So I recently acquired a 2005 Kawasaki Vulcan 500 with less than 5,000 on the clock (well, it HAD less than 5,000 on the clock when I got it...
), and it's got a solo seat- a bit of a rarity with these bikes, which are famous for having uncomfortable seats and almost nothing at all happening in the aftermarket, especially in seats.
Here it be.
The issue is that that cute little solo seat, as comfortable as it is for the first hour, begins to seriously smart somewhere around the 100 mile mark. I've got the original seat, and it looks like it can be changed out in a jiffy, but I need to remove the cross bar that's been riveted across the frame to hold the solo seat in place first. It's just a couple of pop rivets, so my thought is to grind them off, tap the holes in the frame, and replace the rivets with screws. This way, I can pull off that hard-as-a-board solo seat and plop in the softer stock seat for longer trips or for carrying passengers with just three screws.
Any issues with a tapped hole in the frame? Remember, it's already got a couple of small (1/8th inch?) holes in it.
You can see the cross bar end-on just above the top shock mount in this pic.
Thoughts?