Goat

Shitcheah, Subscribed

Ive had good luck using brake clean to soften and remove that horrible baked on dirt on rubber stuff. Its misery, but worth it. Sure you don't want to give your rear struts the spray treatment? @bmxnz11 had some really good looking paint on his suspension stuff, done in his garage. Looked mint. Maybe hit him up or atleast check out his escort build thread (the orange one not the blue one). Seems a bit of a shame since you've gone the whole nine yards on everything else to not go that little bit further. (Not that I'm in any position to make such claims haha)

Always enjoy your updates! Everything looks so good going together with re-plated fasteners and powdercoated gubbins.

After a bitter-sweet journey, its time to say farewell to the old girl:

I am so happy to see this panning out the way is has. Can't wait for your next update!

Awshitcheah!

I love electrical misery. Giz a holla and i'll help you wire it up dogg!

If it stalls off the line, it could be the accelerator pump? I think some of the yank carbs have a piston as opposed to a diaphragm? maybe this is chooched. So it just falls over when opening the throttle?

First step was to see what I'd bought and start cleaning it up. It was responding well to some 400 grit and some autosol. Before: After a test patch: It certainly had potential.... Next issue was the frame. It had some goobied up weld on the headstock. So i ground this back and re-welded it. Looked much better: I then proceeded to strip the frame by hand: I got this far then rage quit as it was absolout misery. Dropped it at blasters to be blasted and powdercoated. While that was happening i put the motor on the bench to give a propper cleanup with new gaskets etc. It had wet-sumped and proceeded to go wees on my bench overnight: Was really fun to clean it up and add new seals: Got the frame back from powdercoaters and put the engine in. Looks like brand new! Started to reassemble it whilst trying to not make it look super gross. Got some short rear shocks from a dyna, and some cuttiez in the front g. Also popped some new shinkos onto the cleaned up rims: Love how narrow it is. Ali express rear guard. This is where it currently stands. As soon as my ironhead is off the table i'll get full force back into this. On the home stretch now. Have a whole heap of new bits to go on it. Plan is just to have something cool and reliable as a backup bike or one mates can ride when they're in town. Will hopefully come back with updates in next few weeks. Motivation is high at the moment.

So yeah, pretty into these turds. Saw this come up super cheap on trademe. Reg on hold. Bought it site unseen and had it shipped down to me. Oohwee, what a turd she was: Its an 1988 883 evo sportster. The successor to the Ironhead. It was cheap, and I really like cleaning stuff up. So something to keep me busy between rage quits with the Goldwing, Laverda and my Ironhead.

A bit of tuesday night bike night motivation. Got the dudes in there helping, hoping the freedom will catch and i'll have someone to do a chopper build with! Took top end off. So simple to work on. There is some very uneven mating surfaces at the base of the barrels... between 0.5 and 1mm out of flat. No wonder it was leaking. I think there was so much oil cos it was wet sumping, but still, would be weeping forever. Applied excessive gasket goo to hope it seals. Its nice grey stuff, not red. So can hardly notice it. Will cut back the eccess (no pics with pots back on) will put heads on later this week. Hopefully get it running again in the weekend.

Oh yeah, This went for its first WOF since October 1996. Just over 26 years ago! Clean sheet VTNZ Wof. Its all legal beagle. Rode it right home and put it in the shed. Has been raining every opportunity since (except last Sunday). Will get some pics of it in its current, legal state next time its sunny here. It actually looks really good out in the sun. Had a few VTNZ patrons, plus the wof inspector complement me on how nice it was. Sounds wild, and pulls really well. Super comfy. Just need to fix the fuel gauge as it reads negative !? The more fuel the lower it reads? wut. Gotta sell it though to fund new turds, if anyone needs "the black bull" in their life, lemme know.

Not all doom and gloom on the freedom front though, Been fixing up this 83 for my Dad. Imported from the states many years ago. Gave it an all round freshen up and got it complied on Saturday. Runs mint, has a soft clutch, and doesn't leak oil! Shout out to Richard and Hayhole for the sweet stickers on the tank! You guys are the best:

While this was this far apart, i thought i'd replace the base gaskets too. Removed the barrels, and tooke pistons out for blasting too. The heads looked disgusting. Ther earlier XLH900s were meant to have silver painted heads. I dont like them. So sandblast and a matty black was in order. Starting to reassemble with new gaskets: After blasting the heads, and what a shit of a job that was. I didn't want to do the barrels. So a quick hone and wacked them back on. Bike started like a champ after being sitting for 8 months. However, it was leaking oil from the base gaskets at orders of magnitude more than before. Fuck it. Back to square 1. Could see it pumping out like an artery! This is after a brakecleen and a wipedown! Was pooling before my eyes. The fact this had wet-sumped while sitting probably doesn't help. But I suspect I need to apply a lot more generous amounts of sealer to the base gaskets! It could also be because the oil pump is incorrectly timed.... (I know, wat?) But they use crank pressure to scavenge oil, and there is a rotary valve, so if that's not open when the crank is under pressure then it cant push the oil out. This would have been like this before my tenure. Could explain why it was also leaking before. Ah well, at least its easy to strip down. Also, replaced the clutch with new everything. Still need Arnie amounts of strength to pull the lever. Only thing I haven't replaced is the cable. So will try that (though it seems to move freely...)

As fun as it is to rage quit in the heat of the moment, as Flash says, let yourself cool down. If you are still over it in a week or two, then maybe it is time to pass it on. But you've come so far bringing this back from the cusp of falling into a state of dire repair. And asides from the engine, its pretty getting pretty sorted thanks to your meticulous touch. Rebuilding the original donk would be fun wouldn't it? Getting it all tidied up and refreshed would be rewarding (for both you and the viewers like myself) Then you'll have a matching numbers SD1 with a freshly rebuilt motor. Will hopefully be good for a while after that (asides from any of your routine maintenance or fixes that we know and love). So yeah, do consider my offer of storage either while you rebuild the original engine. (Offering for purely selfish reasons, I just want to see more of your comprehensive update posts :))

Bummer man, things were going so well. I am saddened (though I fully understand the rage quitting. I do love a good rage quit myself). Gonna miss the top notch content of your builds. I know you've got the Marina still, but the more build threads the better right? If you can't sell it, or change your mind, PM me as I've got space for another British turd in my lockup in the Wairarapa. Can store there while you tackle the engine. Will have some other British stablemates to keep it company.

https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/motorbikes/parts-for-sale/other/listing/3838863156

^This. Try and find new. Had some z1 Kawasaki forks rechromed for $$ and they were absolutely ruined. Super wavy, and one was like 1mm less diameter. Useless job. Would never get any rechromed again. A bit of hunting and you can find most stanchions overseas for not too much money shipped.

I've got a spare magdyno for sale if you'd like to go that route. Clockwise mag direction. Tapered shaft. Was sparking and dynomo-ing last I checked.

Wow Wayne, Looks like brand spankers. What was the process to get it looking that clean?

Jeeze that engine bay is clean. You must be excited Clint! (That's its almost ready to hoon, not that your engine bay is so clean...)

Had a play last night, seems to bind up nomatter what. I could drill/file the holes in the steel plates bigger. Though its apparent it has a mixture of pre and post '74 plates in it. Halfway through 74 they revised the design and added spring pillars and made the slots in the steel plates way bigger. The spring pillars are all mooshed and super rough, I tried cleaning them up, which helped a bit, but it was still tight to get together. And it made putting the clutch plate on really difficult as the studs were slightly splayed apart. Not good. Got it all together for a test. Its still Arnie spec difficult, and now it doesn't disengage anyway. (must be bound up) Also the release bearing is toast. I'll do an order for new bearing, steel plates and spring spacers. Shame the NZ dollar has tanked against the US in the last couple of weeks

I also noticed the clutch assembly wobbles a tiny bit if you spin the whole clutch. Im assuming mainshaft is slightly bent. Which can be explained by the previous damage to the gears and casings. Its obviously had a catastrophic gearbox failure at some point. And the probably didn't replace the mainshaft. Will get a new one, but will pop it in next winter. Its obviously been like this for some time. So its probably ok. Everything is agricultural as hell, so can probably handle a slight wobble right?? Another item on the todo list.

Next part of the saga, the clutch. Now this clutch was SO fucking heavy. It was ridiculous. You'd cup your hand around the lever and use your whole upper body to pull it back. Great for a wellington commute. Aswell as being heavy as hell, it also seemed to drag. Making it impossible to get into neutral when the bike was running. Again, excellent, especially when its kickstart only and you have to hop off the bike to kick it. I ordered new clutch basket, plates, springs, and a release mechanism. Hopefully with a more progressive ramp. More disassembly: Oil was full of clutch material. Keep in mind this bike has done about 20km since it was fully stripped and cleaned. Hmm. Not good. Oil was still golden. Just the last 2mm were clutch sludge. No metal though!! Clutch plate and spring off. You can see here there are sleeves on each of the studs. This is so you can tighten up the clutch basket against these to get it square. However, these are tight on the steel plates. You cant put the steel plates over them without manhandling the studs into the correct angle. So wondering if that could be causing clutch drag. Once the pressure plate is on though it kinda pulls the studs together and relieves some of the tension. I dont know if this would be an issue, and i don't know how to fix it asides from turning them down? Clutch scum: This was the michael mouse basket. Welded pegs and all sorts. Thought this might contribute to the dragging, so have a new one to pop in. Old single spring, vs stock twin. Hopefully makes it a bit easier: The new mechanism looks like it will make a difference. The races for the balls to run in are twice the length of the ones on the bike. So hopefully that makes a more progressive clutch. Will get some snaps of that tonight.

Ah, interesting. I've got a set of NOS James cork gaskets. And a set of silicone ones. I assumed silicone would be legit... Will biff silicone ones in and report back Will be reassembling rocker boxes with a thin layer of sealant on the (new) gaskets to help keep it oil tight. Im also worried that maybe the base gaskets are leaking as this will explain the hard to see oil leak. Might whip the barrels off and replace base gaskets too while I've got it this far apart. My tank is a bit of an oddball one, it doesn't have a provision for the intank filter. So running without. I hope lifter were already like this, and haven't been damaged from the 20 odd km I've done since cleaning it up and re-vin. Though I didn't expose any engine internals asides from the gearbox/primary. Which has its own supply and doesn't go through the engine. I'll just throw it back together and send it tbh. Do I need to anneal the new copper head gaskets before putting them on? Or just biff em in dry...