Sportster Rear Fender Redo

 So I had my feet up and was chewing on some ideas for mounting the license plate on the back of my Sportster. Nothing I had previously considered was sounding like a good idea. Check out the last pic in this post. I was also worrying about how short I cut the fender. Rain water off the tire was going to spray my back or soak my luggage.
 So it came to me. I'd just re-attach most of that piece of fender back on without the tail light mount. This would give me a shorter than stock fender, a place for the plate and practical water protection.
 Thats the nice thing about not having a solid plan when doing a project like this. If I feel like changing it then thats fine.
 The first step was to remove the factory tail light mount.

 Then I made a template of the license plate bracket that would cover up the hole.

 I cut it out with my favorite tool, the Milwaukee 18 volt grinder with a cut-off wheel. That piece of steel is a heavy metal shelf I rescued from the dumpster at work.

 Cut, pound, weld, sand and paint. I left that pointy flare on it. I figured it would be easier to make it look halfway decent if I wasn't trying to blend a seam together.

 Its just mocked up for the pic. I have two other parts I want to make yet but I haven't seen the right pieces in the dumpster yet. Also not shown are the LED tag bolts that will illuminate the plate.
 I can live with this. Its not as long as the stock fender but plenty long to keep me and my gear dry. The plate location works with the rack folded down and should keep Johnny Law off my back.