hmmmnz

yep train nerds are the worst,  hanging round the gates, perving at the defensless loco's

you should see it when the royal scotsman is in,  foamers everywhere.

only train i like is a dead train...  or the 55 class napier deltics that come in,  mainly because of the engine,  could take or leave the train itself,  but it has a cool retro shape, so ill forgive it

when it was in

well its a train that has killed a couple of people,  once you'd  be forgivien for thinking it was an accedent .

but twice.. well a pattern is starting to emerge, 

308 is thomas's murderous cousin high on diesel and mere human souls

was that along the line of what you were thinking? or something else ?

stock location for some models, 

handy because alot of the wiring can be hidden in the headlight

yeah dunno whats up with that, its the stock signal that the bmw clocks got,

i could try the signal from the other cylinder i suppose and see if thats cleaner.

also have to replace that shit start switch as well.

right got the speedo all hooked up,

bike is running pretty good although runs out of gas at high sustained revs because of the stupid floats,

ordered a set of plastic ones out of the states to replace the shit foam ones that sink,  fucken bing and their stupid ideas,

took the bike for a mot (wof) on friday and it went through no bother,

heres a shit video of a wee thrash,

had to hold the camera in my mouth so...

ill keep ya posted,  have also front mudguard to go on at some point.  and a leaky fork seal (gayest job on a bike)

well the seat is back from being recovered.
its not the same style as the original, which is a bit shit, but its a good job, so meh, i doubt any one would notice

ill take it to get a mot in another couple of day and then send all the paper work off to get a new plate for it.

free tax on the bad boy too

ok,
cleaned up all the wiring,  replaced the lighting relay, and the indicator relay,
led indicators got added to front and back,
the rear light has them built in, but they were a little to close together for my liking,

old front ones were shit, so got replaced as well,

have added waterproof plugs for the new digital speedo thats on the way from the fatherland. so that'll just be a matter of adding the plugs to the speedo loom and she'll be plug and play.

had to also replace the ignition switch, from last time some little chavy prick tried to steal it

ummm balanced the carbs,

need to order a front brake switch, hobble together some sort of front mud guard, and she'll be good to go for a mot (wof)
 i think ill go for a fang tomorrow and do a oil and filter change,

i also have a leaking final drive, so that'll have to be fixed at some point

glory shots

well its been a couple of years and ive done bugger all to the bike,
after the gear box was done, i literally parked it up and have not started it since.  as punishment for blowing up on me in the first place

i got the tank painted about a by my workmate and told him to do what ever he wanted.
and this was the result

a nice copper pearl type... thing in the paint, all flickery and shit.
awesome job i must say,

i pulled the carbs off and replaced all the jets and gave them an ultrasonic clean, replaced the diaphragms etc

i also decided it was high time i ditched the master cylinder, (as its set up for a twin caliper front end)
in order to do that i needed to replace the throttle, starter button and master cylinder,
which also gave me the opportunity to re-design and custom make some new throttle cables with a 90' bend into the carb so it avoided the exhaust

im waiting on a new/2nd hand ignition switch because some little tard tried to steal the bike, not realising that it had no gas and none of the fuel lines were connected, the little fucks did get away with my ktm super moto though fuckers

any way while im waiting on the ignition i though i best see if this old dog would start after 2 years of just lazing about, like a gypsy bum on the dole

see here for the results ....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6gbWl8rDRU

and as a bonus when you burn out a phase you have 2 more spare

well, after a successful brew i was in no fit state to go for a ride on any bike,  order of the day was a drunken lunch time nap,
last batch of hops added to the mash ton.  
doesnt look very appetising i admit

but sunday was a good day,
first i took pinky (b120) for a ride to find it was running out of gas at full throttle, so pulled the carb and adjusted the float,
another spin and she was bang on, even managed to get to 55mph on the flat hehe

next on the cards was wee red (bridgestone)
had to replace a buggered exhaust gasket, then decided id take her for a spin with out the seat,
ran like a champ!!  managed 80mph on the clocks and pulled pretty well getting there,

big red (vtr) got a start up a wee run, as well, just because it'd been such a fruitful day

blacky (bandit) didnt get any love

pics for thread

right,

i took the seat to be recovered, so that'll be away a week or 2,

also spoke to the vintage japanese motorcycle club (vjmc) about dating the bike for the dvla (vtnz in nz, dmv in the states)

so that got done pretty painlessly

still waiting for the dvla to send out the paperwork for me to fill in and send back (frankly astounded you cant just download the paperwork, british bureaucracy at its best, of course they've also shut down all their offices so you cant just pick it up either)

so while i was waiting, i thought id work on the mrs suzuki B120 of 72 vintage.  (not that she has ever ridden it, but she swears she's doing her licence this year....  )

it hadnt been started in a couple of years and last time i rode it, the fuel would piss out the float bowl, or alternatively run out of fuel because the bowl wasnt full enough.

and since the carbs are almost the same as the bridgestone i thought id steal a float from one of the 4 spare carbs i have, and put that in, also uses a 95 main jet as well which i had a few spare, so a new one of those went in,

put it back together, turned on the fuel,

and...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0t6I7NK3L1M

first kick after 2 years. might take it out for a spin if im not to drunk after ive done my beer brew in the morning.  so probably wont take it out for a ride

i really need to sell my vtr and buy another 2 stroke,

Well, I replaced the main jets on both carbs.
And gave them a blow through in case more shit had managed
To get stuck in the passages.
No one likes a blocked back passage.

Everything was clear so I gave it a kick over

I love how this thing starts first kick.

Can't/won't take it for a test ride, as it's currently snowing here in Scotland.
Tell ya it was a manic ride to work on the bandit this morning.
More side ways action than I prefer on 2 wheels. One of these days I'll buy a car/ute for the winter.
Not today though

oh for sure,  id have been pretty upset if it had fucked the barrel,

i have another set of standard carbs that i had forgotten that id bought as well, so i can still try them at some stage.

at the moment there is too much snow here to take it for another test ride.

onwards and upwards

i decided id change back to the original carbs for a test.
the new carbs had a piss poor bottom end, but a really good top end,

so i chuck on the carbs, starts first kick as always,
take off and the bottom end feels great, but i get to the top end and it feels pretty crap, couldnt get above 55mph

and way coming back up the hill to my place and a cylinder drops out and starts running on one,

i thought it was the condesor arcing out on the cover (its happened before)  but it felt considerably free'r revving,

parked it up and let it cool down before looking at it.

first thing i did was pull the plug,  it had crap built up on it.....  oh... nooo.....

put my finger on the plug hole and pushed down the kick start.....
noooooooo!!!!!   compression = 0

pulled off the head to be greated with this tale of woe

luckily in my arsenal of spares i had one piston that was in good shape, with 1 good ring,
exactly what was needed

so swapped it all over and happy days

most importantly my stupidly expensive ceramic coated barrels were still in perfect nick, not even a hint of a scratch (thank Hesus)

heres a couple more pics of the semi destruction

so one can assume that the main jet on the left cylinder is blocked,  and it was just running on the pilot jet the whole time,  much leanness = very hot
very hot = burny hole to piston
burny hole to piston = sadness

so therefore much leanness = sadness,
better to be a bit fat

yeah it seems to be, bear in mind the bike has only done 2000 miles since new,

so the baffles arn't carboned up at all,  they have just rusted a bit,

and now broken inside 1 side.  fuck knows how im going to get that retarded piece out.

i think with a bit of work with the needle clip position, it should be running pretty well,

was quite funny, i was hooning up the street with the one baffle out and a couple of builders came out to see what all the noise was about  

ok partial success,its running loads better managed to get to 70 before one of the baffles came flying out and i stopped to turn around to pick it up,
 the other baffle in the exhaust is broken off inside the exhaust and only half of it is able to come out,
not really a problem for now,  but will become one when it gets coked up with carbon and i cant remove it.

its still a bit shit down low getting off the mark.  
unsure if this is a carburation issue or if its the characteristic of the bike.

ill post a video riding it once i figure out how to hold my phone and ride at the same time

7 hours ago, oldnrusty said:

Stink, had a look at air flow? Only say that as you said compression spark and fuel were all good, so that's the last to tick off the list. At least it looks super sweet haha

 

  well there is that.

i can easily pull the case to air box tubes to allow more air flow and see if that makes a difference.

i should really get a new air filter, surprisingly the 50 year old one is still holding together

i gave it a quick start straight after work,

www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RWztB9T42c

it sounds and revs crisper with the new rubber gaskets,

ill take it for a ride after ive had a coffee and a smoke.

well something isnt quite right in the force,

starts first kick, idles fine,  
but its seriously down on power, like id say 5 or 6hp not the advertised 20hp.
i thought i'd change out the carbs as i couldnt get one of them to stop pissing fuel
so got some genuine mikuni vm18-144  going from the stock vm17-18
they are pretty much the same.
i tried the stock 95 mains with 15 pilot = no better
tryed the 70 mains with 30 pilot that came in the carbs (another bridgestone rider skiri251 has had success with setup)

its certainly better than the 95 mains set up but topped out at 45 mph and couldn't even hold speed in top gear

ive had problems with some aftermarket exhaust gaskets sealing... mainly because the pieces of crap melted

yep quality

so i got a set of genuine old stock bridgestone ones to try out

so thats where i am.

compression is bang on, spark is good, fuelling is where it should be..  may be.
timing is as close as i can humanly get it.

ill post ..post ride with the new gasket rubbers

i dunno though, my little kawasaki kh125 rotary valve
 would eat this for breakfast at this stage.  even my little piston port suzuki b120 is quicker.

right ive kind of been slack,

but, ive got most of the bits now to finish this,

i put new tyres and tubes on, the rubber knee guards are fitted,

had to fluff around with the timing quite a bit, i was miles out in the end,  ive got it as close as i can with out a timing light,

but it now seems to start first kick and doesnt piss petrol all over the place now,

still to take it out for a run,

but heres a cold start up video

ill keep ya posted. post shake down ride

well in other news, some little retard broken into my garage and stole my bandit 600 commuter,

thankfully they left my bmw, suzuki b120 and bridgestone alone,

still an arse, so this months pay has been diverted away from bridgestone matters into a new commuter.

not exactly what i was after to use as a winter hack in scotland,

but the price was too good to pass up.

2001 vtr1000

well the vinegar worked ok, but not aggressive enough,
but this is the clour of the crud that came out



so i bit the bullet and got some "deck and patio cleaner" (hydrochloric /Muriatic acid)
it was 20% some of the pool stuff is around 36%


worked great, did a better job in a hour than what vinegar did in 2 days



so in celebration of having a clean tank, i jerry rigged the fuel lines and attempted to start the old girl!

lol.    you'd think living in scotland id have a dryer..  nope.

everything gets "dried" in front of the dehumidifier

so far, fairly under whelming,  its definitely pulled some rust off, but its only 5% acid, so....  it'd probably take a while,

not much happening, as im waiting for parts, (and an email back from richard )

so i decided to see if i could clean out the rusty tank internals




i looked on youtube, and the consensus was vinegar if you didnt mind waiting, or Muratic Acid (swimming pool cleaner/ Spirit of Salts / brick cleaner)

since my local hareware shop was closed i decided to just get some vinegar and see how it goes,



also decided to chuck on the chain,


and sprocket cover, and highway gear selector



hopefully my new fuel tap will arrive tomorrow  which is actually a kz900 unit, whilst not identical to the original, its close enough