurgy class lol, but it is very thin and light and melts at a really low temp and looks like complete poo too hahah, but it seemed to work good as long as i went slow and fully melted the two pieces together and then pushed in a ton of stainless filler rod to my puddle of the two kinds of metal so once i start to grind it down im anxious to see if there is any porosity or cracks in there.
here is the final test fit of the tank on the bike!!!
basically i make the sides out of cardboard and then traced them on to a sheet of stainless and the plasma cut them out/used a shear machine. Then i traced out the top and cut that out too
here it is upside down so u can see the inside and i also tacked the top on and one of the two back plates
i then found a weld in gas tank cap/bung i liked and got the dimensions i need so i can cut my hole for the bung in the top, and started welding my new stainless pieces together
im not sure what kind of metal the stock skeleton on the gas tank is, i didnt go to school for welding so i didnt take any kind of metallurgy class lol, but it is very thin and light and melts at a really low temp and looks like complete poo too hahah, but it seemed to work good as long as i went slow and fully melted the two pieces together and then pushed in a ton of stainless filler rod to my puddle of the two kinds of metal so once i start to grind it down im anxious to see if there is any porosity or cracks in there.
here is the final test fit of the tank on the bike!!!
damn man. thats pretty cool. now you know what this means right? more angular look to EVERYTHING on the bike. swoopy parts might not flow so well. like the chain guard has to go. think f 117 nighthawk kinda look. might be hard to execute tho. sorry im rambling. its been a long day
tbakic
1st cafe project underway
thanks!!!
oh yeah i agree! no more chain guard for sure, just havent gotten to ripping it off yet
oh yeah i agree! no more chain guard for sure, just havent gotten to ripping it off yet
Shaun Chandler
XS400 Addict
Looking good man. As for the welding, the bottom of the tank was likely just stamped from a piece of cold rolled steel. Cold rolled tends to have carbon inpregnated into it from the rolling process it tends to come out as you weld it. Also part of the thing that is making it hard to weld may be the garbage from the old fuel it will actually be right in the steel. I would definetly purge that with argon while your welding it. Not so bad when your tacking but as you start to weld your kinda making a bomb. Purge it for sure though get rid of all the air without air there can be no big bang.
Since your welding stainless to mild steel I would say the best filler to use is probably 309L. Not all shops seem to carry it its good for a number of uses like some dissimilar metals. That being said your probably using 308 rod which will likely work.
Your doing a great job, I would make a habit of checking that tank on a regular basis not because your welds look bad on the contrary they look great but stainless is about 25 percent harder then mild steel so no as maleable. It has a tendency to crack when subjected to vibration which your bike will do.
Are you planning on leaving it polished? That looks like line finished material never seen a tank done with that before might be a cool look. You seem to do a fair bit of nice work there so I would guess you have a line finisher you can use to polish out your welds after.
Shaun
Since your welding stainless to mild steel I would say the best filler to use is probably 309L. Not all shops seem to carry it its good for a number of uses like some dissimilar metals. That being said your probably using 308 rod which will likely work.
Your doing a great job, I would make a habit of checking that tank on a regular basis not because your welds look bad on the contrary they look great but stainless is about 25 percent harder then mild steel so no as maleable. It has a tendency to crack when subjected to vibration which your bike will do.
Are you planning on leaving it polished? That looks like line finished material never seen a tank done with that before might be a cool look. You seem to do a fair bit of nice work there so I would guess you have a line finisher you can use to polish out your welds after.
Shaun
tbakic
1st cafe project underway
FINALLY UPDATED!
I finally had some free time to work on my tank, so i welded in the bung for my gas cap. I ordered it in 304 stainless steel, which is what i made my tank out of so it it SHOULD have let me weld it perfectly because i wanted to leave a sweet looking weld on there. however it welded like absolute garbage, porosity all over, it melted almost as soon as i started my arc, it dont flow like stainless...i will b writing the company i got this from a very strongly worded letter because that bung must have been made out of pure garbage, i have never made a weld this bad in my life i was so mad i didnt touch my tank for over a week
then i finally got the nerve to start working on it again and i ground the weld all down and had to fill some holes. But i think it looks pretty good now
here is a pic with a quarter so you guys can get a good idea of the size of the gas cap
im happy with the end result so thats always a good thing
I finally had some free time to work on my tank, so i welded in the bung for my gas cap. I ordered it in 304 stainless steel, which is what i made my tank out of so it it SHOULD have let me weld it perfectly because i wanted to leave a sweet looking weld on there. however it welded like absolute garbage, porosity all over, it melted almost as soon as i started my arc, it dont flow like stainless...i will b writing the company i got this from a very strongly worded letter because that bung must have been made out of pure garbage, i have never made a weld this bad in my life i was so mad i didnt touch my tank for over a week
then i finally got the nerve to start working on it again and i ground the weld all down and had to fill some holes. But i think it looks pretty good now
here is a pic with a quarter so you guys can get a good idea of the size of the gas cap
im happy with the end result so thats always a good thing
KC-AceCafe
XS400 Enthusiast
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Nice friggen welds man, the tank looks awesome! I love that gas cap.
frwinks
XS400 Addict
great thing about tig...even the shitty welds look good
wish I had a tig.
no room and no money!
nice job on the build
no room and no money!
nice job on the build
Shaun Chandler
XS400 Addict
Drewpy- I understand the no money part but don't let space stop you. I have a large machine but the one I keep at home in my basement is a tiny little miller max star tig/stick. Check them out online I picked up a used one for about 500, they don't usually come that cheap though (I didn't ask where it came from, ,perhaps I should have)
tbakic- looking awesome man. Can't wait to see your finished build. The fitting you had a problem with. It's possible it wasn't a 304 L which could account for the darkening of the weld. Also its a butt weld and not a corner like most of the other welds so gas coverage isn't as good. With a butt you also tend to pull in impurities from the backside of the weld . The only way around that would be to purge your tank but thats a whole lot of work for no big gain. There is no reduced quality in your weld, nothing polishing won't fix.
Your polishing looks great aswell all the rad's look really smooth and uniform.
Shaun
tbakic- looking awesome man. Can't wait to see your finished build. The fitting you had a problem with. It's possible it wasn't a 304 L which could account for the darkening of the weld. Also its a butt weld and not a corner like most of the other welds so gas coverage isn't as good. With a butt you also tend to pull in impurities from the backside of the weld . The only way around that would be to purge your tank but thats a whole lot of work for no big gain. There is no reduced quality in your weld, nothing polishing won't fix.
Your polishing looks great aswell all the rad's look really smooth and uniform.
Shaun
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