Thursday, October 18, 2012

The clutches of evil...

In other news, I've been helping my friend Gianluca with his 1960 Dominator. It's a handsome bike that's been well used over the decades. There's nothing majorly wrong with it but it is worn out and needs a lot of tlc everywhere you look. The good thing is, it runs and we've already refurbished the front forks, the rear shocks (they're new), the carburetter and the front brake. It has new K81 tyres and we'll gradually get around to all that needs doing. It handled the trip to the rally back in September really well (certainly better than my poor BSA).
At the moment we're refurbishing the clutch, which was slipping, dragging, sticking and you name it.
It all looks fine, again just worn out, but there is something about the clutch basket and the plates that doesn't look right. Could it be that it is in fact an AMC clutch from another bike, fitted to this bike at some point in the past?

UPDATE
As it turns out, that is the correct clutch for that year's Dominator; friction plates, shock absorber rubbers, nuts, screws, etc. are on the way from RGM so we can put this thing back together and move on to the next bit.


Friday, October 12, 2012

Déjà, déjà-vu...

Good Lord.... here we go again.

Hopefully we won't be seeing any of these bits again, once they're into the engine doing their job, so let's have a real good look here once and for all. Famous last words?


The bolts are marked "ARP", though I doubt this is Air Raid Precaution.


And here are the new shells, oversized.


Now for the new crankshaft sludge trap plug, which has a hexagonal socket, which should make it much easier to fit. If you're rebuilding an engine I would strongly recommend you fit one of these from the start.



Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Curfew.

I have just placed an order for all the bottom-end parts I'll need to rebuild the BSA's engine, again.
The cost (not including labour and machine shop) is truly eye watering, so I'm turning down the lights everywhere I can to save some pennies...
Nothing will be posted here until parts arrive and work starts again on the Rising Star...