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Mark Taylor
21-09-2006, 11:30 PM
What's the score with a tail chop regarding insurance? Do you have to declare it as a 'modified vehicle'? or is it just cosmetic? Any ideas anybody?

JMo
22-09-2006, 12:36 AM
I trust this is a genuine question...?!

I shouldn't worry - as it neither increases the performance not alters the structural integrity of the vehicle, you can safely regard it as 'cosmetic'...

I really don't think any insurer is going to worry that you've removed 6 superfluous inches of plastic tat from the back of your bike... I doubt they are even aware it ever existed...

xxx

Gilps
22-09-2006, 12:22 PM
but surely it is now more nickable as the robber would have no problems selling it on as the tail-chop increases the bikes desirability due to its aesthetic improvement over the standard ugly bike. Thoughts, anyone?

giler
22-09-2006, 12:27 PM
Blimey, now I'm really worried!
My Dark, tail chop, Termi's, billet bar end mirror - how nickable is that!
Giler

JMo
22-09-2006, 12:49 PM
but surely it is now more nickable as the robber would have no problems selling it on as the tail-chop increases the bikes desirability due to its aesthetic improvement over the standard ugly bike. Thoughts, anyone?


Hee hee - it may be true, although when did thieves ever have any taste?!

xxx

mad_turnips
22-09-2006, 12:51 PM
also i would have thought if you have moded alot it make the bike more unique therfore harder to shift and easer to trace

JMo
22-09-2006, 01:05 PM
also i would have thought if you have moded alot it make the bike more unique therfore harder to shift and easer to trace

Again, a very good point... it's a wonder that there are any tea trays left to be honest...

So, if only to make your bike safer indeed, just check out:

http://www.ukmonster.co.uk/monster/showthread.php?t=19704

Ahem.

xxx

Anf
22-09-2006, 01:15 PM
but surely it is now more nickable as the robber would have no problems selling it on as the tail-chop increases the bikes desirability due to its aesthetic improvement over the standard ugly bike. Thoughts, anyone?

Mine's pretty much standard and I love the way it looks.
Mainly because I haven't the balls to chop the tail yet.
Plus I want some really nice lights and can't afford them!

John k
22-09-2006, 03:35 PM
Mine had a tail mod and was swipped by some light-fingered bastid; wouldnt mind but it was crash damaged at the time....

I am after a new one, funnily enough - 600 in red!

Kiwi
30-09-2006, 08:07 AM
What's the score with a tail chop regarding insurance? Do you have to declare it as a 'modified vehicle'? or is it just cosmetic? Any ideas anybody?

its a modification and any excuse for a insurance company to leg out on a claim they will use that excuse

emily's driver
30-09-2006, 09:18 AM
What's the score with a tail chop regarding insurance? Do you have to declare it as a 'modified vehicle'? or is it just cosmetic? Any ideas anybody?

It is purely cosmetic. However I would have thought the only concern facing you is that you are now heavily reliant on any future buyer of your bike, when you eventually come to sell it, sharing the same tastes as you, since "the superfluous piece of plastic tat", as the rear tray has been described on here, is, like it or loathe it, an original feature of the bike and the problem with tail chops, is that once you remove it and cut the frame rails off, that's it.

A bike that is as near to it's original spec when sold, will always fetch more money than one that has been modified to the current owner's very individual tastes. I suggested pinlock inserts once, on a similar veined thread since these allow you to re-attach the "discarded" elements of the rear frame rails and re-mount the tea tray, giving you the best of both worlds. Any modification is reversible, but in the instance of tail chops, as they are currently performed, it's an expensive and time consuming process.

Gilps
30-09-2006, 10:05 AM
I think it's an easy thing to reverse when you sell the bike. The only 2 things that you cut using Jmo's kit are the frame and the number plate holder. You don't even have to cut the number plate holder if you want to use an alternative way of mounting the plate. It will be very easy to weld the tail back on again and touch up the paint. Because the point at which you cut the frame will then be hidden by the plastic then no one will be any the wiser. I have picked up a new number plate holder off ebay ready for the day if/when I rebuild the back end to sell it.

emily's driver
30-09-2006, 11:58 AM
I think it's an easy thing to reverse when you sell the bike. The only 2 things that you cut using Jmo's kit are the frame and the number plate holder. You don't even have to cut the number plate holder if you want to use an alternative way of mounting the plate. It will be very easy to weld the tail back on again and touch up the paint. Because the point at which you cut the frame will then be hidden by the plastic then no one will be any the wiser. I have picked up a new number plate holder off ebay ready for the day if/when I rebuild the back end to sell it.

I'm sure it is, but I am not sure I would want to buy a bike that's been welded back together, be it a structural part of the frame or not. You can provide no guarantees to the buyer of the integrity of the work that's been done and Ducati certainly won't back you up as the new owner if something (unlikely as it may be) goes wrong with it in future. If you are comfortable with that thought then you are a lot braver than me. Not trying to put a downer on the whole tail chop thing, but I would be reluctant to butcher something as fundamental as the frame, if I knew it meant having to piece it back together afterwards, with a less than ideal solution. No dealer I have spoken to will advocate it, and I wouldn't want to take the risk of jeopardizing the bike's future resale value. Given the choice I would opt for a bike that was unfettled any day as opposed to one that had been patched up.

CK & AK
30-09-2006, 12:37 PM
It is purely cosmetic. However I would have thought the only concern facing you is that you are now heavily reliant on any future buyer of your bike, when you eventually come to sell it, sharing the same tastes as you, since "the superfluous piece of plastic tat", as the rear tray has been described on here, is, like it or loathe it, an original feature of the bike and the problem with tail chops, is that once you remove it and cut the frame rails off, that's it.

A bike that is as near to it's original spec when sold, will always fetch more money than one that has been modified to the current owner's very individual tastes. I suggested pinlock inserts once, on a similar veined thread since these allow you to re-attach the "discarded" elements of the rear frame rails and re-mount the tea tray, giving you the best of both worlds. Any modification is reversible, but in the instance of tail chops, as they are currently performed, it's an expensive and time consuming process.

wise words:)

JMo
01-10-2006, 05:43 PM
Gilps seems to have basically said everything I would have done (unprompted I might add)...

Contary to what you might think ED, a tail chop (using the right kit) is neither expensive or time consuming, nor indeed irreversable - you are certainly not 'butchering the frame', simply making two cuts to remove a superfluous supporting bracket for a plastic mudguard assembly that manufacturers are required to incorporate into their designs to comply with certain countries' construction and use requirements.

Should you so wish, it is certainly straightforward enough to have the rear section of subframe welded back on (or use your pin-lock idea if you want the effort of engineering that of course...) and I would suggest that any competent welder is likely to do a far neater job that the factory do on most of their welds anyway... x

I would agree that if you are serial bike trader every couple of years then keeping your machine as close to standard or using bolt-on bits is the best way to maximise resale value - but most people who modify bikes do it to personalise them... if all you want to do is 'borrow' a bike for a maunfactuer for a year or two, fine, but I'd by a BMW as you are likely to lose a shed-load on a Ducati anyway...

The reason I developed the kit in the first place is to make it as straight forward and neat as possible - if it's done right then why would anyone (other than a Ducati dealer who wants a clean, low mileage, standard trade-in perhaps) even question it?

xxx

ps. having chopped my bike 4 days after I got it, I can confirm that it has no effect on the warrenty, and indeed, no effect on any insurance claim either (damn that hedge...)