Total Motorcycle Community Forums

Hey guys,

This may sound nuts, but its not so nuts. I have a virago 250. An incredible bike. I have 2 gripes about it though

I bought it a month ago, and other than the horrible seat, I have one complaint. no storage. So I am adding a few things to it. I bought a luggage rack and buying a luggage box.

But there is one thing I have been dying to do, but I have little experience, and if you guys think it will work I will give it a shot.

I need some water tight storage on my bike. instead of saddlebags, I was thinking of using 7.62 ammo tins.



They are water tight and I used them for geocaching all the time and hey were great. They are pretty light weight as well. They are only 4 pounds.

Although I would not be overloading them, I have no experience with saddlebag mounts and i don't know if they would be strong enough to hold that box or not. Also, does anyone have any caveats I shoudl look into before I take this on.

This is the mount I am going to buy.

http://www.chromeandleatherplus.com/sto ... 384&page=1

cool Idea, I use an ammo box for my lunchbox lol. The frame should support the weight but if you are unsure contact the manufacturer about the weight capacity of the saddlebag brace

That isn't really a mount - it's just a guard to keep soft bags out of the tire. How were you going to mount the cases to the mount?

It shouldn't be too hard to do because the boxes are small, but you may need to fabricate a custom mount. (You local welder could probably do something up for you in stainless steel for under $50 if you go to him with a clear and concise plan)

I put 30mm crates on my BMW (Fabricated custom mounts for it)

Boxes on


Boxes off (Custom Mounts)

Thats a really nice job there Tech. I have to ask though, I assume the exhaust isn't providing part of the mounting there, looks a lil close

i guess the only warning i would have would be that you might get pulled over a few times if you keep the military markings on there. if the mount that you fabricate is constructed well, there should be no issues with the weight unless you do start loading them up with ammunition heh.

not sure if Tech would chime in on this, but because they are sealed and metal, how hot do they get inside if you are parked in the sun? might not want to transport things that are affected by heat if there is a temperature issue.

cool idea though, good luck with it

awesome. I never thought about the heat. That is one thing to keep in consideration.

wow, that is pretty much exactly what I was trying to do. I haven't seen tins that size though. That would be ideal for storage space. but I am kinda strapped for cash so the small 7.62 tins are all over the place and easy to find.

Thanks for the advice, I will take a look around at local welders to see what kind of deal I can get.

Nibblet99 wrote:Thats a really nice job there Tech. I have to ask though, I assume the exhaust isn't providing part of the mounting there, looks a lil close

Naw, there's clearance between the bottom of the case and the silencer, both vertically and horizontally. The cases bolt along the s/s tubes and (You can't see it in the pic) but they also bolt to the frame under the seat, and there is a s/s tie-bar behind the 2 cases. These prevent the cases from Vibrating.

It's a very solid mounting - I can stand on the cases and they don't move at all. Here's another pic to clarify (Maybe bob can get an idea from this.



Bob, I think 30mm cases might be a little too much for a lower to the ground Virago, but have you looked into geting .50 cal ammo crates? They are a bit bigger and are fairly plentiful.

That is true, but I did shy away from those because they were only slightly heavier. I had a honda elite 250 which is a workhorse. I used to carry ridiculously heavy stuff on that. Butfor some reason I am kinda shy to overweigh this bike. I myself weigh around 215~220 pounds so I am trying to run light.

I was seriously considering doing the same thing. I wound up going another way but I still think it's a good approach

The difference between the 7.62 and 12.7 cans on-bike (I was just sort of bracing 'em near the bike) is actually pretty small. On my bike both sizes are totally behind your legs as you ride so there is no real drag difference. The difference in usable size is huge. I had a hard time fitting even a pair of gloves and some bike basics (oil and whatnot) in a 7.62 can. The 30 cans tech used wouldn't fit on my bike with the stock exhaust system. He's lucky that BMW of his has those nice straight exhaust pipes.

You want the boxes as far forward as possible. That's probably more important than weight really. As an anecdotal example of this: My boxes are very far forward ... in fact they take over the passenger pegs and my heels can hit them if I put my tiptoes on the front pegs. I put them as far forward as I could without impacting ridability. Just after I mounted them I saw someone on another forum who had mounted givi hard luggage on the same model bike. A very nice install too... he welded up a bracket for the givi mounts and had two suitcases and a top case just like you'd see on a v-strom or the like. All of it was positioned "normally" i.e. back enough that the passenger seat was still usable. The difference? His looks just like a small touring bike...but after testing he reported that with approx 30lbs (total) in the suitcases the bike was almost unridable. Very light in the nose, unstable, bottoming the rear suspension, etc. I've had 50lbs of stuff in my bags (25lb/ea side) and the handling difference was hardly noticable... it was like having a very light passenger. Same bike, same goal, maybe 16" difference in position.... huge difference in the end result.

If you are going to do this, do it with style... find a place where the cans fit aesthetically... and don't hesitate to do your own thing. Many welding shops (including independent muffler shops) will do fab work like that as much for the word-of-mounth advertizing/joy of doing it as for the $$$. Find something that fits the bike and what you want to do with it. For example... consider extending the bottoms of the cans (the right welding shop can cut the bottom off the can and weld on new metal to make the can deeper, angle the bottom, or create a side extension to increase the volume without changing the lid size, though it'll be $$$) to fit the lines of the bikes... or mounting just one can on one side... or whatever looks good to you. Just make it obvious you meant what you did. Some people may not get it... but many people don't get bikes to begin with so you should be used to that by now.

And have fun! It's now "custom".