Greer Tail Installation

Ah, yes.  The marvelous Greer tail section by Kevin Greer Products.  When I first looked at it, all I could think of was "what the fu&*??!!".  I knew it was for a race bike, and I had never mounted a race seat on a bike before.  Had to work my nogg'in overtime (and then some) to figure that one out!

Here's the skinny

A) Mount it like Greer intended, with some simple L brackets up behind the seating area and some more down near the lower front and screw (or dzus fasten) it on.  It's still up to you to come up with the brackets, plus you'll need tools to get it off when you want access under it (ie. dead battery; then, "damn! - the tools are under the tail!!!").

B) Go to a hell of a lot more work and mount it like I did so that it fastens down like the seat did - a post in the rear to hook to the seat latch and a big tab in the front to hook in there.  More work - yes, but now to get it off I can use the key and it just pops off like the seat did.

 It does require a small electrical quick disconnect for the taillight.

C) Seat? another easy way out - piece of race seat foam and glue or velcro it on, or

D) much more work, but...

lay-up your own fiberglass seat pan using the tail section as a mould, then find the right kind of foam and have it upholstered to look like a Corbin.

How I did it 

The braces were all made from 1/8" thick aluminum and aluminum angle, then cut down to fit properly; and the rubber bumpers were some I picked up from McMaster-Carr a while back and turned out to work great for this project.

The seat anchor post was made out of a piece of stainless rod I had laying around.  The round pieces on the under seat support braces are pieces of aluminum tubing and provide solid backing for the bolts to tighten up against.  All (aluminum) bond points were first 'home' irridited using a marine DIY kit, then bonded the fiberg  lass tail with a thick epoxy adhesive.  After curing, the bond areas were fiber glassed over with several layers of cloth and epoxy resin.

I only had to drill two holes in the subframe, up near the forward end to mount the front seat support brace/bumpers.  The rear brace bolted to the original 'front' tail section bolt holes.  In the rear, a couple bumpers (with large washers underneath for support) bolt to the OEM rear tail mounting holes.  These bumpers give something firm for the anchor post support plate (mounted in the tail section) to press against when mounted.  As far as mods to the tail section go, I had to bond two mounting brackets into the tail in the rear that the anchor post support plate bolts to, and I also bonded a brace (piece of tubing) that extends vertically from the anchor post up to the glass.  This gives a solid point to press down against when latching on the tail.  Holes drilled in the  front provide mounting points for the big 'Z' tab which hooks up under the tank, as well as the seat pan mounting points.

The home made 'glass seat pan has (4) carriage bolts bonded into it so it can bolt down on the tail after being upholstered.  It's also got a molded 1/2" wide groove on the bottom side for a relief so when the upholstery wraps around there's some place for it to tuck into and get pop-riveted on.

The mounting scheme you use depends on what you want.  For me, it was worth the work and I already had some knowledge of how to work with resins/fiberglass and epoxies; though again, I'd never done anything like this before on a bike.  Makes for a VERY SANO installation - very factory-like.  The easy way out is the race-bike mounting method, which is also not all bad, just less convenient.

Jeff Gum