Hotrod Hayride

Ok so I was a little worried about riding the bike down to the Hayride on friday - I had only done a few short rides on it, so not really a proper shake-down. So the thought of going 225 miles each way was a little nerve wracking!!

Anyways, all went well for the first 120 miles, then I heard a few clanging noises and discovered that my number plate bracket had decided to jump ship!!



It was bolted onto the end of the rear axle which is obviously a position high in vibration! I had strengthened the bracket with a triangular brace but it broke just off the side of the axle washer. Unfortunately though it came off on a road that had a big overgrown verge with a big hedge and ditch too. So after walking about a mile up and down this road  we failed to find the escapee!

This meant I had no number plate and no tail light/brake light! So as we were near Northampton, we found somewhere in town that would print me a number plate on the spot. I was going to try and tape the big yellow plate to the rear fender, but couldnt see a way of doing this safely and securely with just some tape, so opted to just keep the plate in my tank bag and hope any coppers would give me the benefit of the doubt.

Then on my Dad's brilliant idea, we located a cycling shop and purchased a battery powered red LED tail light that I could mount off the frame;



So I carried on like this, and rode it all the way back like this too! Pleased to say that apart from the rear end shaking to bits the bike worked well and reliably. Got a snap of the bikes infront of the pavillion as we were leaving;


Also managed to stay dry apart from the last half hour on the way home;



The bike needs a good clean now!!

Busy weekend!

I finished up the repair on the rear fender strut;



but guess what - the other one has gone now. Not unexpected really, when the bike is warming up with the choke on the fender shakes quite alot. I guess this is my own fault for just having the one mount at the bottom of the frame.. but it felt so sturdy! Think I'm going to have to make another mount somewhere behind the seat to add some more support.

Also swapped the yellow MOT plate for a printed black and silver one..



Look loooads better - and its TOTALLY LEGIT so get off my case alright?!  :o :o ;)  Had to change the plate lights though, the cheap little LED oned that I had originally wired in snapped while tightening them up, so luckily I had another light with a bulb in it that I had bought from low-brow ages ago...



Using this was actually quite beneficial as it only has one wire that needs connecting up, rather than the four I had to sort on the LED's.

Modified the stock kickstand - it wasnt locking out in a forward enough position so could snap back too easily. Also it snapped back onto the frame - CLANG! so I screwed a little rubber bung on there to soften the blow...



Seat springs - I felt like I was sliding off the back of the seat with the 2" springs I had on there originally - changed them up for some 3" ones. Feels alot safer!





Thought they might ruin the look but you can hardly tell really!

And finally... I painted the letters on my Firestones because lets face it - thats the reason you buy them!!



Busy weekend? That was just my Saturday!! Rode the bike over to a friends on saturday night for a BBQ, it ran OK and pulled through all the gears, though not as responsive as it should be - but I still had the stock jets in at this point. Also after setting off it would give me a few minutes before cutting out, then I had to just let it rest for 30 seconds before firing it up again... it would do this a couple of times then seem to be OK.

So Sunday I took the carbs off again and increased the main and pilot jet by one size from stock and took it for a quick spin. You could tell it was running alot better straight away - its alot more responsive and actually puts some power down when you open it up.

Still with me? Tired yet?? As Im planning on riding this to the Hay-ride next weekend, and my dad is going on his 1950 Thinderbird, we need some luggage space because at the moment we have none, and back-packs are not fun for 250 miles!! So we got stuck in and made a very basic rack for the back of his bike, as its got lots of nice fixing points.





Just used some 20x5mm flat bar I had lying around, doesnt look very pretty but should do the trick!

Sorry for the mega-post, as you can see I didnt sit still over the weekend!!

Getting there...

Was hoping to go for a spin last night but there are too many jobs that needed sorting out. Honestly, this last stage off finishing all the little niggling issues is the hardest and most time consuming!!

So last night I wanted to balance the carbs, but one of the carbs started leaking fuel though the air filter, so first I took them off, stripped them down and gave them a good blast with carb cleaner. Then I managed to put it back together and run it so I could balance the carbs.

The side light/headlight/full beam had given up completely. So I took the bulbs out and both were knackered. My own fault really - I had used a 15A fuse on the lighting circuit because I had run out of 10A ones! So after a bit of searching I borrowed one off the car, and replaced the bulbs - sorted.

While the bike was running, there was this loud rattling noise and it turned out that the welding on one of the fender struts had broken!





So that had to be cleaned up and welded too. I also tried to tidy up the components inside my electrics box as upto now everthing was just rattling round in there. Sort of tried to line it with some bubble wrap, and decided to mount the fuse box on the inside of the lid (which I wish i had made bigger!).

Still several things to sort but it can go back together now. Need to modify the kickstand, swap the ugly yellow number plate with a black one, replace the clutch rod seal.......

MOT PASS!!

Chuffed to bits! I'd taken the friday and monday off work to get it done, and my dad did the same to lend a hand. Was working right upto the last minute though, and was 30 mins late to the test! No advisories, though the headlight didnt work (side and full beam did) but he said that as it looked like I had made decent job of everything else, he knew I would fix it when I got home - what a lad!I cant list all of the little jobs I had to get done for MOT, needledd to say there was lots of tightening bolts and lock-tight! here's some pics of it without the big yellow plate on it...




And in the interest of the recent size/weight/riding position debate; here is me sat on it (please excuse the clothes - it was very warm!)

I put the stock front mudguard on it also for the MOT - Im not sure if you actually need one, but it had the added incentive of providing a fixing point for the speedo and front brake cables.

It got me there and back but was quite reluctant! Its a bitch to get started - the choke doenst work - and it seems that I have to cover the air filters up to get it to fire. It cut out on me quite alot when I stopped at junctions unless I kept feathering the throttle. Also coughs and pops alot!!Ive increased the main and pilot jet sizes in the carbs, as per the general consensus on XS650.com for this set-up. (+1 pilot, +2 main jet). But now Im thinking it would be a good idea to go back to stock and start from there. The other issue is that the choke has never worked on this bike. I have had the carbs apart and cleaned etc, but still choke doesnt work. Im wondering if maybe the diaphragms are fooked....

Anyways, I am chuffed to bits and riding it was a blast! But my to-do list seems to be twice as long since before the MOT! Still lots to tweak before its a reliable road bike.

Quick vid of it running;

Video

Painting...

I wasn't interested in painting anything until I got it on the road, but somehow my dad has convinced me that I need to cover up the 'bare metal' to stop it going rusty, and cover up some of the ugly bits!

So, the plan was to just get some rattle cans from Halfords and do a quick once over, but of course you don't want it to look complete shite... so we have ended up spending more time than I wanted to on painting things up. But at least it should look a bit more presentable..





Frame actually looks a lot better than I thought it would! I guess you just get used to seeing bare metal, welds and the remains of the stock black finish all over the place. One colour is a big improvement!

So after spending a small fortune in Halfords I just did everything black, with the exeption of the tank that Im going to throw some proper 90's vaxhaul red onto! Just couldnt face a completely black bike, had to brake it up with something.

Hot weather has been ideal for painting and things are drying up fast so going to start gingerly putting it back together tonight - MOT booked for Monday!!!!!

Video

Video I took the other day of the bike running, I was more just checking that the thing was wired up correctly, but managed to start the thing too. Though I did have to put my hands over the carb inlets. Think its running too lean at the moment and also don't think that the choke is working!!

More wiring....

Been hammering at it this weekend trying to get the bike closer to complete. This might seem a little jumbled as I was jumping around doing all sorts. I put the sealant in the tank Saturday morning so that's drying off now, only a couple of little holes in my welding, hopefully nothing the sealant cant cope with!

Then I made a mount for my number plate. I have bought a totally legit and legal black and silver small stamped plate to go on the back (and a big ugly yellow one for the MOT), so I made a mount for that. Used a trusty cardboard template to make a bracket that will mount it off the rear axle.





To light the plate I've got two little LED bolts, and the tail light is something that I liked the look of on eGay



Then I spent most of yesterday on the wiring. I drilled the necessary holes in the electrics box for the key switch, starter button and kill switch. I then wired up to all these bits before starting on the lighting circuit. Man I didn't realize how complicated the lights would be! Probably more complex and confusing that the running circuit...!

There is a nice clunky light switch in that old-style headlight that I want to use, that was a total bugger to wire up - and the contacts in the headlight bulb are really sketchy and dont always give a good connection.



For the horn and high beam ive got a little 'Ducon' replica thing on the handlebars;



I also incorporated the front and rear brake light switches into the circuit. Amazingly I'd managed to buy a universal switch for the front brake lever that fits perfectly (never happens right??!!) but the rear I had to get a bit more creative. I drilled and tapped a hole through the rear axle plates and mounted a little pull switch onto the inside of it. Something I've copied off XS650.com





So with all that junk on the bike now looks a total mess!! Not impressed with the amount of wiring needed all over the bloody thing! Even if I went kick only - wouldnt actually make that much difference to the loom, the lighting circuit swamps everything. So next task has to be trying to tidy all of this up, probably drilling some little holes in the rear frame rails to hide the wires going to the tail light and rear brake switch...



Back in the shed tonight!!