40 - Making a Chain Guard

 I thought I'd better make a start at making a chain guard. A friend in work cut me a sheet of 1.5 mm aluminium. The folders we have only make square folds so I took it home to come up with something myself.
 I had a rummage round the shed and gathered a few bits together. 

 Some plywood and 22 mm copper tube was enough to make a simple folder and it worked very well.

 I already made a template from some card so I'll use that to mark it out ready for cutting and filing.

39 - Rebuilding #1

 Now that I have most of the bits ready it's time to start rebuilding the bike. 
 The new stand fits very well. I was going to make a jig for John to help when he welded in the pivot bracket, but he said "don't bother I'll just hold it position myself" It turned out absolutely spot on. It has a nice line parallel to the swing arm and the spring has good clearance with the tyre.

 The springs look nice now that the're chromed and I have a new chain fitted over the old sprockets, but they were ok. The tensioner and torque arm have been zinc plated.

38 - finishing the brake

 After a comment from Michael I thought I could remember there once was a big rubber seal which sat in the circular groove beside the brake shoes. I guess the idea was to make a seal to prevent water and dirt entering, but how well it worked was debatable. I would think that unless a lick of grease was kept on it, it would soon wear flat.

 Anyway the means and materials were at hand to make something so I did just that and fitted it. Its made from a piece of polycord drive belt, melted with an iron and joined together then the excess trimmed off.

37 - Setting the Points

 The engine was up on my electrical workbench this afternoon. I hooked up an old AVO meter and set the points. All very straight forward using a DTI for accuracy.

Points gap 0.4 mm
Opening 3mm before TDC

36 - Brake re-line

  Last week I had left my brake shoes into Belfast Brake Specialists

www.belfastbrakespecialists.co.uk

 The brake drum in the back wheel was pretty well worn and at first I had thought about boring out the remainder and making a new cast iron liner to go inside. Since I've never tackled this job before I wasn't too sure how it would work out, nor did I know just what degree of interference fit I would need between it and the hub for it to be successful, although I could make a good guess, it was still going to be a lot of work. 

 Previously to get a better brake I had attached shims to the faces of the shoes to try and move them out closer to the drum and give me a shorter pedal travel. There had been so much travel in the pedal it would touch the frame and I didn't want this happening again just to ruin the new paint work.

 I decided instead to go about it a different way by relining the shoes with thicker material and skimming them to suit. By measuring the internal diameter of the hub I reckoned a 5mm thick lining to be about right.

 I explained all this to Trevor at BBS but he only carried 4.7mm (3/16") or 6mm thick material. Based on the grounds it would be less work I picked the 3/16" material but changed my mind and phoned Trevor the next morning to get him to put the 6mm material on. Even though he had started the job that wasn't a problem, and I picked them up the other day looking like new again. It's always good when you can get excellent service like this from someone local. 

 The next day I made a simple mandrel to hold the brake plate, mounted the shoes and tied them together with a piece of wire and a tie wrap to pull them tight against the cam then proceeded to turn them down to size.

The material turned down very nicely to leave a good surface. The internal diameter of the hub is 141mm and I made these shoes 140.8mm 

 I wasn't sure if this was going to be enough clearance but when I assembled everything the wheel rotates freely without even the faintest sound of the shoes rubbing. So I don't think I could make them any better other than cut grooves across the shoes to displace water, but then I don't plan to be competing on the bike again so I'll leave them as they are.

35 - Getting Started Again

 Things have been slow over the winter. It is just too cold to feel like going out to do any work in the shed, but now I have the frame back and want to make some progress again.

 Clifford made a good job on the frame, it's done in base coat and lacquer which is the way he wants to paint the tank when the time comes. We choose Ford Silver Fox as we couldn't get the crystal silver PPG colour.

 I've left in some parts for chrome and zinc plating, and the rear shoes for re-lining so I hope to get them back next week then get the wheels into the frame.

34 - Fork repair

 Back when I stripped and rebuilt the forks one of them was sticking a bit at the bottom of its travel. If you pushed the stanchion up and down the fork leg it felt like it was binding a bit. A tug would release it but it didn't feel like the other side, which was sliding nicely.

 I mentioned this to Mr Romero when I was in his shop and he said this was a common thing. Allowing the forks to bottom out hard must swage or deform the bottom of them. "Not possible to repair" was his diagnosis. Although I didn't say anything, I didn't agree with him. I gave it some thought and decided it would be possible to hone it out.

 Today I pulled the fork leg apart and made a long "emery stick" from a couple of feet of brush shaft. I simply cut a slot in one end to receive a strip of emery cloth and put a screw nail in the other end so I could spin it in the drill.

 I gave it a few whizz's up and down near the bottom of the leg, cleaned it out, and within a few minutes I had the stanchion sliding in and out right to the bottom without any tight spots.

 So I reassembled it again, put the rubber boot over the fork and left it aside. 

 Clifford still has the frame, its only primed at the minute but should be ready soon in the new year.