Ducati gone

It's gone!!!! and I am starting to miss it already, although the extra space will be welcome! A fair price - I'd say.

In the meantime I found a couple of things on the RG, a hairline crack in the clutch cover and a hairline crack in the no. 2 carb float bowl! The rear cylinders and pistons look good (the guys told me one cylinder was smoking quite a lot). And it started up no probs, am looking forward to testing the new ignition curve. I also checked to see if the exhaust valves were working and they are. I fixed the clutch cas with JB weld and found a perfect float bowl on an old carb, still put some JB weld on the cracked float bowl just as a spare!

Brake adaptors for the 350

I upgraded the brake calipers on the FZR 600 to Yamaha blue spots that I got for 50 euros, so I had a spare pair of 4 piston calipers going spare. I thought I would get them to fit the 350, they are not a straight fit, the 350 calipers are 83-84mms between mounting holes and the FZR calipers are over 100 mms. I had a good think about different plate systems and eventually went for a flat plate with spacers behind it. The most difficult part of this is to get the correct amount of pad on the appropriate part of the disk.

The second most difficult part is to ensure the bolt holes are exactly in the right place, if they are more than a 10th out it won't work smoothly!

Well it took more than 3 attempts to get it right! The first time I tried it  I only had the fork leg and calipers - no relation with the disk and wheel. The second time the disk to pad relation was still a little out.

First attempt

I worked this through with templates however the cardboard cutouts only go so far... You can't get good accuracy with a cardboard template!

The third time lucky!  I will fit them tomorrow and then clean up the ally, only then will we really know!

Still all this gave me ample time to use the mill, lathe and plenty bench grinder!

Ducati 888

RG500 Ales feedback

I haven't blogged anything in a long time, so much has happened.

Just to keep a record, I changed the fork seals on the RG and on the 350 as both bikes were starting to weep. The RG has 1989 GSXR 750 forks (K I think). I put 410 ccs of 10W Ipone fork oil in both legs.

I have been investigating new forks for the 350 and have purchased a second hand pair of FZR600 1994 Forks with wheel and brakes. As far as I can see they are pretty much plug and play except the stem is too long, so may have to make up a spacer to get them to tighten up!

Here is brief news of the rest of the bikes in the garage :

The Ducati 888 is still waiting to get sold I reduced the price to 6000 Euros, quite a bit of interest but no serious buyers. People aren't too keen knowing that there is little service record.

The Daytona is going well after having the vacuum pipes on the IVAC changed - the ends split and leak air - a common problem. I have fitted a new Bridgestone S23 tyre to the rear and am waiting impatiently to wear out the front to put a new S23 on it!

The FZR had new carbs float chamber gaskets and one size bigger main jets and seems all the better for it, much less buzzy at high revs, could probably go up another size but not for the moment, she is on my list of getting fairings painted and road worthy this winter!

The Triumph T120/T140 has almost been finished I am waiting for a final drive chain to arrive and then it will go back to Olivier for the winter - oops!

Libby's street is fine - no work or anything - still runs great although the cam chain adjuster is noisy - again a common issue!

I have only qdded approx. 200kms to the 900ss this year, it went very well although a little difficult to start for the first time. Will need to change the oil and filter in the spring.

The FZR Track bike had a new Diablo supercorsa tyre (a 150) on the rear zhich zore out in just 3 track days! So I have fitted a much cheaper Bridgestone RS10 which will get a try out next year. I have had a great couple of track days - both at La Vaison circuit near Torcy Challon sur Soane, a nice grippy circuit, quite small but very twisty.

The final track day of the year was at a damp Ales circuit, where both the 350 and 500 worked well, I am told the 500 was smoking more from the No. 4 so I need to investigate that, and I will also be investigating ignition curves again as after discussing with some of the guys, my ignition curve needs tuning! 

On a two stroked the ignition needs retarding as the revs get higher, not advancing as you would expect on a 4 stroke. The basic two stroked curve, goes almost straight up to full advance (in my case 30 degrees) then starts to fall as of about 6K in a virtual straight line to about 4 degrees advance at 12K rpm! The reasoning behind retarding the ignition is all to do with mixture swirl apparently, I listened to a number of guys on youtube ( look up 2 stroke stuffing if interested) and it all gets a bit fluffy when talking ignition advance, but you have to retard to get overrev (apparently important).

So I will be trying some stuff there, I managed to alter the standard Suzuki pickup to give approx 30 degrees static advance. And I am in the process of modifying the leaky Dent pickup so that I can use that again as necessary. Photos as I finish. In order to modify the standard pickup you basically shave off some of the plastic material on the top of the pickup and elongate the screw holes to let it sit higher (about 4mms). There is a great article on Randys website on how to do it.

T140 primary chain

Well after having tried to tighten the primary chain a number of times (about 5), I finally came to the conclusion that something strange is happening! There are wear signs in the crankcase - down the bottom and on one of the studs that hold the alternator in place.

So in order to get a better look and measure the chain I needed to remove it.
The the stator and clutch need to come off at the same time to get access. I used metric sockets to unscrew both the alternator (rotor) and the clutch centre nut after having remved the pressure plate and clutch plates, I used my home made clutch blocker and my rattle gun to remove both - no issues.

With the chain completely loose, there was play in both the clutch basket and the rotor... not normal me things. Anyway when you remove the clutch hub the rollers that form the bearing between the hub and backet fall out - there are 20! A part from a little marking on the basket grooves there was nothing untoward. So clean everything up and reassemble.

The chain measured out to be 84 links with a length of 15.75" for half length therfore 31.5 total length, which gives a pitch of 3/8" which is exactly right so the chain has not stretched at all!

T140 Primary Chain Adjustment

Primary chain on the T140, is the chain f**ked?

Daytona in Italy!

Well I have been out on a couple of trips with people from various Facebook groups to get know a few bikers and let them know that Atelier entre 2 Temps exists, anyway went to Italy for lunch on Sunday and the bike broke down about 5kms from the French border so I had to get the insurance breakdown service out to get the bike and myself home!

What happened was a tool had vibrated forward from under the passenger seat and shorted out the battery, luckily every thing seems to have been saved by a fuse, however the battery was flat so no way even to limp home. I got the bike back today and swapped out the 30amp fuse from the reg/rec and charged the battery up and all was well. The connectors from the stator to the reg/rec had got significantly hot so I renewed them at the same time. Connected up the PC and cleared all the ECU errors and away it went! Phew I thought that was going to cost me at least a new battery! I tested out the diode bridge on the rectifier and the resistance and AC output of the alternator which were all good, just lucky I guess could have been a lot worse!

FZR jetting

Just a quick note to document the change in the FZR after upping the jets to 122.5 and replacing the float bowl gaskets, also changing one of the float assemblies, as it was very loose. Anyway feedback is that there is a vaste improvement in pickup at medium throttle, and although at really high revs it is still buzzy, it is miles better,  I could maybe try a half size up - 125 again but it is good enough!

The T140 was making significant noise from the primary chain case so took it apart to find that the adjuster threads were stripped so no matter how much I adjusted it it never held the adjustment! The new one had a slightly larger diameter, so that went into the lathe to trim it down, but it is still sticking at some point and I haven't got to the bottom of it yet!

FZR 600 Jets

Upped the main jets to 122.5 from 120s, hope it makes it a bit less buzzy at the top end, also fixed a leaky fuel tap, just waiting for new float bowl gaskets to finish the job.

Daytona clutch gasket and FZR jetting

The dipstick area on the Daytona has been misting with oil, so I thought I would swap out the clutch cover gasket and the dipstick o ring. That said, I removed the fairing and removed the visible bolts (8mm), unfortunately one of the bolts is hidden behind the starter motor cover, so I had to remove the starter motor cover and the crankcase cover, thus damaging 2 gaskets! With silicone gasket cement I replaced the clutch gasket and used silicone on the other two. Doesn't seem to leak yet.

As customer bikes are slow I thought I would have a look at the FZR600 carbs and petrol leak, the leak was dealt with quickly as the petrol tap needed tweaking up, I decided to take a look at the carbs as something isn't quite right. I removed the carbs and proceeded to dismantle, nothing really to report so should I up the mains a tad....? They are 120's so I need to see who can do me some 125's..... Maybe.. I used my new ultrasonic cleaner on various bits of the FZR carbs, trying to get any crap off, we will see 

T140 won't start

Ha the bastard won't start, there are apparently sparks and petrol and compression but it won't start. It coughs occasionally first kick, but nothing afterwards. I have checked much of the wiring, and did find a wire inverted on the coils which allowed me to get the lights working! But nothing conclusive, for some reason I thing the ignition is responsible somewhere, so have been looking at troubleshooting the Boyer Bransden ignition.

The BB ignition replaces the points with a back plate with two hall effect coils on it, a rotor with two magnets  fixed to it is fixed to the crank shaft end, and this generates signals which go to the black box which fires both coils at the same time (wasted spark), although I get a spark at the plugs thought I would take a look anyway!

If you remove the black/white wire and the brown/white wire and rub them together you should see a spark at the plugs - check!

If you move a magnet across the coils you should excite them and generate a spark - check except I had to touch the coils with the magnet to get them to fire!

I used a screwdriver to test the magnets on the rotor, and there didn't seem to be any magnetic power at all, so I removed the stator plate and the rotor and effectively very little magnetic power from the magnets! Strange it says on the Boyer site that the magnets should just about support the rotor plate when lifter with steel, mine don't! Maybe this is giving a too weak signal to the hall effect coils and not generating a signal when at speed?

The price of spare parts for the ignition is ridiculous so I am going try re magnetizing the magnets...... we'll see.

Removing the back plate gives access to the small rotor with the magnets screwed onto it.

Daytona

New O'rings and new vacuum and what a difference, I couln't make it pink at all! I think we can say we got that one!

Daytona

You can remove the throttle bodies partially to replace the o'rings

Showing half of the IVAC and throttle bodies

I haven't posted for a time, as I can't make my mind up whether to use this blog as my business update or not - I am leaning towards not....

Anyway, my Daytona has been pinking a lot lately, slightly less on SP98 fuel but still anything pulling a load below 4000 rpm, and it rattles a lot..... Talking to the virtual Triumph world the prognosis is an air leak somewhere. Either the IVAC hoses are cracked (this is a typical problem) or somewhere in the admission there is a leak.

Anyway planning a bigish trip so I wanted to get it sorted. So I stripped down the throttle bodies, and I have the o'rings on order.

In the mean time a couple of things to note, there was quite bit of oil droplets in the airbox, which is unusual never seen this before, we are not talking masses but more than usual.

The IVAC hose end pieces are cracked (at least two of them), so this maybe the problem, however am going to change the o'rings as they are ordered and are cheap anyway.

On a different subject I have now wired my USB charger port back to the battery, so I now have a readout of the battery voltage (a plus) but on the minus side the charge is on the whole time (a minus), it doesn't draw much without anything connected but enough to flatten the battery after about 5 days. Temporarily I am unplugging one of the spade connectors when the bike is parked up! What is interesting is that the voltmeter reads pretty much what you would expect around 14V when running, whereas when the thing was wired into the light circuit it was measuring between 9-11V - a very significant difference and enough to make the output derisory when on the light circuit!

Ducati ignition, 888

Well I thought I would site the ignition box on the mudguard next to the battery, so I extended some of the wires and got it looking rather nice, however when I put the seat unit on, it just touched the unit so I had to move it down nearer the rear cylinder air box, not so nice, but I really can't see another place to site it.

Anyway, it started up well, although I didn't leave it running long as was in the garage with doors closed! Anyway that's pretty much finished, although I need to road test it!

The horn button on the 888 doesn't work, so I took it apart and it's a simple contact between the push switch and connectors, however the metal insert in the push button was missing along with the spring. I turned up a small insert and glued it in, and then bent a small spring into the right shape and put it all back together, the battery is on charge, so will test later.

Ducati ignition

So I am replacing the ignition system on the Darmah, because the pickups weren't working correctly on the old system, the new system replaces the pickups, the magnetic rotor, and the ignition boxes. It has LEDs to show you where the pickups are in relation to the crank position, which are then removable so you don't have flashing lights going all the time, it also has multiple ignition curves which can be selected by a rotary switch. The components that I removed were :-
The pickups and wiring loom
The Bosch boxes
The resistances
I am trying to wire up the new ignition box using the 12v feed to the coils and the return from each coil, plus the four wires coming from the new pickups.

I wanted to position the ignition box between the coils, but on checking with the supplier he suggested I keep the box well away from the HT side of the circuit. I think I have enough wiring to be able to site the box nearer the battery.

Triumph Swinging arm bushes

So as you may remember I made a little tool to  insert the bushes into the swinging arm of the Triumph, which worked very well, and was used loads of times as you will see below. The thick part of the tool is a bit smaller than the inside diameter of the swinging arm tubes, the thin part is a bit thinner than the compressed bushes. The threaded bar, is used to pull the bushes in (or out).

Unfortunately, with the bushes in, it was impossible to insert the hardened steel spacers, I forced a bit but it would wreck the bushing copper to insert completely. After much cogitating, and contacting the guys that sold me the bushes (LP Williams) I decided the only way forward was to remove material from somewhere! Using emery cloth I first cleaned up the inside of the swinging arm tubes, then working slowly I sanded some material off the inside of the bushes, trying every few minutes by inserting the bushes and then trying to fit the spacers, it took me about 10 attempts as I didn't want to have play in the swinging arm!

Eventually managed to get a tight fit and using my tool on the second spacer to pull it in, the spacers have a tendency to displace the bushes and can cover the grease nipple hole so I screwed a screw (metric) into the hole to prevent the bush from moving over the hole, this worked fine although need to make sure it is not proud of the bush otherwise there will be contact with the spacer!