Slow Monster rebuild

[Albie]

would it not be same thickness as speedo drive unit ?

[Mr Gazza]

I'm fairly sure that the space is usually occupied by the speedo drive gearbox. I guess if you are driving the speedo some other way (electronically?) then you will need a spacer instead. Maybe someone could mic up a gearbox for you to get the dim?

Edit.. Yeah, what Albie said.

[350TSS]

I could have made a spacer that matched the diameter of the inner wheel bearing race (30mm), but in aluminium, this may have been too "crushable".
I decided the spacer should match the machined face on the inside of the fork leg (33mm).
Rather than a plain tube type bush which would leave the seal exposed to the elements, I opted for a wasted bush that fitted inside the bearing housing (50mm) and reduced to 33mm.
Here it is (needs a cleanup and a buff before I fit it)

This took a long time to make as I cannot hold 50mm bar in a 3 jaw chuck and had to use a 4 jaw which means a long time trying to get the workpiece to run true.

[350TSS]

One other job got done today and that was to reduce the width of the RH rear wheel adjuster so that it clears my rear brake caliper hanger bracket.
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A 1mm cutting disc in a 110mm angle grinder did the business followed by a 2nd cut file.

[350TSS]

One step forward two steps backwards yesterday. I fitted the carburettors and realised there would be a clash between the float bowls and the proposed location for the starter solenoid, currently mounted on the battery tray.
I trimmed the battery tray accordingly with no real idea where the solenoid could fit. Clearly from a fire safety point of view, above and away from the carburettors would be preferable. Trimming the tray had the disbenefit that it now not as well located within the frame.

Then I started to fit the MU unit mounts and found that because of the way the spacers from the ignition key worked it was going to be a horribly fiddly job to assemble so I modified the mounting of that and made up some new spacers.

This then caused me to think there would be a very near clash between the battery tray and the MU unit. In that space, all the wiring harness congregates around the MU unit, the battery and the Ignitech unit, 4 sub harnesses going forward to the headlamp and instruments and 3 going back to the coils, rear lights, camera and neutral and rear brake lights switches.

I always intended to install a lithium-ion battery (electrical engineers will cringe at this choice) but I designed the battery space on the basis of the lead-acid battery originally installed and in the same orientation physically. Thus I could buy a LiPO4 battery the same physical size as the lead-acid original and get maybe twice the cranking amps as I am definitely too old/arthritic to consider bump starting as any sort of option.
Now is absolutely the right time to reconsider that philosophy, the available space is extremely constrained and with nowhere to put the starter solenoid does not work anyway, the existing trimmed battery tray does not have the security of fixing that it needs and the existing battery tray looks pretty awful anyway.

The original battery spec, YB16AL-2, is 205mm x 70mm x 162mm (2324cc) with 190 Cold Cranking Amps. After a bit of internet research, I have found a LiPO4 with all the bells and whistles, balancing circuits, LED indicators with 4 terminal posts at 130mm x 65mm x 93mm (786cc) with 300 CCA.

Time to redesign and re-make the battery tray.

[350TSS]

No physical progress over the last couple of days but a clear direction has emerged.
There were two issues to resolve, a smaller battery tray and a new brake lever to avoid my chain tensioner.
My first reaction, when confronted with an issue like the battery tray, is to get into making something to see if it works. This is expensive in materials and time because it usually doesn't. No change on this occasion.

Two 3mm aluminium plates were cut to shape and an appreciable amount of time was spent laboriously squaring them up as I am congenitally incapable of cutting material square.

After about three hours buggering about and contemplating my navel I realised that my proposed design involving parallel plates hung off the frame and attached to the only available fixed point on the frame required me to be accurate in three dimensions and with at least two compound angles for it to be secure in it's chosen location. This design would almost certainly be almost impossible to insert into the frame without removing the carburettors.


There were two chances of this ever working, slim and none.

The second design will be much easier to execute and will be in CF, so half the probable weight of the first. Unfortunately, it requires quite an intricate lay up and as I have run out of the 200gm weave, I have to wait for delivery of fresh supplies of CF.

As far as the gear lever is concerned, I ordered the 6mm plate to fabricate it and this has arrived. Whilst pondering my proposed design I thought that it would be so much better if the bearing surfaces, on the footrest peg itself and, where the reaction rod takes the message to the gear change splined shaft, were sintered bronze bushes, this means that I am also waiting for deliveries of vital raw material.

Hopefully, the postman will curtail this paralysis tomorrow.

[350TSS]

The postman delivered the CF but nothing else today.

First, I cut 2 x CF sheets 95mm x 246mm from the larger sheet I made earlier, then I bonded them together. These will sit across the horizontal frame rails in front of the carburettor float bowls. At about 6mm thick this is incredibly rigid and easily capable of supporting the weight of the battery (600g). This should lift out, once the battery is removed and will be retained vertically by 2 x 5mm socket cap screws through the washers welded to the inside of the frame to support the wiring harness and provide mounting points for the air scoops.

I found some thin wall steel tube that fits nicely over the two horizontal frame rails just in front of the carburettor float bowls. This was cut at 100mm and then sliced longitudinally into segments about 70 degrees on the circumference. These will sit on the frame rails with the two CF sheets (bonded together) between them.

To retain the battery itself I have used a yellow plastic sharps bin (my weekly dose of immune system suppressant comes as injections and they nearly always deliver a sharps bin with it) cutting about 50mm off the bottom.
This plastic " cup" will be attached to the underside of the CF plates and laminated in place with about 4 layers of CF. The width of the yellow plastic is only about 15mm less than the width of the CF so I figured it would be better to laminate first then cut the hole to slot the battery into the top.
Once the CF is cured I will extract the plastic cup afterwards.
I got as far as bonding the CF plates to the steel tube. This took a long time as I had to get the CF plates exactly the right length so they did not intrude into space above the frame rail. effectively the transverse CF plate is tangential to the two horizontal tubes. If they extend much above these tubes I would have to modify my air scoops. Work stopped on this while the CF to steel bonding cured.

I then roughly cut out the shape of my gear lever, which in profile looks like a cross-section of a flaccid male reproductive organ from a year 8 sex education textbook.
I need a bush/spacer 3/4" wide with a 7/8" hole bored through it to spacer the gear lever itself away from the footrest hanger plate. The spacer will need a flange (c 1.1/2") to attach it to the lever via 3 x 3mm x 12mm SS socket cap screws. I was halfway through drilling the 7/8" hole when the drive belt on my lathe parted and there was no spare in evidence. That obviously stopped progress on that front.

Finally, I spent some time making the rear wheel adjusters slide within the swinging arm. I had two options here remove the powder coating from inside the swinging arm or remove material from the adjuster block. I chose the latter which on subsequent reflection was probably the wrong option as I suspect with use the compression of the powder coating will cause it to flake off and then the adjuster blocks will be a bit sloppy or cause excessive compression of the swinging arm extrusion.
In my defence, I could think of no way to remove the powder coating for the length of the adjustment (c45mm) without causing the extreme ends of the swinging arm to be tapered.

[350TSS]

The gear lever is now finished apart from polishing and buffing.
In the first picture, I made up a dummy battery to be sure the dimensions would fit and did not interfere with the carburettor float bowls.
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This is it as fitted.


The battery tray is as I write this curing in the garage in front of a fan heater. I used 3 laminations of CF so it will be a lot lighter than the Mk 1 version and I think there will be room on the right-hand side to mount the starter solenoid and the re-settable main fuse (RCD).
Here are pictures of the battery tray immediately prior to CF lamination.


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The rear-drive chain is now also fitted and riveted up. I measured the width across the other links in the chain and then pressed the new rivet link on and managed to get it to within 0.05mm the same.
Applying the chain press individually did not however mean that the squashed head was the same size as the other rivet heads on the rest of the chain, probably because the mandrel in the riveter is a bit bolloxed. The rivet heads were 0.18mm larger than the pins that go through the rollers so I do not think they will be coming off.

One small failure today, I tried to make up the main starter motor cable. I am using 16mm multi-core welding cable and the terminal lugs to fit the starter motor end are fairly robust, so much so that my HD hand-held crimper does not have enough leverage to work. I tried crimping the lug in the vice between two 5mm Allen keys but it just squished the cable out. I think I will manage it that way but I may waste a few lugs until I get the technique.

Finally, one state of play picture

Very impressive constructional talents!

Without wading back through 70 pages of details, may I ask why the drive-chain tensioner? I see you've retained the slotted swingarm with the diabolical bit of tin to locate the axle rather than go to a fixed rear wheel position. A custom chain tensioner should avoid all risk of damaging the gearbox bearings by having the chain over-tightened, but a modicum of chain-slack works for most of us!

Nick

[Dukedesmo]

Originally Posted by Mr Gazza

I'm fairly sure that the space is usually occupied by the speedo drive gearbox. I guess if you are driving the speedo some other way (electronically?) then you will need a spacer instead. Maybe someone could mic up a gearbox for you to get the dim?

Edit.. Yeah, what Albie said.

I've had a couple made, for both the Monster and 916 - basically a 30mm long ally spacer.

[350TSS]

The Clockie - why a rear chain tensioner? - because commuting in London on the bike the transmission was quite harsh, low revs, slipping the clutch, filtering etc
It could have been a decidedly worn clutch basket or a poorly lubricated chain /worn sprockets etc. that was one of the abiding memories of the bike before I parked it against the garage wall for 10 years.
Anything that would smooth the transmission and was a challenge to make /design was, therefore, something I should at least try, no stronger rationale than that

Did you think of tapering the throttle advance to make it progressive? That works wonders on bikes with on/off motors like Ducatis, making it much easier to feed in power smoothly. I made a progressive drum for the twistgrip of my ST4 which improved the low-speed manners a great deal, but not before I'd snapped my lower leg beneath it when I stalled on a walking-pace turn! The G2 Throttle-Tamer does the same thing (not break your leg!) and you can rapidly catch up on the power with a few extra degrees of turn.

[350TSS]

I haven't considered the modified cam throttle because that was the first I heard of them.
I will try my rear chain tensioner first and see if it a) works at all and b) removes some of the snatchiness. With the chain correctly adjusted (c25mm up and down play in the middle of the chain run with the bike on the ground) and with the tensioner bungee disengaged, the top run of the chain sags about 8mm at the mid point between the sprockets. Engaging the tensioner causes the top run to be straight with virtually no sag so I am hopeful it might work.
Today was supposed to be packing the silencer with some sound deadening fleece and polishing the exhaust and fitting it. When I took the DB killer out of the end there was wadding already inside behind a welded in perforated almost full length inner tube so there was nothing for me to do but polish the can and the pipes on the buffer.
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I also did the brake lever and a couple of other alloy bits.
ETTC is now down to 124 hours Inclusive of a re-siting and re-manufacture of a mounting for the regulator rectifier which will not work where I had planned to fit it.

[Darren69]

The snatching is probably more likely to be down to poor fuelling at low rpm. On the ie bikes this can be fixed easily with a custom fuel msp. Carb bikes are the same its just harder to fix.

[Mr Gazza]

I don't have the swinging arm sticker any more, but I'm sure the recommended slack in the middle of the lower run is 30mm? The picture makes it clear that this means 30mm including the chain at the top and bottom of the play.