More CT70 fun...

More CT70 love here…  After reading some about a friends scooter racing adventures got my minibikes back into my mind.  The fact I am broke and could pretty much do some parts bin work helped too.  After some more reading I realized that I do need a battery for the 70 to run proper, and many hours of looking at the wiring diagram I sorted out a new one.  A lot of the work was undoing the work I did a few years ago stripping the harness.  I wired the lights back in, less the turn signals, planning on platting it after I go back to NH next time.  I’ll get the necessary paperwork from my dad and can have a silly plated CT70 just because I can.  Overall everything in this project took way longer than it will to read, or to be honest longer than it really should have.  To be fair I have been bleeding from the brain trying to keep up with my chem homework so it all works out.  Besides this is for fun, or something like that, or so I keep telling, myself.  Anyways back to the fun…


The broken OEMish set-up.


The years were not kind...

After an hour or so of looking at the wiring diagram I realized I had switchgear that wasn’t knackered that would work.  Since I had stripped the OEM stuff off of my CB360 I recycled that onto the mighty 70.  This let me play with the multimeter some to ensure I knew what all the wires did.  Not surprising for 1970’s Honda parts the casting were almost identical, I was even able to swap the throttle tube right over from the 70 into the 360 unit.  Besides having more switches to work off of I also had a brake assembly that would accommodate a brake light sensor.  Double plus awesome there.  Anyways after hours and many revisions I worked up a new working wiring harness diagram.  Besides deleting the turn signals I also eliminated the keyed ignition.  I do not have a good one to use, and even plated doubt I would really take this bike around town.  Making a wiring diagram was the easy part, then I had to draw a new one showing where the wires would go and what I could put into shrinkwrap to run from one end of the bike to another.  Another hurdle was making a battery box, since the OEM is long since gone. 


The "new" switch gear circa 1974.

After more than a few tries to weld 20ga metal with my welder (I am sure my welder can do it, I just can not) I moved to 16ga.  Last minute after some bad measuring I changed how it was going to be mounted I was able to make a workable box.  I also found that my sheet metal brake that Rock supplied as payment for work on his former KZ400 would handle 16ga.  Sorta wish I knew that when I was working on that KZ650 battery box a few weeks ago.  Anyways some paint and plenty of drying time the battery box was good to go.


Layout and bending...


Ready for paint.


Final test fitting.

Since no one has bothered to make a sealed battery for 6v bikes I stole the idea to use a security light battery from one of the Honda minibike part suppliers.  Damn near the same specs as the factory Honda battery for less coin and I can mount it sideways.

Now was the time for running wiring and checking the wiring many times too many with the multimeter.  I found out the shrink wrap I bought was the wrong size, but pressed on.  After more than a week messing with this when I had time I wanted to hear her run.  There were some more “angry moments” when I mounted the tank and messed up some of the wiring.  After that I was able to finally fuel her up and see if this whole project was for nothing…

She fired!  The carb is still grossly out of tune, but the battery did make a HUGE difference.  After minimal messing with the carb I was able to start the bike using my hand on the kicker first try, on a cold motor.  I know this is a small motor and hand kicking it isn’t that hard, but I was impressed.  I chalk this up for a victory none the less.  Still have a bunch of tuning to do, but things are looking good, this makes me happy.  There is also a good chance I will redo the wiring soon so I can shrinkwrap the wiring running the length of the bike, but modifying a running and laid harness that is proven is so much easier than doing it from diagrams I made. 

Sometimes it is the small things, not just that it is a small bike, but a project that doesn’t matter.  Things like the battery box were an engineering exercise for future projects that I know are going to come my way.  I know this isn’t the only bike I will have to rewire, and doing things correct seem to mean more to me these days.  I have the time, I am going to keep the bike, why keep doing it over and over again, when once right and that will be it.  Other than the tuning I have other things in mind for this project.  I have a café seat for a small bore bike that might make its way onto this bike.  The bars have been bent and welded too many times, but I have a few extra sets of Husky bar clamps that should work and allow me to use any minibike bar.  The exhaust will finish getting wrapped, these will happen.  If nothing else small low cost victories can make an otherwise ego hurting world of college classes and weak job market bearable.


Next project?

State of the garage address…

I have no idea how often I will do something like this, but with the lack of progress I feel I should throw general update up.  The past year or two has brought many changes to the garage and inventory.  Tooling is much better, my knowledge has grown, and the overall class of bikes has improved.  In the past two years the KTM was added, a bike that is hands down the best off-road motorcycle I have ever owned.  The Suzuki DR350 that helped me back into the off-road fold after a small break was sold at a profit.  A 1981 Suzuki GS750 16v spent some time in the garage and has happly been passed to a new home.  I also stepped into the vintage motocross scene, so far the Hammer and Tongs series.  Sadly I am now officially waving off any other racing this season due to lack of funds, the current goal it to be back for the start of next season with at least one bike if not two.  Also if I am using a two year back marker for this opening address the proud 2006 Triumph Scrambler was swapped out for a 2007 Triumph Tiger 1050i.  Now on to the bikes…

2007 Triumph Tiger 1050i:  Over all nothing but great things to report here.  The bike has served me well since day one.  After a few months of getting her properly sorted with crash bars, HID lights, hard luggage, skid plate, and hand guards she has needed nothing more than regular services.  In October of 2008 when she was bought there was just over 2,000 miles on the odometer, currently she is sitting just shy of 25,000 miles.  The valve clearance was checked and still in spec.  I final beat up the fork seals to the degree that they needed to be replaced, I also added the Moose neoprene seal protectors that have worked well on the KTM.  Pivot-pegz have started making a very aggressive foot peg for the Tiger, and the stockers have been replaced with the fine Australian Pivot-Pegz.  The stockers left a lot to desire in the wet, mainly the grip to keep your foot on the pegs.  As with anything I do have a very short list of things I want to do.  High on the list are some auxiliary driving or fog lights to help compensate for the inherent flaws in projector beam headlights on a motorcycles.  For those who are not savvy on this subject, projector beams work great in the straight line, but leave you quite literally in the dark when you lean the bike over in a turn.  I also need to wire the bike up with heated grips, this has stayed low on the list mostly to the heated gloves I have, but it is on the list none the less

1997.5 KTM 200 EXC:  As I have mentioned this is by far the finest off-road motorcycle I have ever owned.  It has made me a better rider, and really not left me much to do with her other than ride.  After the second time replacing the fork seals they seem to be holding, the fork boots are probably to credit largely for that.  I am currently working on dialing in the suspension for my weight, this is just a matter of adjusting the fully adjustable suspension.  I also plan on changing the handle bar out to improve the ergonomics  while standing on the pegs.  Other than adding a skid plate and swapping to steel friction disks in the clutch this bike has been nothing short of “Ready to Race” as advertised.

1979 Husqvarna CR250:  This was part of the pair of vintage Husky’s I bought to get into vintage racing,  This one was far more apart than the CR400 that it can with, but did include more spares.  With the engine coming already in a box I could see it needed a top end, and it was missing the carb.  I was able to get a very good deal on a 1981ish Husky 250WR with a blown up clutch.  After much waiting I pulled the trigger and bought the case tool needed to reassemble the cases and have a running motor.  Currently the transition parts are laid out on the work bench and I have a feeling the motor will be back together soon.  The parts bike also yielded a set of good 40mm forks to replace the 35mm forks that were on the 1979 CR250.  Lots of other good parts went into the parts bin to include a second set of Ohlins rear shocks.  Right now I am figuring this bike will need less than $300.00 in parts to get her race ready, be it still ugly, barring the $200.00 of engine tools.  I hope to not only have this ready for VMX next year, but also the vintage class at the Odessa Desert 100.

1978 Honda CT70:  As shown here this bike did receive quite an over haul in the past year.  Still not 100% but is very close and will be completed when funds and desire line back up.  Right now there are too many other bikes on the front burners, being I do not have a yard I can play with this bike in this will stay low on the list of projects.

1975 Honda Z50:  This was a parts bike that I picked up while working on the CT70.  After realizing how complete it is I have decided to bring it back as a runner.  No real work has been done other than figuring out what it needs.  After finding out my sisters were pregnant I was thinking of rebuilding it for my niece or nephew.  Not sure if I will do that still, keep it as another vintage pit bike, or sell it off to finance another project.  It takes up very little space, so for now it sits on the shelf torn down.

1974 Honda CB360 Café Racer:  This is another bike that I documented well during my work on the past few years.  Currently she is sitting 90% complete, I am still making progress, be it very slowly.  Right now the big project I am currently working on is the seat assembly.  I am sure I will post more pictures in a dedicated post, but pretty much I am dealing with a very time intensive ground up fiberglass build.  Other than the seat being completed, the tank needs to be coated (fiberglass and gas don’t mix well anymore), a rear brake linkage needs to be made, and the Magura lever assemblies need to be swapped out for units with the proper pull. Overall it is getting very close, but most of my funds keep getting diverted to keeping the daily runners (KTM, Triumph) at 100% and getting the Huskies back on the track. 

1972 Husqvarna CR400:  This went from a “running” basket case, to a semi restored race bike, to a blown up race bike in less than two months.  The rise and fall I did document fairly well here.  Anyways right now she sits needed around $1,000.00 worth of parts from the engine exploding.  I have a feeling I might end up getting a parts bike when the time comes to soften the blow, but this is a very back burner project right now.  I did dump a fair amount of money into this bike to get it on the track, but I have a feeling that the CR250 will be back on the track first.  So for now she sits noblely wearing number plates, with the topend off the motor as a somber reminder of the unforgiving nature of the track.

Crashing still sucks…

The title pretty much says it all, bouncing off the ground has not all of a sudden become awesome.  I would even be as bold as to say that when you do it less it seems to suck more.  Its not that I don’t chuck the KTM most times when I take it out, I do.  For the most part they are  low speed jump off the bike, riding it out into the weeds while hard on the brakes, or something of that like.  It has been a few years since I have done the out of control rag doll.  Before anyone worries too much, I am fine, a bit sore, but ok.  The KTM that I stuffed into the ground with myself is pretty much no worse for wear, there are some new stress marks on the front fender and headlight mask, but it is a dirt bike and I do not need to order any parts.  Now for what happened.

So this is what I think happened…  I was on wide singletrack (about 1-½’ wide path) and gassed it to loft the front wheel over a whoop type rut and didn’t give it enough gas.  The front wheel bounced off the top of the far side of the whoop instead of clearing it.  I am pretty sure this was the first piece of my demise.  Anyways that crossed my bars up a little, so when the front wheel came down with me still on the gas, possibly in power band still, the front end pushed a little.  I tried to stuff my right foot down to pop the bike back onto track, this didn’t feel to good, I guess stuff down a booted leg to right over four hundred pounds of bike and flesh doesn’t always work or make ones knee feel awesome.  Now with the KTM sliding out and dropping to the ground I find myself rodeo style with both feet off the pegs and my throttle hand ripped off the bar.  The front tire finds raised edge of where the trail ends and the woods start back up, the back end of the bike slides around a little bit as the rest of the moment dies.  In the split second that I am in the air getting ready to find the earth again I notice (and this stuck out in my mind afterward) that my throttle had is just sitting out by itself.  I pull my arm to my chest and shoulder check the ground, I don’t think the ground got out of my way.  From the failed lofting of the front wheel to laying on the ground probably only took a second or two, reading it takes a lot longer.  Laying on the ground with my KTM’s motor silent I hear the other two bikes I was riding with get farther away, everything hurts.  I take a moment and just lay there trying to mentally do a systems check.  For those of you who have not spent lots of time hurting yourself, pain right after impact is generally good, it means you are not in shock and nothing is hurt too bad.  After about thirty seconds my legs don’t hurt and my right side is feeling better.  After taking my helmet, goggles, and gloves off  I get the KTM back on her feet and off the trail.  My left forearm still isn’t feeling good, so I pace back in forth on the trail wiggling my wrist to see if I have lost any range of motion and feel for swelling.  Everything is pointing to me being sore for a while.  I hear the sound of my riding buddies heading my way, when they arrive I make the call to head back to the truck.  On the ride back out (dozen miles or so of trail) I take it a bit easier than I normally do and my arm doesn’t feel too bad, though it didn’t like lateral motion that much.  Otherwise the ride out was pretty drama free.

Now before anyone decides to be a smartass and bring up that crashing is part of dirt biking and I need to just suck it up, I know this and I am not griping here.  Like when anything goes awry it is always best to try to sort out what happened.  Times like these I just end up popping Advil while working it out.  I do find it interesting as well how hard it can be to work out what happened in the few second span of time that is a crash.  It makes sense that you would not remember every detail of a ride, the highlight reel normally is what sticks in your head, not the little rock that threw you to the ground.  I also have no doubt in my mind if the terrain had allowed me to ride into the trees on the right side I would not be writing any of this.  A few little things add up, you hit the ground, then all the little details get dragged out.

Overdue catch-up

So I am long over due for an update on my blog, sorry about that, I have been a bit busy.  For a quick catch up here we go, slightly out of order.  Brought the Tiger to Twinline in Seattle for their dyno day, put down the highest BHP at 107.49.  I was laid off and now I am currently a college student again working on a AS transfer degree in mechanical engineering, thanks to the GI Bill.  My roommates all moved away and I moved into my own place, just over 500sqft of living space and just under 500sqft of garage space, it is awesome.  The GS750 ran, then had oiling problems, and finally I managed to unload it on someone for $450.00.  Less than I was hoping to get for it, but still more than I had into it.  I have bought another Husky to use as a parts donor.  It’s a 1981 XC250 with a blown up bottom end.  So far the 40mm forks have found a new home on my 1979 Husky CR250, the topend and carb will be on there soon as well.  The parts from this bike should allow me to get the 250 running before the end of the Hammer and Tongs season and for the AHRMA race at the Farm.  I have also made some progress on the CB360, after many attempts I think I have finally sorted out a seatpan/tail section.  A battery box has been made, and the rest should come together nicely.  I also went to the Desert 100 at Odessa and ran the Ironman poker run on the KTM, I might do a separate write up on that, good fun. 

Vintage Motocross Project: 1972 Husky CR400, Epic Failure

This is another late post, this picks up the day after my last one...

  
A glimpse and total internal combustion fail. 

Thursday night I start back into the motor after the big bang and now stuck motor.  I wasn't felling too bad about the work, I figured it was going to be something easy or something that was going to have me miss the race on Saturday.  With my fingers crossed hoping for something simple I drained the tank, then pulled the tank and seat.  When I pulled the exhaust I heard metal in the pipe, game over for racing in the near future.  


Chunks of piston and sleeve that dumped out of the pipe.
  
For those who do not know, metal chunks in the exhaust means the motor grenadeed itself.  I dump a small pipe of metal out of the pipe and onto the workbench, I can see it has chunks of the sleeve not just the piston in the pile.  Pulling the head it did not look too bad, then the fun of removing the cylinder came.  


Chunks I picked out of the motor itself, some piston, sleeve and connecting rod...

I should have been able to just lift the cylinder off of the motor, but then again if I was able to do that the motor would not have been seized either.  A quick change in music (from Cake to Rammstein) fit the change from race prep to an autopsy.  The industrial music fit a lot better with the big dead blow hammer that was needed to force the cylinder and piston apart.  As the piston and the cylinder started to separate I was able to see the damage, and what most likely was the cause.  


Broken conrod...


The crank with lots of crap still stuck to it, it will wait until I split the cases for proper clean up.


After I was able to get the topend off, the piston was still stuck in the bore and needed to be hammered out...

All said and done the piston has the better part of it's skirt broken off, the connecting rod broke where the wrist pin goes through it, and the sleeve had large chunks of it shattered off of it.  I think the pictures tell the tail pretty well.

In my best judgment the cause of this terminal failure of the motor was largely due to the missing base gasket.  It turns out the last person to assemble this motor decided that it was not needed or something.  That is not to say the carburetor jamming open didn't contribute to the problem, but I think most engines would have been able to run at WFO for 5 seconds or so without failing.  The missing gasket would have cause the bike to run very lean, which would explain the failure during warm-up at the last race as well.  The big kick in the pants on this one is I almost pulled the cylinder off when I was doing the timing to replace the base gasket, but decided to save it and use it for when I planned on rebuilding the motor over the winter. 

The parts hunt is now on, and turning out to be a bit of a pain.  I found the parts and it looks like it will cost me a little under a grand to get all of this fixed.  This will have to wait for other things in my life to get sorted before I can blow the cash.  I am not going to enjoy this, but I am reminding myself that even after I dump the correct amount of money into it I will still have less into it than I would have spent to get a race ready bike.

Vintage Motocross Project: 1972 Husky CR400

Note: I wrote this on Thursday, but am just now posting it...

Back to working on the motor, I picked up where my break down during warm-up (a DNF would sound almost better somehow) problem started. After waiting over a week for the replacement woodruff keys to come in I finally start the work on it. First step was to lap the flywheel to the crankshaft, hopefully this will help prevent it from coming off in the future. Timing the motor was a bit of a process, but not too tricky over all. After getting all of the tools I needed, which in and of its self was the biggest pain of the process. It seems no one stocks a 25mm socket locally, I ended up using a 1", I will find the proper tool later. Anyways back to the job at hand, the threaded spark plug hole insert for the dial indicator that I borrowed from my friend didn't work. The combustion chamber on this motor was just too tall. Pulling the head off the motor I was able to get the dial indicator on the piston and timing it was not a problem. All said and done the timing had been set to far advanced before, which could have cause the problem with the flywheel coming loose.

Dial indicator measuring the distance before TDC

Everything in the right spot, the flywheel with the timing pin inserted.

The marker lines are where the timing was set, a noticeable difference from the correct setting.

After getting all of the covers back on and the oil filled back it I went to start it. After a dozen kicks or so it started... But the throttle was jammed WFO and the motor revved all the way out of a few seconds before I was able to reach the kill button. *BANG* The drive gear coming off the crank shaft fell off, but the flywheel was still on. I remounted the gear, making sure the tapered shaft and the inside of the gear mating surfaces were clean. The motor is jammed, I am really crossing my fingers that it is not seized, but it is not looking too good. I can stand on the kicker and it does not move at all.

I'm going to pull the head and probably the jug too. Hopefully this can be worked around and I can still make the starting grid.

Mixed bag of bikes

I have been lazy updating this, then lazy posting this too. I wrote this on Tuesday and now it is Saturday that I am posting this. So this will be the first part of a big string of updates. I took a week off after the last race to just relax and get parts on order and got side tracked with some other projects.

My first project was getting my 2007 Triumph Tiger 1050i to run breath better. Anyone who has ridden with me has heard the big backfires and smelt overall rich smelling exhaust. Both are byproducts from the "race style" exhaust modifications I made last year. I have tried a handful of different tunes over the past year without much luck; at the end of the day I think the bike was just not sucking enough air to balance out the open exhaust. After hearing that I can stuff a Speed Triple tune into it if I swap the air box over to a Speed Triple specification unit I figured I would just try to modify the current airbox. The Tiger ended up get getting her spring cleaning too, it’s a bit weird seeing it all clean and shinny.

After opening the airbox and looking at the openings for the throttle bodies compared to the opening in the airbox (which is a lot smaller on the Tiger than the other 1050i motors) there is no doubt why the motor is having a tough time breathing.

The snorkel pulled out laying next the the intakes, note the size difference.

The two holes the bike now breaths though, the snorkel only used one of the holes to suck air though.

I pulled the snorkel out, opening the second air box breather hole up as well. Even with the same tune (I think I currently have the Arrow Race tune) it is running a lot better, almost no popping on deceleration, and it is popping now not huge "BANG" backfires as unburnt fuel just cooks off in the exhaust system. I am pretty happy at this point with it, next time I am at the Triumph shop I will probably try a Speed Triple race tune or something.

The second project was changing the seals and fork oil on both the Husqvarnas. The inside of the CR400 forks were not too bad, but I had also changed the oil before the last race. On both the bikes getting the oil forks seals out was a little bit of a pain, I ended up taking a Dremel tool to the seals to make it easier.

Cutting the old seals out, and you can also see the awesome double seal set-up.

While I was in the forks I did find the CR400 fork springs are undersized and in need of replacement. I also noted that the fork travel on it is a meager 6". The CR250 forks were pretty gross inside, as you can see in the picture there was a lot of muddy burnt up old oil at the bottom of the tubes.

Yummy muddy crap I found in the fork tube.

The oil that was in the forks didn't really smell too bad when I dumped it, so I think it might have been changed at some point and the guts were just not cleaned out. I used 30wt fork oil in both sets of forks, hopefully that will do fine, the factory manual calls for 10wt-30wt motor oil. I also pulled out the CR250 and washed it off a bit to take the "before" picture.

Don't mind the gaping hole where there is no motor.

The only other things really was a night put into trying to get the GS750 running so I can sell it, and spending a good part of the past weekend helping my buddy Zach get his GS500 back on the road again after a year slumber. Between that and helping Kellen with motorcycle and motorcycle gear shopping I have been dubbed a "Motorcycle Superhero." So that is pretty rad too.

Race Report: Hammer & Tongs VMX @ Woodland 06MAR10

Race Report: Hammer & Tongs VMX @ Woodland 06MAR10
By: Flat_Black_Rat


The beast in the fog before the sun cut away the dark.

After the massive push down to the 11ish hour to get the Husky ready to go for race day I found myself dragging my ass out of bed before the sun. The issues I had on Friday night that made what should have been a short night in the garage and a full night of sleep and very late and sleepless night. Driving south down I5 with the sun starting to break though the darkness was pretty cool, same feel as a building crescendo at the beginning of a song. Some coffee, cold pizza and a bunch of miles latter I pulled into the track and found parking. The air was still chilly and the sun was still burning off the fog and cold from the night. After refilling my coffee from my thermos I wonder over to sign in for my races, vintage amateur open and vintage amateur +30 (should be -40 but they never changed the name). After that it was time to unload the bike, get my riding boots on and warm the bike up before the riders meeting. The riders meeting was the typical stuff, it’s a nice day, have fun, don’t be stupid, ect.. Then it was time for practice.


Pretty shot of the Husky pre-practice.

I was stoked for practice, the fraction of a mile of pavement I had been able to ride the Husky to make sure it was in good working order was not the preparation I had wanted heading into a race. I had also never raced motocross of any sort, I have always claimed to be a woods guy, and have a few hare scrambles in the C class under my belt. With the bike warmed up I dawned my chest protector and helmet and headed to the start point. I pulled to the back of the starting area. I had no intention of trying to warm up with the expert riders on bikes that might have been only a few years newer than my 1972 Husky CR400, but the technology on the evo class bikes (1974-1980 and unlimited suspension travel) dwarfed what my Husky offered. I will say it was an impressive lot of hardware present. I would guess there was at least 100 bikes waiting for the green light to run the track. I have seen dirt bikes of this number before, but normally modern era stuff, not vintage and post vintage (evolution). It was everything from mid 1960s Euro bikes to 1980 vintage Japanese stuff there was even a v-twin Harley in the mix. When practice finally started I waited for the guys chomping at the bit to tear off and started my bike up to get a few laps in. The torque this bike puts down is impressive, from I am guessing about 2k it starts pulling like a tractor until it runs out of steam at 7kish. I guess the shocking part is not the fact it pulls low, but it pulls like a two-stroke (which it is) from so low without the huge two-stroke hit at the end. After the first few turns and table tops I am starting to get the feel for the bike. The new tires are biting good and I know I pulled the front wheel off the ground a few times going over some of the crests. After each turn I was feeling more and more comfortable on the bike. It didn’t really feel like any other dirt bike I have owned, but I guess if anything it was vaguely reminiscent of the 2006 Triumph Scrambler I had abused off road a few time. Just for the fact the suspension was lacking, don’t get me wrong I mean vaguely, the Husky is a lot lighter and felt a lot more sure footed. After I finish the first lap and start getting into the second on I am really starting to feel good on the bike, then the motor dies.

I pull off to the side of the track and try to refire it, but the kicker is doing nothing. I am not talking about the bike does not want to fire, rather the kicker is not moving the piston. I can tell it is moving the transition, so I push it back to the truck. On the walk back I am trying to figure out what could have failed, going through my knowledge of motorcycle drive trains. I figured the motor wasn’t seized since the transmission still was functioning with the kicker and a seized motor would mean the kicker would not do anything. Back at the truck I grab the shop manual and drop the tailgate of the truck and start to look at the parts fiches. I figured baring splitting the cases the problem would be under the left side case cover, so I get to work on that. The sun is out now, I can see it is going to be a beautiful day, but I am more worried about getting this fixed before practice is over, or at least before my first moto. I drain the oil and remove the cover in what I felt was a respectable time. I find the nut that holds the gear to the crankshaft that moves the power from the crank to the gearbox sitting at the bottom of the case.


The gear and nut in question are the ones all the way to the left meshing into the clutch basket.

The gear and shaft that it mounted to were both tapered, so since I lacked the proper tools to do this I used the best method I could think of. I wiped both parts down, then tapped the gear with a dead blow hammer to seat it. I got lucky and had a penny in the cab of my truck to stuff into the gear then proceeded to torque the nut down as much as I could, I think the torque spec was 90nm. After that I tried the kicker and could feel it was moving the piston, awesome I am still in the game! Get the cover back on and dump some oil back into the cases. Try to kick it and damn it is hard to kick, a lot harder than before. The big dumb animal in me came out and I jumped on the kicker like a retard, after a few tires I stopped winded and thought some. I pulled the plug to check the plug and clear out the motor. Still kicked a bit hard, then went back to normal. Hmmm, soft seize maybe? Then I check for spark, there was none. Try another plug, still no dice, change the plug boot (the one on it was old) no love. I skipped over checking the coil even though I brought a spare, and went right to the right side cover and the flywheel. Sure as shit the flywheel ate another woodruff key.


Game over in my hand.

Sitting on the ground after a good and semi effective effort (one problem was fixed) at fixing the bike, with the sounds of practice dieing down I admitted defeat. Strangely I was ok with it, not angry at all, even with all of the mid-night oil I burned this past week and the large chunk of money I had spent to get the bike ready for this race. Not to mention the fact I dropped $25 on the gate fee and another $45 for entry fees I got only one lap of practice in. Deep down with all of the sins and signs of a rough past I knew I should have checked the motor over better, but I ran out of time and rolled the dice, and went down swinging. With a silent promise to myself that I will be ready for the next race and I will just watch this race sitting in my riding pants and boots.

As I was settling in sitting on my bike stand to watch the races one of the guys parked by me wandered by and ask if I was going to get it running before I had to race. I admitted failure and explained what was wrong. His buddy came over too and mentioned that he knew someone who might have one, and I should just walk around asking everyone with a Husky or any Euro bike with if they had a spare woodruff key for a Motoplat flywheel. They walked around with me introducing me to people and helping me canvas the area. End of that still no part, it really isn’t a trackside repair type part. I did realize that this was a really cool group of people, everyone was friendly and I believe they were honest when they were like “If I had on I would hook you up.” At this point I call off my friend that was on his way down to watch me race and settle back down into my bike stand with a bottle of water to watch the races for a while.

One of the guys that helped me look for a woodruff key (I cannot remember his name for the life of me) came back over and said “I have an old Yami 250 in the trailer if you want to race it.” I was a bit stunned, and said yes, not worried when he proceeded to go though the things that were wrong with it, little things like shagged out tires and hates to start or idle. With a new spring in my Alpinestar Tech 6’s I wander over to the tower to change the classes I wanted to race and the number I would be racing under. The lady working was super helpful, and even asked someone else to help figure out what two classes I would be able to fit into, since some of the evo amateur stuff was running on the same moto. I ended up getting into the 250 Evo Am and the -40 Evo Am classes. I guess this type of thing is pretty normal for vintage racing, I know I heard at least one person when I had wondered through the pits talking to someone about how one of there bikes were broken and they needed to change classes. Anyways with that I jogged back to the truck to get geared up again.

Not sure what moto they were up to I ride over to the start gate and wait for my first moto (250 Evo Am) to be on deck and go to the gate. This is where I finally got the race feeling in my stomach, the little bit of nerves and stuff. I sorta laughed to myself that I was lining up on a bike borrowed from a complete stranger to race my first VMX race. When I get up to the gate I look down the line and realize I am the only one on a four stroke trail bike, everyone else is on proper two smoke mx bikes. The gate drops and I get a pretty good start in my mind, edge out the Husky to the left of me before the first turn. On the first lap I was able to pass a few people and get used to both the track and the bike, I could feel myself getting a little faster towards the end of the moto. I ended coming in 8th that moto our of 15 riders on the gate.

After heading back to the truck to grab some water I make it back to the gate with not much time for my next moto (-40 Evo Am) this time there were two classes racing at the same time, but I was still the only thumper there. When the gate dropped I came close to looping it, forgot about the concert pad under the starting gate and got a bit too much traction. Once again I was able to make a few passes on the first part of the first lap. The bike I was on just could not match the power of the two smoke bikes out the gate. By the second lap I found myself behind a Bultaco. It turned into a good battle, or it did to me at least. I kept trying to pass and he kept closing the door. On the last lap I was able to get on the inside of him on a mild turn, but was passed back the next turn. That was the way I finished up, behind the Bultaco, on his back tire coming out of the last turn, but the short straightway from the last turn to the finish didn’t leave me enough to pass him. I knew that coming out of the turn, since during the other laps I had to wait until the turn to pull him in again.

After this I headed back to the truck to wait to go again, it was a nice long break as I was racing on motos 12 and 16 out of 19 motos. Waiting and drinking water it was fun watching the other classes. The little kids were a lot of fun to watch, it was like the adult racing but slower, it was so cool to watch on kid on a XR50 pass one on a XR70. The differences in speed and riding style between the classes was cool to see too, the vintage bikes were slower in lap times, but the straight line speed I think was not to far off from the newer stuff. The racing was just as fierce no matter the class, clean racing but still lots of passing, late braking into turns to shut the door, drag racing down the straight aways, and all the other things that make racing a good time. Racing lines were a lot different too, vintage cut the turns tighter, while the evos were clearing the table tops in the faster classes. I also took this time to walk around the track and watch the lines other people were taking. I noticed during my first set of motos that I was taking a different line in some spots and now I was taking notes where other people were passing and such. I was determined to be more aggressive in my second set of motos and try to get a podium.

I head back over to the start area for my second round of motos. For the 250 Evo Am I ended up taking the same gate I had for my first moto, figuring it work good the first time so I should stick with it right? I felt my start was good, I was able to stay on line with the bulk of the pack until about 3rd gear on the drag race to the first turn. The bike I was riding didn’t have the power to beat anyone I was racing in a drag race and I hit my brakes earlier than I probably should have going into the first turn losing a few spots. I was able once again to pass a few people on the first chunk of the first lap. If memory serves me right by the second lap I was pretty much running in my own bubble or there might have been someone else I was running with that I was not carrying the speed to actually pass. I could tell I was riding faster, and going a lot further when I was jumping onto the table tops, I think I was not hitting the big table top by the start at least on gear up from what I was doing at the beginning of the day. I dropped the bike on one turn towards the end of the last lap, but was able to get the bike back up without it stalling or getting passed.

I make my time at the truck shorter this time being as I almost missed my start last time. By a few turns in I find myself behind the same Bultaco again. I am determined to pass him this time. One the first lap I realize he is blocking me on a few of the inside lines I have been using to pass people most of the day. Quickly the white flag is out and I am really dropping the hammer. After going wide on a few turns in the tighter sections and not being able to pull the ground I go wide and stay on the gas on a big sweeper on the back of the course and get by him. A few turns later I look over my shoulder and he is not breathing down my neck. With a few turns to go I am feeling pretty good, I knew he wasn’t even in my class but it still felt really good. As I head over the big hill two turns away from the finish I see the yellow flag is out, someone went down. I pass the downed rider on the second to last turn then proceed to drop my bike on the last turn. I managed to stall it too. I can see the finish like less than 25 yards away and the bike does not want to start, I though about trying to push it across the line even. I get passed by both the formerly downed rider and the Bultaco before firing the bike and crossing the line. Looking at the scores later if I had not crashed I would have been able to pull third for the class (they combine the score for both motos), but it didn’t matter it was still a blast.

At the end of the day the whole event was awesome. I am sure I missed some details in my account of it all, I know there was more passing and stuff, but so much of it blurred together into a big blob of awesome. The people were great, racing again was a lot of fun, the track was nice, and I could not have asked for better weather. Speaking of the people, besides getting loaned a bike to race on from a stranger everyone seemed more than willing to help each other. I didn’t worry when I left my toolbox sitting open when I had to rush to the line for my first moto after getting a bike to ride. When the racing was over I even saw on guy go and make sure another racer who beat him didn’t think was mad at him when he was swearing in his helmet after the race, he was just mad at himself for having a bad race and told the kid that he had done a great job. I had heard good things about this series, and I was still blown away in a good way. At the end of the day I finished 6th out of 15 racing in the 250 Evo Am with 8th place finishes in both motos and 5th out of 7 racers in -40 Evo Am finishing 5th in both motos. I am really happy with those finishes being this the first time I raced any sort of motocross or vintage race, and all on a bike down on power that I had never ridden. I can not wait for the next race in a month, I am going to start the total tear down of the Husky motor this week and get parts on order so I will be ready for the next race. I have some ideas as what might be wrong and want the warm fuzzy that everything is correct, and there is not any other loose hardware.

The information about the series can be found here: http://www.siegecraftnw.com/hammer.htm. When they get the results up I was racing under number 95, next race I should be back to 603.

Vintage Motocross Project: 1972 Husky CR400

Before...

The past few months I had done some reading about the local vintage motocross scene (VMX) thought it would be something fun and cheap to get into. About a month ago I found myself with my old Suzuki DR350 finally sold and a wad of cash in my pocket looking at the motorcycle section of Craigslist and found something. It was a pair of vintage Husqvarnas, a 1972 CR400 and a 1979 CR250 to be exact, with a lot of spare parts to boot for $650, being that I had just sold the DR350 for $850 I almost just jumped on this. I tried to play it smart, I did some research online about parts availability and the the like, half figuring when I was done a couple hours later the bikes would be gone and I could use my money for something smarter. Alas when I called they were still there and didn't sound too bad, I mean one had been painted with house paint and the other the motor was totally torn down and in a box. Anyways I drive up to Seattle and buy this pair and all the spares feeling pretty good about it and with a truck full of new to be bikes and parts. At this point I now had the basic fixings for both a vintage mx bike and an evo mx bike.

As with any "cheap" bike, buying them was the only cheap and easy part. Shortly after getting the bikes into the garage I tore the CR400 down to start to clean it up. Someone in the bike's past for some reason thought it would be cool to paint the bike black with house paint. Now I have spray bombed my share of bikes, but I also take them apart first. Who ever did this did not do that at all, everything had black paint on it, the tires, forks, and most of the hardware. Even cleaning up any rust was too much to do, as I have pictures showing on the rear shocks. Anyways I decided since it was too cold to paint in the garage and I did not have much fun painting a frame last time I was going to send this out for powdercoating. After having the bike sitting around stripped down for a few weeks I welded up a hole that had been drilled into the backbone of the frame and dragged it off the the powdercoater's. I had no idea how nice it would turn out, I am sure the poor condition of frame when I bought it really made the change seem larger than it would have on a better looking specimen.


Frame fresh back from powdercoating...

While the frame was gone I started to order parts. This I will admit was a bit painfull on the wallet, but you have to pay to play at the end of the day so calls were made and parts were shipped out to me.


Sorta like X-mas, but I paid for it...

Since I wasted a few weeks figuring out what I was going to do or if I was going to put this whole mess on the back burner I was down to about two weeks before the next race. I really wanted to be able to do this race since if I missed it I would not be able to race enough to qualify for the championship, silly goal but I do work better under deadlines too. Anyway it was time to strip and either paint or leave in raw aluminum the parts that did not get powdercoated, namely the triple trees, fork tubes, brake backing plates, rear brake lever, and the rear shocks. The rear shocks are going to be replaced at some point down the road with Works Performance units, but time and funds did not allow for that to happen yet.


Before and after wirewheeling.


The only tool to polish a turd with.

With the odds and ends painted the frame started getting all of its parts put back on. The motor was put back in while the frame was still on the workbench. The swingarm was upgraded from rubber bushings to roller bearings (not fun at all to do) and that was mounted up with the freshly painted shocks. The forks were going to get new seals, but the caps did not want to come off so just the oil was changed, the seals seem to be holding ok so I am not too worried at the moment. At this point the bike was back down on a milkcrate and actually looking a lot like a motorcycle again rather than just a pile of really old parts. It was also down to the final crunch time, race day was less than a week away. This lack of time meant ordering parts was out of the question and it was time to find stuff in the garage or locally.


Next batch of parts.


And new rubber too.

Changing the tires was about as much fun as I figured it would be. The front didn't fight me too much, but 21" tires never seem to be that bad. The rear on the other hand had to be cut off the rim.



With the tires changed the brakes assemblies were put back together and the wheels were mounted onto the bike. I found out that with fresh rubber the milkcrate was too short to use as a bike stand, so my KTM ended up giving up its perch for the Husky to sit on. A silencer was also fabbed up to work, my buddy Dave donated an old FMF unit off of his RMX250 that after a bit of cutting and welding I was able to make work.

Now since it is getting really late and I don't have many more pictures left I will wrap this up. I hooked up the rest of the little odds and ends and after a lot of kicking the bike started. I am hoping to test ride it a bit on Friday (so later today I guess after I sleep). On the next one I will try to remember to take more pictures. With this build ending up being more of a crazy push to finish and 8-10 hour days in the garage after I got home from work I slipped a bit this time. I will leave this with the after pictures, there are still a few things I have left to do as can be seen in the pictures, but it runs and looks way better than when I started.

Last on the list for love... a Mini Trail saga... circa summer 2009

Part One:

My 1978 Honda Mini-Trail 70 has had the best I can figure a long a tough life. As you will see later in this report the toll of neglect of past owners will show, but the bike played true to Honda reputation and kept running, I can honestly say I know why this is the most produced motor (the Cub 50 / XR50 / Z50 / CT70 / XR50 ect) in the world. The odometer reads close to 4,000 miles and the speedo cable was broken for an unknown amount of time. Many of you here have rode this fine machine since I have owned it and have learned to deal with adjusting the choke depending on the RPM range you were riding. When I acquired this bike many years ago I knew it needed work, but filling its roll as a play bike (read: drinking beers in the backyard with some friends) it was always at the bottom of the list of things to spend money on. I finally put it on a milk crate and said it was time to get the bike back to 100%, I am more than a bit embarrassed after what I have found to have put it off this long...


Milkcrate time

I had pulled the bike into the living room over the winter to rewire it, it ended up sitting on a milk crate for months with the wiring loom hanging from the handle bar. I have managed to take the wiring harness form this:

The unrapped stock harness.

A view of the wiring diagram.

This is what was left on the bench:


The bike stock was set up to be street legal, full lights, I have no plans of it ever leaving the yard so that all went into the bin. The wiring it pretty much a total loss system with a kill switch. I did a quick test ride to make sure the streamlined wiring harness worked without any issues.

Now that the electrical issues were sorted it was time for the motor, and I knew there might be things found here. I pull the motor out to get in on the bench and check the topend. I know I could do that in frame, but depending on what I find a total rebuild might be called for as this is a bike that has lead a long and largely unknown life.


The more I look at this picture the DR and KTM seem to be looking at the ripped apart CT70 with the CB is looking away.

When I went to pull the motor I found out that one of the two motor mount bolts was missing its nuts, the bent bolt was just unable to back out more. Finding stuff like that make me feel like a bad motorcycle owner, I have noted it to myself to do better pre-ride inspections on all of my bikes.

Bent bits...


With the motor on the bench it was time to scrub off as much of the dirt and stuff as I could, a few drinks later I was ready to crack her open. My garage isn't the first place I would thing of for open heart surgery but it would do. Oddly enough this was the first motor I felt bad about not cleaning more, I think I'm just getting older many before this one have been much dirtier. Before opening the motor up I found more bad things...

Half of the hardware for the pegs missing, and the are both different sizes...

The front sprocket badly hooked, I wonder if it is stock...

Some carbon but still ok.
After getting the head pulled I am relieved to see it still looks ok, but the jug will be a different story...

Massively worn and pitted...
Once I get the jug off I can see and feel that it is toast. I know when my Dad bought this bike for my sister the air filter was missing I don't doubt that helped make this damage. The order for an 88cc kit happen shortly for this now, if I am going to replace the parts they might as well be bigger.

The piston is a cute little thing I think..
I pulled the wheels and checked the brakes and brake drums, new shoes will be put in lucky both drums are still ok.

I never thought I would end up flipping a motorcycle bicycle style to work on it, but it made things easier. So far my list of parts needed is as follows:
(1) 88cc Bigbore kit
(2) sets for brake shoes
(1) New kick stand spring (last one lost during snow riding)
(1) Giannelli exhaust system (stock one is currently held together with soup can)
(1) Set of chain and sprockets
(1) New front tire (Might be a 30 yr old stock on still on there, massive dry rot present)
And assorted hardware both missing and bent to be replaced, still debating repainting the frame too.

Part Two:

I know I could buy a pretty much drop in motor (other than converting to 12v from 6v) for the bike for the same price or less then the rebuild would run me, and I would be able to get a manual transmission, but I really want to keep the Honda cases. No good reason other than being able to say it is a massively improved 1978 Honda CT70. The big reason I am not currently planning on plating the bike is I will have to run through all of the lost title paperwork (NH doesn't title old bikes) and I can not think of when I would run it on the street. I do still have all of the lights and such in a box so maybe later down the road.

Right now I'm fighting with myself over which big bore kit to buy, and what other work I will do while I'm in there. I think I have it pretty much figured out and will spend the extra money for the "better" parts. With the fifty craze that happened there are tons of parts and kits (both good quality and bad) for this bike now, and I have been doing lots of homework to figure out what to buy. These little bikes are evil, parts are really cheap compared to a bike bike (under $400.00 for a 88cc kit with a race head and carb) but $35.00 here and there adds up. As much as I would like to throw tons of money into the motor I am realizing that I do not need a race motor in this, I have had tons of fun on it with a crappy motor. How much do I really need for a bike to ride in the yard while drinking beer with some friends? My updated parts list of stuff I have to pay retail for looks something like this:

88cc Big Bore kit (Not sure which one yet): $124.00 - $184.00
Giannelli Performance Pipe: $175.00
High Volume Oil Pump Kit: $30.00-$54.00
Kitaco Performance clutch spring set: $20.00
Total: $349.00-$433.00

The other things like brake shoes, carb rebuild kit (or new carb they seem to be pretty cheap), chain, sprockets, valves, valves springs, and tires I will order though the Triumph shop that I work at with my discount. I hate seeing the numbers add up, but I figure this will be a job I will do once, the stock motor lasted 30 years. I am also going to rebuild the head after talking to the mechanic at the shop, $30 bucks in parts now will be better than having it drop a valve after the rebuild, its not like I do not have the tools and knowledge to do it.

Now that I'm waiting to order parts I don't have too much to do on the bike. Last night I pulled the tires off and found rust on the rims so I'm going to clean them up and repaint them. I'm kicking around painting them a different color, sorta leaning towards red at this point but haven't decided yet.



Part Three:

It looks like this project will drag out for a while, I couldn't bring myself to blow the large wad of cash needed all at one time. So for the mean time I will collect parts and get stuff ready one thing at a time. Back to the progress, as nice as it would have been to keep the wheels the stock color the rear was really rusty and needed to be stripped. To be honest I was really too lazy to try to match the OEM paint and had a bunch of black rusto spray cans sitting in the garage so they went black. I forgot to take pictures of my drill with a stripping wheel clamped in my vice but I was able to bang out some of the dents in the rims when they were apart.

Primer

Paint

All back in one piece
I think they came out well, I like the two tone effect.

The next task on the list was to take care of the head. I was debating buying a new race head for it, but figured I should save some money and try my hand at a polishing job. The first fight was getting one of the tappet covers off, it was totally stuck. After starting to round it out using a wrench I tried to slot it and use a screwdriver, that failed too. So I resorted to cutting it apart, I'm glad I have tons of extra from my CB360 projects.

Hacked to pieces
With the tappet covers off I used the oversize socket method of removing the valve keepers. The valves had a bit of build up on them, at $7.00 a piece I will replace them when I put it back together.

Lots of crap on the intake valve
Looking at the ports on the head it was easy to see that there was no finishing work done to the casting, really that isn't shocking considering the bike. I will be a sicko and clean up the head the best I can.

Stock nastiness

After a little time with some sandpaper
Tomorrow I will pickup a Dremel tool to speed up the work, the casting is pretty rough and a few spots and there are big seams that will take forever to sand down by hand. As a parting picture look at the cute little cam...


Part Four:

I picked up a Dremel tool and started working on the head last night, after a few beers progress was deffintally being made. I think I still have another nights worth of work to do before it will be ready to go back together. The toughest part is the motor being so small, my fingers are too big get in some spots for the finishing sanding. Now for some pics.


Exhaust side still needing alot of work


The intake side is a bit bigger, that makes it alot easier


My camera doesn't really like to focus this close



Part Five:


I figured that since I did not have the required engine parts to move forward with that aspect I should work on other things. I decided to change the fork oil. I found tool marks on the drain plug so someone else in the past 31 years changed the oil, but it was a long time ago, this is what it looked like coming out. No, I did not pour my white Russian into the drain pan...

Milky goodness...

This is what went back in, fresh 10wt fork oil, all 95cc of it per leg.

Clean and blue oil...

This is why I need a new pipe for the bike, besides the general awesomeness of having a full system exhaust on a minibike. In the middle of this winter's snow riding I had to use a soup can to patch the head pipe (a PBR can and a Fosters can both failed at the roll).


This should be one piece not five.


Pile of exhaust parts

I also looked into changing out the stock throttle, front brake, and kill switch with the Magura on that was sitting in my parts bin.


Stock
Well I guess I forgot to take a picture of the fancy parts on the bike. Anyways while slacking on at work and trying to sell my DR350 I found something on Craigslist. After leaving work a little early and grabbing my truck this found my way into my garage...

It's a mostly complete 1977 Honda Z50 (less the bars and exhaust) in boxes with a second motor and an extra 70cc top end. I am sure the newest bike in my garage will soon have its own build thread. For some unknown reason the last owner thought it would be wise to split the cases then dump the parts into a big plastic bag on one of the motors. So I call Rebecca to join the party in the garage and start sorting things out. As the laptop provides the tunes and the cocktails go down the parts get cleaned and sorted. Rebecca makes quick work of both sets of carbs while I fight with the wheels (the fight was not won until the next day).

One carb starts its tear down, yes I rock my laptop in the workshop.
After the night came to a close I found myself making new parts lists due to new to me parts coming into the mix. It looks like there will not be big bore kits in the future just gasket kits, an extra set of tires, and second carb kit.

Part Seven:

The bike ran and fun times were had, I am sure this is not the end of this, not buy a long shot. I have a feeling this will be a long term back burner project...