Air box flapper mod (Strong HF content)

Time to strip her down and see if I can find that "flapper" thingy

Here is a pic of my R² in her birthday suit


top of the air box contraption thingy, AKA "the flapper"


Using my thumb to hold the flapper up. The round silver thing tells the flapper what to do.....i think


Here is a pic HF posted in the monster thread of his modified flapper


HighFive scrapped the foam off the bottom side of the flapper and glued it down. He also made some good points about the down side of using a screw (as many have suggested) to hold the flapper down. Then removed the round silver thing and covered the hole it left.

So what exactly does this flapper do? It must change the air flow, restricts it maybe? It doesn't seem necessary, so I guess it's gotta go...

Hi . . . do you have a link to HF's mods in the A/R thread (I cant go thru 190 pages again!) .. . why did he leave the top in place with flapper stuck down, rather than remove the intake horns or open the top of the airbox as many others have done?
bROOc

Taking the entire top off the airbox leaves it susceptible to water running down in it. If you take your seat off after you wash the bike, you'll notice water collects all around the "removable" top. HF and I have been working on a better mouse trap and I think we've got it down. HF did it on an extra "test" airbox he has, and I did it to my bike.

What we did, was to first remove the whole top by grinding away the tops of the hold-down pins, then with a dremel, remove everything from the underside except the forward wall, which helps deflect air/water away from the air filter itself. Then, the top is put back into place. I'll see if I can get some pictures of it tonight to show you exactly what I'm talking about. I think it is the best of both worlds. The inlet is opened up, but the actual top is left in tact to help keep out water.

edit to say: read Krabill's post above and forget what I said ;-)

There is no easy way of removing the flapper in a clean manner. Covering the hole left by the solenoid is much easier and prettier. HF did open up his air box by cutting a series of holes in the top of the box. Just be careful where you put the holes, you don't want water getting down in there.

I have more to post in this thread, just need to find the time. I think this forum will eventually be a much easier place to find answers than the "monster" thread as long as people keep their off-topic comments in the "off-topic" forum.

I too am not willing to sift through 190 pages to find the pics or comments. Please explain what is wrong with using a screw to hold the flapper down. Mine has been held down with a screw for about 6 months and I don't see any issues.

mwakey wrote:

I too am not willing to sift through 190 pages to find the pics or comments. Please explain what is wrong with using a screw to hold the flapper down. Mine has been held down with a screw for about 6 months and I don't see any issues.

If it doesn't have a sharp point sticking out of the bottom side then the only thing to worry about is the screw coming loose and getting sucked into a place you don't want it to be...

Well all my screws are tight, despite what others have said about me.

If it did come out, I doubt that little screw is going to make it past the air filter anyhow. Not enough suction there even at WOT to suck it through the foam. That being said, I did take the extra precaution to use some superglue on the threads when I put the screw in the flapper. And I made sure to use a screw that was long enough to bite good into the plastic below. Plus, the advantage to a screw is obvious, when it comes time to undo the mods and sell the bike, as opposed to gluing the flapper down totally and not being able to get it back up.

Alright, here are a couple of pictures of my airbox with the lid in tact, but with all the guts and the flapper completely removed.

You just have to knock the very tops of the "pins" off to get the top off. That way, the pins are still there and you can use them again to realign the lid and I actually even just melted them back in place with a soldering iron.

Once the top was off, I used a dremel to get rid of everything up under there that I possibly could.

You can also see in these first couple of pictures that I removed about 3/8" from the top lip of the inlet scoop to give it a bigger opening.





From the underside you can see that there is nothing left except for the front wall to help direct any water that may get in away from the air filter.



I tried to get a better shot up in there, but it came out kinda fuzzy.



There ya go . . . that's about as "open" as you can get the airbox and still remain relatively water proof.

The power programmer looks really slim here

That's the supermodel version

Krabill....who's your Daddy?

You shouldn't be posting photos of hurried work that looks like that. And jumping the gun, well that's another matter...

Now, I have to tidy up this mess and share a glimpse of the REAL project. My full report will come later...somewhere.


Before:





After:


















HF

I'm going to do the airbox mod similar to how Krabill did, can I just remove all the stuff that is attached to the round silver thingy? There are some gray hoses, a plug in thingy, a little canister, and then a hose goes up under the gas tank somewhere.... How much of this comes out?

Jeremy

Yup. Remove it all. There is a small hose that goes up under the gas tank that will leave a small brass nipple you'll have to put a plug on, but everything else just comes off.

PM me your email address and i'll send you an instruction sheet if you want.

Thanks Krabill, I think I can manage now that I know what to remove. Disassembly is a specialty of mine...