Adding a Pelican case to an XJ600 Part 1

The aftermarket for the XJ series of bikes is slim to none in the US market.  There are factory racks and engine guards but they're as rare as hen's teeth.  Needing to be able to carry my laptop and other items in weatherproof and secure manner, it was time to improvise.  The rear sub-frame has four mount points for the factory rack, two sharing the mounts for the grab handles and two further towards the tail.

Yamaha was nice enough to mark the drill spots.

The Pelican case is too large to be mounted directly to the bike.  If it were, the seat would be almost impossible to remove.  Plus, it would sit at a downward slope towards the tail of the bike and look a bit odd.  So, to raise the case off the tail, I bent some 1/8" x 1" aluminum stock.  Originally, I had a very fancy idea and made a cardboard template. 

However, I ran out of room on the vice and talent. So, I was forced to simplify my design into a Z bracket. 

Here you can see the rough mounts sitting on what will become my rear rack.  In true Penny Tech and scavenger fashion, it's a wall mount that was going to be thrown away at work.  It fits perfectly between the to raised lines on the bottom of the Pelican case.  

The bottom of the mounts will have a slot milled out instead of a hole, that way I can fine tune the location and the corners will be ground down. Originally, I planned to mount them this way: 

But I'm concerned about the strength of the mounts since they're facing the same way. I don't want the case to get shoved back or forward and bend the mounts.  So, I changed the mock up to this:

This may require that I bend the center mounts and shim the ones towards the seat to make it as close to level as possible.  I'll know more once I pick them up from getting the slots milled and holes drilled. 

Click here for part II to see how it all pans out.