New Build For The Wife

[kerf]

Hello MBc's, kerf has made a rare venture outside the Combustion Chamber, to start a new build. About a month ago, my wifes bike was stolen.

http://www.motoredbikes.com/showthread.php?t=23746

I'm beginning a replacement build and I wanted to post it here, both to share info with others and to get input from the MBc Team of experts. I'm not going high tech and I'm on a budget with the economy the way it is but I want my lady to have a nice ride. I'll be using a Staton friction drive, made up of parts I have on hand and a HF water pump engine I just bought. I think we'll probably try D i c k s Sporting Goods for a Mongoose full suspension, I think she'll really like that when she tries her first ride. It's gonna take a while to get it together, cause I'm waiting on my HF clutch parts and they are slow.

I ordered some parts from David, that I didn't have. I needed a 78mm clutch drum as well as a 78mm engine spacer and a twist throttle/ cable. The drive housing was from a TC300 unit, with a 54mm clutch and did require a little mill work. The TC300 has the drive roller bearing retainer snap rings on the inside, next to the roller. The 78mm engine spacer, needs to center on the bearing shoulder, so the snap ring must be on the outside toward the engine and requires a recess cut around the bearing hole. This recess is .125" wide and .040" deep (see IMG 0956) and allows the snap ring to be flush with the housing so it is sandwiched between the housing and spacer (see IMG 0957).

The engine looks very good except for the air filter/choke unit, which came out of the box broken. It's junk and since the carburetor is a Walbro WYK 119-1 clone, I decided to upgrade to a DDM velocity stack/choke unit and a DDM HP air filter. Looks and works much better (see IMG 0958). My cost on the engine, including tax and any shipping are, $108/engine, $20/two year replacement plan, $33/ air filter. I'll be using a 1 1/4" Staton roller that I have on hand, she had a 1 3/8" on the TLE43 so we'll see how that works out.

My Staton parts should be here tomorrow and I can get the drive housing together and start looking for a bike. Then we wait about 5 more weeks for a clutch. Oh well, weather stinks anyway.

 

[fetor56]

While your waiting you could always advertise in the local papers(Bicycle WTB) & let potential customers come to you....community notice boards are also very good.

 

[kerf]

The build continued today with the procurement of the bike (IMG 962) and a box of parts from David. I was going to use the standard Staton U bracket with two 6" extension bars to position the drive roller directly above the rear axle. Problems arose with the rear brake (IMG 963), while the brake had sufficient room to operate, I would have to remove the engine or brake shoes in order to remove the rear wheel. I've decided to control front/back loading using a thrust bar, connecting the drive housing to the rear shock mount. I used this same method on the Snake Eater (IMG 965). I would have had to install struts from the front drive housing mount to the dropout in either case.

I have two drive housings, one stock, the other shortened and re-bored to use the thrust bar. The forward mounting hole was originally 3/8" but I changed it to 5/8" (IMG 959) to accept rubber vibration dampening bushings (IMG 961). Enlarging the hole would have been simple but I had to change the center as well as the diameter.

Tomorrow I'll pickup some 1/4" x 1" aluminum flat bar and begin fabing the thrust bar and forward struts. I'm going to remove the fan cover from the engine and take it and the drive housing to the hardware store to select engine mounting bolts. If the bolts are too long, I'll wipe out the flywheel, OUCH.

 

[moondog]

Nice ! Thanks for the pictures !

 

[kerf]

I've fabed the drive mounting struts and have the drive unit on the bike (IMG 970). As you can see, I've scrapped the stock Staton U bracket in favor of thrust bars attaching to the rear shock mount and forward struts attaching to the dropouts (IMG 971). The dual tension bars, that I built for a previous bike, use a sliding cam bolt setup.

Looking at my roller / bearing setup, I've installed a 16ga x 5/8 machine bushing on the inside of the left bearing (IMG 966). This takes the slack out between the roller bearings and sets the bearing shoulder inside the bearing race (IMG 968). When the drum is screwed on, the inner race is clamped between the bushing and the drum hub, controlling roller thrust on the left side bearing. It also brings the drum mounting hub flush with the threads on the roller (IMG 969).

I also removed the fan housing from the engine and along with the drive housing and engine spacer, set off to select engine mounting bolts. These 6mm bolts must be selected with care, if they are too long, they could contact the flywheel. My choices were 45mm, which engaged about half the fan housing threads or 50mm which protruded a little less than 1/8". While the 50mm didn't contact the flywheel, I found that adding a 6mm lock washer and a flat washer brought them flush with the inside of the fan housing.

My next step is to replace the handlebars with a 5" riser set, add the center mount kickstand, install a new seat and I may need to replace the twist type shifters. At that point, I'll be sitting and waiting for a clutch rotor.

 

[loquin]

What's the width/thickness on the thrust bar, Kerf? Any concern that it may 'bow' some when you're at full throttle?

 

[kerf]

1" x 1/4" aluminum and no it won't bow as it will be under tension not compression. Bike goes north, drive housing wants to go south.

 

[loquin]

Yup - you're right. Pulling the top of the wheel forward would put tension on the straps... for some reason, I was thinking the opposite when I posted... Must have gotten sidetracked with work at work this morning!!!

 

[kerf]

Well, I'm still waiting on that slow boat from China, with my clutch but I'm pushing the build ahead anyway. Got home from the bike shop yesterday with a box of goodies. The Sunlite Double Kickstand is coming from Florida but I got everything else on my list. I like to use mountain bikes for these things but in order to ride comfortably, quite a few parts have to be replaced.

The first thing to go is those flat handlebars, replaced with a set of Wald 5" riser MTB bars, which of course required total shift and brake cable replacements.(IMG 972) The twist shifters were replaced with Shimano STX Alivio trigger shifters. The wife always had trouble shifting, these should fix that. Once we had something to hold on to, something from Schwinn to sit on was in order.(IMG 974) The mountain tires were replaced with Kenda Kwest 26 x 1.95 tires with one of the best treads I've found for a friction drive.(IMG 975) I mounted a speedometer that I previously had on one of my bikes, lost the bracket so improvising was in order.(IMG 973) Added the throttle and a mirror so tomorrow we will do some test rides, pedal power of course.(IMG 977)

 

[cycledude]

btw the clutch bell with the roller you are using in your build, do you have the part numbers? Are they Staton? Will you be using the Staton cluth for the 50cc honda?
Maybe I should post this query in your thread.
Done