So here's what I've gotten into this so far. anyone looking to do anything similar in the future with what I've done may find this helpful.
-Paid $400 for the bike, had the drive sprocket cover dangling there and only ran on 1 cylinder. Was sitting a couple years I'm betting.
-New tires dual sport 120/90-18 in the back, and 110/90-18 in front, since I have mag wheels. Both fit no problem.
-New 7/8" cafe racer handlebars with a new brake cylinder, clutch lever, throttle and grip, center headlight switch (grey switch seen), dual switches next to clutch lever for rear blinkers only.
-Orignal headlight for now (bought new one I can swap H4 bulb for demon eye assembly), New universal guages. RPM's seem right, MPH doesn't. (All lights are LED except the headlight.
-brat style seat from Ebay.
-cut off back of seat post and welded on a hoop I made out of the small sissy bar in the back.
-Emgo mufflers, made a relief cut about half inch to 1" on one side only and used exhaust clamps to tighten her up.
-Purchased a new license plate light to put in the holder for a brake and running light.
-fork LED blinkers for the rear hoop, they're flexible so it will fit nicely on the hoop.
-Obviously took care of rust spots and reainted everything (unprofessionally until next year)
-New wheel bearings which I didn't expect to do, but had to. And all new grease.
-rebuilt forks
-added gator boots for the forks, nice touch and helps keep it clean there for the sliding motion
-MikesXS performance carbs
-AGM battery 2.9ah, but thinking about sing a 1.3ah battery to conserve a bit more space.
-Bought a reg/rec combo unit ESR350 and will be putting that in to save space and I bought a R292 part from Orielly and it only seems to charge at 12.5v even though I confirmed with a jumper that it can output quite a bit more than that, so I don't think its running right despite being hooked up properly, and its about 2.5x the size of the original. R292 is made to control power, not ground, so keep that in mind, one wire will have to be grounded at all times, and power sent out from the green wire of the unit to the field coil (78'xs400E)
-Welded a bolt on the frame next to the side stand so it doesn't hit the mufflers, rubber boot or not I didn't want them touching.
-made a quick seat plate for electronics, I'll be making a nice one this winter, I just wanted it rideable at this point and slapped that together since I ripped out the harness and made my own.
-Got an electronic LED flasher unit for the blinkers from Oreilly, they have it in one of the isles. wiring that up soon, has only 1 lead off the unit but supports up to 4 LED blinkers, just running a pigtail off that to power both blinkers and using the switches to control the individual grounds to select which blinker is on.
-Has a master switch for turning on and off the bike, but I'll be adding in an on/off key cylinder before the switch for anti theft. But this way you turn the key and you get the LED on the switch to turn on when the system is live.
-didn't wanna purchase an LED and try to mount it for the fuel pressure, so I am hooking up the fuel circuit to illuminate my Neutral light in the speedo. Not using the neutral switch, I think I can tell when i've got it in neutral, lol.
-Purchased 2 distribution blocks, one with 6 fuse holders and 1 with 4. Currently running the 4 since space is tight in the tray for now, will be using the 6 once I get the smaller battery and the reg/rec combo unit.
-pigtails are soldered connections, Connection points are crimps for now, Ohm tested all connections for 0 resistance after installing. However, once I have everything how I want it and finished I am going to make a list and how I want what wires in what plugs, and will be buying molex extension plugs, cutting in the middle and soldering the appropriate wires together, so I don't have all the crimps.
-Getting some wire harness covers, those plastic casings you can put the wires in, and having all of them ran through those for protection and to look neat and tidy.
-All grounds go to chassis, then 1 wire to batt -
- All wires are ran with AWG14, except the original wires on the switches and LED's since they are much smaller. For those, I soldered the small wire to a short piece of larger wire with an appropriate crimp on it for easy connection until I get my connectors.
-Eventually I will be getting new rear shocks/struts, but that will probably be next year.
-didn't have to touch the swing-arm bushings as everything is tight yet, however, Next year I'm planning on swapping them for bronze bushings from MikesXS, and probably adding the center grease cert. Hoping it's not going to be as much of a pain as the horror stories I've heard. Either way, I'll figure it out.
-Brakes and everything looked good yet, so eventually I will probably see if I can find some slotted rotors for this. I know a lot of people like drilled, but on cars I've seen a number of instances where they crack because the hole causes a weak spot, and the grooved ones work just fine. The idea is to make sure the gasses created don't get trapped between the pad and the rotor, so the grooves will trap the gasses building up to keep the pad on the surface of the rotor whereas the holes can eliminate it all together. But again, if your rotor cracks because of the weak spots, you end up spending again.
-spent the extra on hobbyist plates here in wisconsin. One time fee for life. Was going to go with collector plates, but my bike isn't stock as I modified it.
-Was missing the left foot peg when I got it, so I made a new one, then I took the right foot peg off, ground out the pin, removed the foot peg, and welded int a new peg with the bolts to match the right side. For the left, I cut a piece of length I wanted, heated it with MAP gas in a vise, and used a hammer to bend it accordingly. Welded a couple nuts on in the correct locations for the mounting holes, then welded the nuts on the foot peg portion and painted black.
-Bought a new shifter lever, which I think is shorter than stock, but that's quite alright, it sits where I want it based on how I made my foot peg to sit.
I have to thank everyone on here who helped me out with all my questions, and for those who had posts already that I found with information i needed. I could have probably done it without this site, but it would have taken far longer, and much more of a headache figuring things out on my own that did or didn't work, and probably would have spent more money on junk that didn't work. Now that it's driving and all is good, basically finished, don't think I will dissapear, I will still come on here and hopefully spread my knowledge to those who are looking for it. after all, I was helped, least I can do is return the favor. I'm also a member of 2 xs400 groups on facebook.