Katana Owners Club U.K.

Has anyone ever taken a 650 and either transplanted an 850 mill or even a bigger engine with chain drive?

The 850/1100 G engine is wider , I would have thought obviously it can be done, but would need loads of frame mods.
Why would you change a shaft into a chain?

If you wanted that shape Kat with a bigger engine chain driven ,wouldn't you just use a 550 frame to start with. Like Nige and Russ are doing in project forum.

fossie wrote:The 850/1100 G engine is wider , I would have thought obviously it can be done, but would need loads of frame mods.
Why would you change a shaft into a chain?

The GS850 AND 1100G were shafties

I guess the answer is "any thing is possible with the right amount of application"

But where you start from and what you want at the end of the project is up to you.

The 2 550 Kat projects are pretty good examples of what can be done, but each have put up "challenges" with making stuff fit and look right.

I'm sure this was mentioned else where, Wraith has done a single sided swing arm conversion using Honad bits that is worth looking out for on the forums

I suppose if you are aiming for an ED1 GSX1100 Katana shaft drive then that's the way to go. but as Fossie says why add a shaft to chain conversion into he mix as well?

Pop-Kat wrote:

fossie wrote:The 850/1100 G engine is wider , I would have thought obviously it can be done, but would need loads of frame mods.
Why would you change a shaft into a chain?

The GS850 AND 1100G were shafties

I know there shaft that's is why I wrote G. Suzuki's designation for shaft.

Struggling to see this. So we have a mid sized shaft drive with old type wheels, and we want to change it to a large engined chain drive with modern wheels.

Just buy another bike and fit h kat tank.

Didn't read the original post properly. Now bigger engine with chain drive would work and has been done with 850's. you could put a gsxr1100 or bandit 1200 engine in fit a big fat rear wheel, 6' for example, the advantage here of the shaftie frame is you have good clearance for the chain run.

Gsx1100g motor is essentially a shaft drive gsxr lump and is physically not much wider than the 650. Or you could really go to town and fit a vx800 vee twin shafty!