Tail Tidy to Fit or Not To Fit That is the Question

An age related upgrade, age of the rider. How come it now seems am uninterested?
Back when was drooling over Grisos in the early days, when owners were waiting on the first after market silencers to become available and posting youtube vids.
Tail Tidies were about, official certainly as far as Stucci was concerned I imagine made ones along with the Official Guzzi Eagled Fly Screen, those grab handles maybe or perhaps they came later.
Lots of different oil cooler grills.
Certainly a few fancy seat upgrades.
On every bike I've owned have always modified the back end to remove the nasty tacky black plastics in favour of a tail tidy.
On the X1 the original frame mount for the tacky tail unit to mount was used, usually painted black, you then had to create an under tray (have one fabricated) to mount the seat lock.
It had some intricate folds to encompass said frame box and indicator mount section prior to fitting flat on the underside.
You then had to silicon seal between your new plate and an existing plastic curved box section.
Now for some unknown to me reason I seem not to be bothered with such immature ambitions, am definitely getting old
Actually I could say that about a lot of the over the top modifications I see on this and other websites.
I mean the obsession with mounting a silencer on the right side or both sides WHY.
Facebook groups are awash with uninformed people owning GRiSO's, foreigners (non english speaking) are the worst for it.
Hopefully I've nudged a few this way.

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I put the standard tail back on mine as i got tired of washing mud off the back of my (and my pillion's) jacket.

 Actually think that the GRiSO one is not too bad looking

Hello, taste is certainly different...but I find the original rear more beautiful and above all: more practical.

On the contrary: I find the end piece removed from the top spoils the balanced lines.

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Greetings
Holger

Am 59 you guys are 67 and 70 I did say it was an age related upgrade/downgrade.
My missus back got covered in cack the other day regardless of having the original still fitted.

there are some people who are older with 55 years of life - than active motorcyclists who have 70 years of life but are much younger [You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

I personally dont find the rear plate plastics repulsive, they have curves and a bit of style, and as Johnny says they are practical mostly. Mate feels the same.
Am 59 going on 99 though with a mental age of 15

I have fitted a "tail tidy" and I have stuck with the original mud guard.

Eliminating the stock mud guard does change the look.  At first I kind of liked it as it sort of "beefed up" the rear end by exposing more of the rear tire and showcased the single sided swing arm.  But it did that at several costs.

1.  It ruined the lines/balance of the GRiSO when viewed from the side.  Looks cheap and vacant.

2.  The rear tire now throws all manner of road grime all over either the pillions back, or the pillion perch if vacant.

3.  If you ever ride with friends in a close group carving up the twisties, you will immediately piss off whoever is riding close behind you as you throw all manner of road debris back in their faces as well.

I put the stock mud guard back on and have never looked back.  The simple act of relocating the extended reflector (required here in the US) cleans up the back enough to improve the rear "exposure".

When modifying the looks of anything designed with an Italian Eye, I think that less is always more.  Especially amongst knuckle dragging Guzzisti who value personal "touring function" over classic Italian styling.

Two thumbs down on "Tail Tidies" for this 57 year old who's been riding GRiSOs since 2007.

[quote="Steak" The simple act of relocating the extended reflector (required here in the US) cleans up the back enough to improve the rear "exposure".

[/quote]


Yes, I agree. I did the same thing, kept the fender and got rid of the hanging reflector. I think they still look pretty cool with the fender eliminated but I have always been someone who keeps his bikes stock and I dont think the rear fender looks all that bad.

I have removed the mudguard on the Yellow Peril and have the plate, (Smaller than most US plates and less than half the size of the HUGE plates used in the UK.) mounted directly beneath the tail light which is illegal as it should be illuminated by a separate, white, light but I haven't been pulled for it, probably because I very rarely ride after dark. Due to the angle of the plate, (Which is also as dodgy as fuck!) I don't get huge amounts of crud up my back but once again I don't do much riding in the rain by choice nowadays, at least locally.

With the Green Shitter it's a different story. The previous owner has trimmed a bit off the bottom of the guard but it is still substantially there, along with its witness light. Really a far more practical way of going about things and for a bike I'm setting up principally for a 'Round Australia' trip where I'm bound to encounter inclement weather it makes far, far more sense.

There are obviously a lot of things that will be personal choice as far as aesthetics are concerned but the fact that number plates are so enormous in the UK does mean that whether you modify or remove the mudguard won't really help in changing the 'Billy Bargearse' experience when viewing the machine from the side. God alone knows why pommy plates have to be so large! Our speed cameras seem to be able to nail us with our tiny plates so it can't be that! Perhaps all the coppers in the UK have dreadful myopia! Few of them seem to wear glasses like the bottoms of coke bottles though? Perhaps they all wear contact lenses?

I'm with Steak on this one. I did the same mods to my rear the first week of ownership, and have left it that way since.

Last week I was in Eastern Kentucky, riding in the rain, dodging coal trucks. A larger rear fender may have kept the back of my helmet cleaner.

True that UK standard plates are huge especially if you have long reg (it's based on letter size - same for all vehicles - so shorter numbers can use smaller plates with right size numbers); but I run smaller (number) plates and never been stopped or failed an MOT. At least UK doesn't require plate lights, but weirdly you can fail MOT if you have plate lights & they aren't working..

I didn't dislike the stock setup. This Lightech setup came to me cheap. May keep, may not.
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I'm with Steak on this one too. Our Buddy Karl used to hate riding behind Steve or me on our first-gen Grisos with tail-tidies for all the gravel we shat at him. Three-legged dogs seemed to have a thing for him and his Eldo too.

I sill prefer what I have mounted ;-)

when you look at the GRiSO from the side, you understand the Italian elegance, with the standard tail section. It is balanced. When the lower part is removed, this balance is missing...regardless of whether you find it more beautiful.
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Nope ...this is like a beautiful woman with ugly underwear.

but your wife gets an inflammation of her vagina without underwear. [You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

janguzzi wrote:

Nope ...this is like a beautiful woman with ugly underwear.

Deffo need a lol button

I have tried both, untidy!

The Italian eye of design doesn’t always appeal to the eye of those outside of Europe - I think the designers must hate confirming to be legislatively compliant for road use - hence the concept motorcycle in this instance is not what we bought of the showroom floor.

Steak wrote:

I have fitted a "tail tidy" and I have stuck with the original mud guard.Eliminating the stock mud guard does change the look.  At first I kind of liked it as it sort of "beefed up" the rear end by exposing more of the rear tire and showcased the single sided swing arm.  But it did that at several costs.

1.  It ruined the lines/balance of the GRiSO when viewed from the side.  Looks cheap and vacant.

2.  The rear tire now throws all manner of road grime all over either the pillions back, or the pillion perch if vacant.

3.  If you ever ride with friends in a close group carving up the twisties, you will immediately piss off whoever is riding close behind you as you throw all manner of road debris back in their faces as well.

I put the stock mud guard back on and have never looked back.  The simple act of relocating the extended reflector (required here in the US) cleans up the back enough to improve the rear "exposure".

When modifying the looks of anything designed with an Italian Eye, I think that less is always more.  Especially amongst knuckle dragging Guzzisti who value personal "touring function" over classic Italian styling.

Two thumbs down on "Tail Tidies" for this 57 year old who's been riding GRiSOs since 2007.

Well i have a free R&G tail-tidy with number plate light lying on the garage floor.
Anyone can have it for the price of postage.

Osi wrote:

The Italian eye of design doesn’t always appeal to the eye of those outside of Europe - I think the designers must hate confirming to be legislatively compliant for road use - hence the concept motorcycle in this instance is not what we bought of the showroom floor.

Please note Osi that I specified the "looks" designed by the Italian eye.  The feds don't regulate beautiful, sexy lines...

Edit to add: Osi, you need to figure out how to stop buggering up the "Quote" feature. How hard can it be?

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Everyone has an opinion, and mine was that the stock rear fender was too long and it also led to a design compromise which further ruined the aesthetics. I am specifically talking about the plastic extension the factory added on US-spec bikes to extend the rear license plate light out so that it would shine down on the plate. This piece is unnecessarily ugly and sticks straight out like a stinger. It is begging to be removed!

To fix this malady and to also keep the stock turn signals, I came up with the following undertail:

First, I used a Dremel to trim the rear fender back to a radius right below the rear lamp extension. Then I removed the lamp extension and remounted the lamp directly on the fender using a shorter cap screw. I then fabricated a cantilevered plate undertail to mount the license plate so that the lamp light illuminated the license plate in the new position. My template included a couple of small “ears” on the forward portion so that I could take advantage of the factory threaded bolt holes that were already present on the underside of the fender. In all, I ended up using all four preexisting bolt holes and drilled the appropriate holes in my undertail to position them so everything was secure (see pic).
The final step was to drill holes to remount the factory plastic license plate holder directly below the now repositioned lamp. At this point, you could opt to also paint everything black, but I chose to leave it the textured finish on the piece of 20 gauge stainless-steel I used.

My new slightly bobbed rear fender and undertail now shows more of the rear wheel and single-sided swingarm, but still keeps stuff from being thrown at a following rider. It also keeps the factory turn signals and, most importantly, it repositions the lamp light without the factory extension. I’m happy with how it turned out, so maybe some of you are now inspired to do the same thing.