Anglia4’s small bikes

[Valiant]

Make a new key out of steel. It takes a bit of filing and testing but works well.

I used to make them regularly for my IT.

[anglia4]

I just found one sitting nicely in the crank of a spare engine I had. This engine never had a flywheel on it when I got it, so I assumed the key would be long gone.

Rather be lucky than good aye.

[anglia4]

So this nearly survived another Eastcapescapade in November.

The gearbox locked up about 5km short of the finish, so it got loaded on the trailer and I rode bitch on the RGV150 to finish the ride on a bike.

I finally got to pulling it down and found the same issue that I had riding into Gizzy the year before.

The selector retaining screw had wobbled out. You can see all the scratch marks where it had jammed the mechanism.

I put this back in with lots of loctite so hopefully it won't happen again!

I had been getting worried about the engine during the ride, I had convinced myself there was a bearing on the way out, so I whipped the head and barrel off and gave it all a good wriggle, but everything seems to feel nice and tight.

Plenty of oil deposits in there though! I'll be using a better quality oil going forward I think.

I've cleaned all the carbon off everything and have just been waiting on a new set of rings to replace one I bent

I'm quite looking forward to getting it nanging around again. Hopefully I'll have it back together tonight!

 

[anglia4]

It lives!

There were challenges. I hadn't bent a ring, it was the carbon deposits in the ring grooves that were making the rings tight.

That meant the new rings were also tight, so I ordered a whole new piston...

Which arrived and was for a different model of TS100...

In the end I bent one of the old rings in half and used it as a scraper to clean out the ring grooves.

Also on the east cape ride, the muffler fell off at one stage, it had chewed itself to bits to where the spring was loose. So i've fixed that up now.

I took it for a ride to town today.

Fuck its awful. I need to sort out the petrol tank mounts as all the rubber has worn out and the vibration and noise is horrific.

How I've done two east cape rides on this bike, I have no idea.

I'll get it to be fun again soon with a bit more tinkering.

[anglia4]

So by the end of the last east cape ride this had a really horrid vibration, made more horrid by the petrol tank rattling.

Last time I took it out for a ride I had a fairly solid look over it all to work out where more issues might be.

I found the chain was quite loose, the cush drive sloppy, the petrol tank issue and a loose engine mount.  I'm hoping the engine mount might be what was letting the vibrations out.

I got a new tank rubber set from Ali, machined up a thing and set about modifying the mount:

Much better!

Last night I cleaned and tightened the chain, and have whipped the wheel off to inspect the cush drive. Yup that's fucked.

So I need to sort that out, clean the air filter, advance the timing and then start thrashing it to work again, hopefully keeping my will to live intact.

[anglia4]

OK so my small bike experience has started to escalate... so I'm changing this thread to be a catch-all...

First is the GT"50" - Silver Bullet

Then there is the GT50. Its tucked away waiting its turn - hint, its been queue jumped...

The RGV50 Frame is still in the shed. I still haven't quite figured out why I brought it.

And then this happened...

Scrolling the old Facebook buy and sell one night, and up popped this CRM50. It looked rough in the photos but mostly complete, the price was OK, and it was local! So I jumped on it and started messaging.

Then I started getting messages from other oldschoolers asking if I could go and look at an old Honda for them haha. No sorry, its mine!

Its been tucked in the shed for a few months due to lack of time, but with the next east cape ride looming I've decided to start seeing if I can get it sorted.

Seller says "It will run, but pisses fuel out of the carb".

I've had it started, so it does run, which is great!

Last night I pulled the carb out for a look-see. There as definitely been some diddle fingers here...

First thing is the choke plunger is broken and was held together with a hose clamp.

Then I pulled the bowl off to clean and set the float needle.

That doesn't quite look right 

The float needle is missing.

[anglia4]

The other thing we have been working on around here is decidedly more miniature.

This JR50 belonged to my older cousins, and then I rode it when I was little, and then it saw use again at the occasional party when @Duke Blackwood and I were big.

 

A while back my daughter spied it hiding in the back of grandads shed and went and sat on it. She doesn't usually have the courage to go and sit on scary things like motorbikes, so it was a bit of a big deal for her, but at this point her favourite thing to watch on the TV was Dora (The biker, not the explorer).

Here she was sitting on it in grandads shed doing her best Dora spec bike tour:

I pushed her around the lawn on it and then we took it home for a restoration. Its been slow going as we have tried to work on it together and she's not always interested, being she was only 2.5 years old when we started and all... We stripped it down at xmas 2020 so its been an 18 month rebuild so far.

(Peanut butter lid air filter cover my dad made once upon a time)

We have pulled the whole thing down, powdercoated some bits, painted some others, new bearings here and there.

Lots of old stock suzuki parts. New tubes and tires. New forks from China.

Whipped the barrel and head off and had them vapour blasted and honed.

Its very very close to finished now. The last piece of the puzzle is the fuel tap. Suzuki used this fuel tap on 2 models from 79-80, so its rocking horse poo. I'm going to have to make something special up for it and haven't quite managed to make it happen yet.

 

[anglia4]

Alrighty.

CRM update.

Manawatu Hondas finest parts man organised me a bunch of parts from Japan to get the carb back together and reinstate the auto oiler. Choice.

I asked around on the bucket bike pages if anyone had a spare choke knob, as these are the same carb as an NSR50, but a 15mm carb is no use to anyone on a race bike, so I knew there would be some hiding in parts bins somewhere. Sure enough I got a whole carb in the mail. Excellent.

I rebuilt my carb like a new one but the bike just wouldn’t run for more than a few seconds. Like a float issue.

I stripped and compared both carbs and found that the little posts that retain the float pin were chipped, and the float pin was well, floating. Good one pictured.

So tonight I tossed the spare carb on with my original jets in it and hey presto, second gentle kick and it’s running!

stoked!

[anglia4]

I also rode the silver bullet GT”50” to work today. The vibration issues are much much better with the new tank mount and the engine mounts all up tight  

[anglia4]

I’ve still got some carb issues to sort. The hoses are very hard and aren’t sealing so it pisses fuel everywhere and I think it’s sucking air into the oil hose. 
 

Last night I thought I’d see how much of the road gear was in the box of bits and assembled the front.

I was so stoked it was genuinely all there including most of the original screws. None of the wiring has been cut. The Speedo cable wasn’t lost. It even has the original key that matches for the fuel tank!

I fired it up quickly and it all came to life

[anglia4]

Next on the list is the front brake pads.

 

i think they’re due…

[anglia4]

I got all the fuel hoses sorted out and it still wouldn't run right.

So I have stripped the carb down, put it through an ultrasonic cleaner and re-assembled.

I got myself all set up ready to start it up, and you know how with kick start bikes you always tend to give it a gentle push through of the kick starter to get a feel for where its at in the cycle?

Yeah well I did that, gently stroke of the starter.... ring ting ting ting ting. Not a word of a lie, it started that fucking easy.

Tuned up the pilot and now it will sit there and idle and has a nice crisp brap.

I've also replaced the front brake pads, and freed up the seized rear brake lever.

I just need to get the clutch free'd up now and this bitch is pretty much ready to ride.

[anglia4]

*Happy Dance*

It is now totally legal for me to hoon the CRM up and down the road to free up the clutch 

[anglia4]

Freeing up the clutch turned out to be as easy as simply kicking it into gear the next time I started it up. Happy Days.

But then it became very apparent that the clutch is absolutely on its last legs. I've ordered a new one from the land of the rising sun, hopefully it will be here very soon. In the mean time I've been for a couple of short rides to see how things are going. Its awesome around the 50km zones, plenty of grunt and runs nice and crisp.

The speedo isn't working, which is annoying so I will sort that.

I've fitted a whites rear light bracket which fits quite nicely and looks nice and tidy.

Problem now is that it runs like dogshit when you start getting to higher speeds. It really doesn't seem to like being loaded up and having the throttle opened further. I've replaced the spark plug, but that doesn't seem to have helped. It is also spewing out mass amounts of blue smoke. Enough to leave a film of oil on the number plate. I'm trying to remember what fuel mix I did, and I'm a little suspicious that I may have mixed it up as 25:1 for the lawn mower. I might drain the tank soon and do a fresh mix to test that. The airbox also has the inlet cut out quite a bit, I have an un-modified airbox that I might try as well if the fuel mix doesn't solve the problem.

Time is running out to get it running mint!

[anglia4]

 

[Truenotch]

That's quite a bit of black smoo on the number plate! Does the smoke smell like 2 stroke or burning trans oil? 

[anglia4]

Unsure... More investigatory nangs required.

[anglia4]

On 05/10/2022 at 13:40, anglia4 said:

Problem now is that it runs like dogshit when you start getting to higher speeds.

Because it’s got a fucking speed limiter!!

I took it for a good 20km ride today, during which my fault finding brain was working hard to diagnose the conditions causing the poor running.

The only consistent variable was speed. So I disconnected the Speedo cable hoping it would solve the problem, it didn’t. So I googled it.

It turns out they have a rev limit which varies depending what gear it’s in to limit it to 50km/h.

A new CDI is the proper solution, but we are gonna try and trick it into thinking it never goes over 3rd gear.

[anglia4]

I made a start on replacing the clutch last week. What a ball-ache of a job...

First snag was that one of the clutch cover bolts, and hence the clutch cover, are tucked in behind the frame. So I had to pull out two engine mount bolts and an exhaust mount to jack the engine up slightly in the frame.

Next I discovered a special tool was required, which pretty much put the brakes on the whole exercise. Trademe came to the party on the tool pretty quickly.

So last night, Bucket Barry and I got set on finishing the job. I had overlooked buying a new gasket, so BB spent the best part of 2 hours making one. Buzzed the clutch nut off with the new tool. Whammo its all back together. Completely assembled, just waiting for new fluids.

Then Bucket Barry texts me at 11pm last night... He must have woken in a cold sweat... "Did you remember to do the lock tab on the clutch nut?"

Fuckety Fucking Fuck

[anglia4]

On 15/10/2022 at 21:52, anglia4 said:

A new CDI is the proper solution, but we are gonna try and trick it into thinking it never goes over 3rd gear.

There was no tricking it. There must be a feed-back loop type thing wired in so any attempt at tricking the wiring with simple solutions ends with it shutting itself off when you get to the tricked gear.

I've ordered the new CDI, fingers crossed it gets here in time for the east cape ride. https://japan.webike.net/products/25012482.html

It left Japan nearly two weeks ago so hopefully its not far away now.