Modern Vespa

Ever since I sat on Old As Dirt's bike three weeks ago, I've known for sure that some sort of extended footrest was a necessity. The long rides I've taken since then have just served to confirm that.

For the last couple weeks, I've been throwing around ideas for what to do. Jeff's UFPs are probably the best option, but money is really tight for me right now, so I don't think I can afford them.

On my Harley, I had a set of crash bars that also had an integrated footrest. Thinking back on it, I decided that I'd like my foot pegs to be up higher, like those were. The two ideas that I really was debating between were to get some pegs for mounting to crash bars and to attach them to the front frame of my MP3. The other was to mount one of those mustache bars.

So, for the last week, I've been riding around with a few stacked pieces of thin (1/4 inch thick) wood to make sure that I would have enough clearance between the front leg shield and the front suspension. I chose to use the wood because I wanted to put something in there that would be a lot less strong than the suspension so that if something were to hit, it would break the wood instead of doing real damage. After several hundred miles of both city and highway driving, I hadn't so much as even scraped the wood and decided I was ready to try it out. I decided I wanted to get some Schedule 40 PVC pipe for the next stage and use that to mount pegs.

I stopped at JC Whitney on the way to my parents' house and got a set of the bar mount foot pegs that I thought could be used either frame mounted or on the mustache bar.

When I got to my parents' place and explained what I wanted to do to my dad, he decided he had a better idea. After a couple minutes of rummaging around the garage, he found a piece of silver aluminum square tubing. Measuring where we wanted to cut it, we took it down to the workshop and made the cut. While we were looking for a piece of wood we could use to reinforce the tube, he came across a piece of black square tubing (I'm not sure if it's steel or aluminum, but I'd guess aluminum, since both of them were legs from broken pop-up tents) that was just slightly larger than the silver aluminum. We cut that to size, trimmed the silver tube a little so we could put in some end caps for the black tubing that my mom remembered were somewhere in the junk bin, and took it out to my bike for a test fit.

Sliding it in place, it looked and felt pretty darn good to me. We had brought a few hemispherical pipe clamps to attach the tubing to the inside of the leg shield, but unfortunately, they weren't the right size. So after a trip to Farm & Fleet (Find value ... at Farm & Fleet) and $4 spent for pipe clamps, U-bolts to attach the tubing to the frame in the center, and a packet of self-drilling machine screws, we had the materials to mount it.

After getting it in place, we found that I didn't even need to use the foot pegs. I'm just using the bar as the footrest. I added a piece of pipe insulation foam to cushion the ends, and after about 250 miles since I mounted the tubing, I'm pretty darn happy with it.

I know this is a lot words without any pictures. I'm sorry about that, but it's really not my fault. I'll post some pictures just as soon as I can get my computer reformatted. For some reason, it's losing its mind and won't recognize any USB devices...

Mark

Hmmm....I think I get the picture, but would love to see a picture (or 2+). Great you are improvising and the price is right. Hope it All comes together and safely. "It's a family affair" (love the song).

OK, here's some pics. (The internal SD card reader still works, fortunately...)


Here's the left side, viewed from the seat.


Left side, viewed from the side.


Under the front fender. You can see the U-bolt attaching it to the frame and the pipe clamp at the very edge.


The right side U-bolt.


The right side, viewed from the front. Much better look at the pipe clamp.


The right side, viewed from the top.

The pipe insulation foam is wrapped in black electrical tape. Looking at it always reminds me of the people on my Freshman college dorm floor that would do Live Action Role-Playing with their foam swords...

I am having difficulty understanding what the expected benefit is - my calculations indicate that depending on your inseam length, total leg extension actually decreases with the feet in that position. Are you after something other than leg extension? Or perhaps I am not understanding how you place your feet on this - perhaps laying your ankles across the top? Could you post a pix from the side in riding position?

Thanks for sharing your pics. I'm a little concerned about materials used (foam, electrical tape)....will these last under foot for a looooong time? rjeffb is the man on this related mod! I will now lurk along and await reviews

"I'm a little concerned about materials used (foam, electrical tape)....will these last under foot for a looooong time? "

I think, if you used the right size pipe, cheap bicycle handlebar grips would work.

Jeff, you are correct in that while riding with my feet on the bars, there's not a real change in roominess. In fact, my knees end up within a few inches of the handle bars. If I was taller, it might interfere, but as it is, it's OK. Taking a pic is problematic because I can't do it myself while sitting on my bike. I'll have to draft someone to do it for me...

I have ridden with my legs stretched out and resting the back of my ankles on the bars.

There are 2 benefits that I can think of immediately.

First, if I have my feet on the bar, I can rest my arms on my legs while cruising. Using the O-ring cruise control, all I have to do is rest my hands on the bars and my arms on my legs.

Second, it now gives me 4 options for seating positions. I can put my feet: back on the passenger pegs, sport bike style; on the floorboard; with the soles of my shoes on the bars; or stretched out, with my legs resting on the bars.


MySkyMizer, I don't know if the foam will hold up. I think it will since the foam is just like what you use for water noodles in a pool and the tape is ruberized, but only time will tell. If it does, great. If not, I'll try something else. Maybe some bike hand grips, like YaYaDave suggested.


Also note that the bars stick out about 5 or 6 inches beyond the edge of the bike. I think they're maybe an inch or two beyond the width of the handle bars. For me, that's not a problem. For people who do lane splitting, it could be. You might need to cut it shorter and attach some foldable foot pegs. That's something I may revisit in the future...

Cubs

If you were to cut the foot part off and weld it on at 90 deg coming straight down, then drill a hole and add pegs this would allow you more forward foot position. And you could incorperate the folding pegs.

Very true. Unfortunately, I don't own a welder, or even have access to one, as far as I know

For that matter, the whole bar could be reshaped to be more of the traditional "mustache" style, which would probably reduce the likelihood of any contact with the wheel control arms...

Right now, it's working well enough that I can spend my time either riding, working on other mods, or (unfortunately) doing house work. Maybe this winter I'll try something else, so I'm always open to suggestions...

Mark

instead of square tubing you could using round tubing and that is easier to bend/shape

Scroll down on this link and adapt it to your idea.
http://www.rivcoproducts.com/products/product.php?productid=193&cat=221&page=1