Places to check for frame cracks?

[Stevo]

Where are all the possibly points to check on a 400ex frame for cracks or breaks. And subframe too? that are common

[kicken250x]

check above the shock towers, and just about anywhere else on the frame ive seen cracks under the gas tank on a 400 the frames are verry weak in my openion

[NJ300ex]

Ok, there are alot of places you will want to check for both bending and cracking. The two most common is the battery side of the subframe and the front shock mount area. The battery side is prone to bending form harsh landings and the wieght of the battery. The whole subframe is pretty weak actually. You will defenitley want to gusset it by where those rubber seat things touch the subframe and where the battery mounts.

The shock mounts are pretty weak If you are doing lots of jumping with stock shocks. The actual shock mount and the whole area is weak and can crack. Most likely to crack around welds where two tubes meet and the upper part of the actual front shock mount, due to the crappy Honda welds.

The next place is by the footpegs. If you look you can see that where they mount on the frame is gusseted slightly from the factory. It is however only welded on part of it. You will want to weld the rest of it and maybe add some material.

Next places would be rear shock mount and engine head mount. These will only break if you do extremely hard landings on stock shocks repeatedly. This can be fixed by adding more weld to the factory gussets in this area. The engine head mount can break if you have tweaked the frame. A nice tig weld will fix that up nicely but it doesn't break often.

Some other things that will strengthen the frame is to just add more weld to the factory gussets because they never seem to be welded on all sides. You can also fill in all the open ends of frame tubes.

I think that is all,
Mike

Considering what NK300ex just said i need to go check my frame now, for some reason i think it may be broke in a few places.

[RytM1]

here are a few pics of gusset areas. http://www.exriders.com/vbb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=12508&highlight=gusseting