Dragon Pegs

The Dragon trike has footpegs!

Uh oh, I've got..... HAPPY CLUTCH!

With my apologies to Steve Martin...

I had to skip an evening, but we were released from work a couple hours early, so I have had time to get a bite to eat (skipped lunch today), get home, change clothes, finishe assembling the trike, test ride and adjust the clutch, all by about the time I would normally be getting home.

The new clutch works very well. Everything is very smooth. This throwout bearing may have been going out for longer than I had thought.

Sponge Bob Clutch Problem Resolved

I used my fancy new tool and removed the remaining shock absorber. It worked perfectly. :)

I pulled the engine and saw that the throwout bearing had not, as I had suspected, jumped off the fork. Instead, I saw that the collar on the pressure plate had been ground off.

Some pieces of metal were recoverable, but mostly, there was a lot of shiny dust and a funky "burned barbecue" smell. The inside of the bell housing was coated with oil. My first thought was that the seal on either the engine or the transaxle was leaking.

None of the oil looks fresh, however. I recall that when the oil cooler event occurred, the top of the engine and transaxle were pretty much drenched in oil and I think that's where it came from.

The throwout bearing itself had not jumped the rails, but you could tell that the surface didn't look right.

Turns out that the bearing was not turning and the collar from the pressure plate had friction welded to the bearing race!

You can see the bearing race is completely hidden. For the entertainment value, I will see what forensic data I can gather and report back.

It's no wonder the bearing failed, what with the inner race being off center and the balls scrambled inside the bearing.













I found that AutoZone carries the throwout bearing, for $37. They are about $15-18 at most places. AutoZone isn't usually that high on any given item.

More importantly, while I have a new pressure plate leftover from the other trike, it looked like replacing the disk would be a good idea, what with all that oil. The disk also had a slightly strange wear pattern on it, seeming to wear most in a circle that would describe the center of the friction material. The contact side of the otherwise ruined pressure plate looked fine, but obviously it had to go.

AutoZone has a clutch kit which contains the clutch disk, pressure plate, throwout bearing, pilot bearing and a (redundant) pilot alignment tool. This whole assembly is $102 *and* carries a lifetime warranty. So I got one.

Nothing very magical about the installation from this point forward. I scraped as much of the slightly sticky dust off the flywheel as I could and vacuumed it away. Then I used a bunch of brake cleaner to ensure that the flywheel was clean and oil-free. After the brake cleaner, the pilot bearing needed grease.

Then I put the disk and pressure plate on and snapped a picture of it:

Looks like pretty much every other clutch, huh? :)

It took pretty much a whole can of brake cleaner to get the bell housing clean. I found a few recognizeable bits of metal from the old pressure plate in there. I installed the new throwout bearing. Now that I've done it a few dozen times, I can remove and install the spring clips with minimal bloodletting.

Bolted the engine and transaxle back together and before I continued, I verified that the clutch will disengage. That was a problem with the Dragon trike's clutch and I wanted to make sure the same thing didn't happen here before I finished bolting up everything else and had to pull it out again!

I ran out of time and will need to finish the rest of it tonight.

Sponge Bob Clutch

This was unusual for me. Rather than the typical problem of it being something I did, this time the throwout bearing had simply gone bad enough to freeze up, which in turn took out the collar on the pressure plate.

AutoZone appears to have the bearing. I'm headed up there to see.

Sponge Bob Break

Sadly, this is a pun. Not only does this post represent a break in the current storyline, it is also a lament that Sponge Bob is broken.

I swear, I'm not taking that trike to Arlington anymore. We took it Oklahoma and to the Hill Country twice and all over the metroplex. The clutch broke once in Oklahoma on it's first journey, but regardless of all the other traffic, it has broken down three times in Arlington.

Good or bad, at least I've gotten good enough at riding it without the clutch that at least I wasn't stranded in Arlington. This time.

So, I need to figure out what's wrong this time. I suspect that the throwout bearing has jumped off the rails. There seems to be a delicate balance on exactly where the clutch arm needs to stop. Which is, of course, me saying that I'm sure it's actually my fault, but I still suspect an Arlington connection.

Checking the throwout bearing is a fairly simple affair. Remove four wires, one fuel line and the four nuts holding the engine on and check it out.

To remove the engine, however, I need to remove the baja bumper. To remove the baja bumper, I need to remove the shocks. The new shocks are coilovers, which complicates their removal and installation because they need to be compressed to fit.

They make a tool to compress these sorts of springs. I have search for one locally to no avail and just have never gotten around to ordering one. So I was trying to figure out a way to compress the shocks since I will need to do this occasionally.

I first tried a ubolt extended with all thread, but there isn't room on both sides of the shock for the all thread. I figured a way to do it with a couple of hand fabricated hooks. It took about 30 minutes to fashion the hooks and try it out to remove one shock. It worked pretty well, but one hook straightened out and failed while the shock was sitting on the bench. I knew the concept was good and just needed stronger hooks, so I made another with braces.

The hook on the left is designed to clear the spring. Were I to remake the hook on the right, I might offset the hole for the all thread so it would be parallel to the body of the shock, but I'm not sure that would really be necessary.

I might also add a brace at the far right and use a longer all thread so the wrenching surface would be easier to reach. That hook is on the bottom of the shock and moving the nut closer to the end would let it be reached more easily from below the trike.

As it stands, it works well enough to install and remove at least the one shock.

Once I was finished with that, decided I was too tired to tear into the trike and cleaned up the shop before things get out of hand. A few days of cutting and grinding makes a mess.

Maybe I wasn't so tired after all because I also *finally* assembled a storage cabinet that I have had for enough months to wonder if it could be counted in years. It's a nice big cabinet, and as expected, it doesn't have enough shelves, but I can fix that.

It looks twisted in the pic, but it isn't. I put a few things that have been sitting on the floor in it, as well as all the power tools that have been in a functional but ugly cabinet that I will be taking down. I think I have a place for the old cabinet. Where it is will go my band saw and drill press, which have also been sitting around on the floor a while.

Footpegs Continued

The #2 tip is enough bigger to get the job done, but I still had a LOT of trouble getting the inside corner of the 3 way intersection properly bonded.

Still, I think it will plenty strong. Nearly 50% of the gusset's entire edge is secured.

I ran a sanding disk over it everywhere I could reach.

Perhaps I can use my little abrasive blaster to further clean the crevices.

Tomorrow, I pick up the ubolts and try it on for size. Assuming it works, on Monday I will drop it off for powder coating (which is preceded by a rather aggressive shot peening by a massive machine called the Wheelabrator, so I'm not sure why I am worried about sanding it) and that will nearly be that.

Picking it up and handling it reminds me of a crossbow....

Footpegs

I got started on the footpegs for the Dragon Trike. I'm making a simple T-bar that will be u-bolted to the frame. The u-bolt mount will allow it to be adjusted and removed for eventual powder coating or other modification. For a ride of any appreciable distance, I would like it to eventually be a bar with footboards on it.

I have a 4 foot long piece of 1-1/2" square tubing and I picked up a 3 foot piece of 1" round tubing.

I sawed a hole through one end of the square tubing and centered a 32" length of the round tubing and welded it in place.

I placed the hole slightly off center so it would be simpler to give a chamfered look to the end. The chamfer will be about parallel to the ground.

I cut wedges out of the "wide" side:

 And folded the side down to meet them:

I then cut a rectangle to fit the opening and welded it in.

The front edge weld in the pic above is possibly the best looking weld I've ever done. It's almost a shame to grind the smooth.

I cut the square tubing to length, 16 inches from the crossbar to the end.

To make the saddle, I used a 3" x 8" black steel pipe nipple. I cut the threaded ends off then split the remaining tube.

I had a steadier hand for the other cut :)

After cleaning up the edges, used a magnet, barely visible here, to hold it temporarily in place so I could tack it on the end of the square tube.

I welded to two curved straight sides. The curved sides will be carrying the most weight in service, so I cut a couple of gussets to weld in along this side.

My #0 tip just couldn't throw enough BTUs to do a good job the the intersection of all three pieces, but I'm pretty happy with the long weld along the gusset.

I also ran out of welding rods small enough for the selfsame #0 tip, so this is how it sits at the moment. I will swing by the welding supply joint tomorrow and get a little bigger welding tip and a bunch of the smaller rods. With a bigger tip, I should be able to clean up that mess and avoid a similar mess on the other side pf this brace and the other brace.

This is the nearly completed thingy:

Quick Update on Sponge Bob Square Trike

A couple of weekends ago, Sponge Bob started to experience some odd clutch-centric symptoms. During the course of the day, the clutch became less and less responsive to the pedal. Go ahead, push the pedal... the gears are going to grind anyway. At one stop, it the starter even ground a few times before it kicked off. It was beginning to look like something major was wrong. I rode the rest of the way home shifting without the clutch, shutting of the engine at each stop and starting up in gear on the green light... it was not particularly fun.

So, since I doubt the Dragon trike will be ready to take to the IMS tomorrow, I tore into Sponge Bob last night to see what the matter was.

The plan was to pull the engine out and see what was going on with the throwout bearing, my first suspect. I figured while I had it apart, I would also change out the old leaky airshocks with the nifty coilovers I ordered long enough ago for the box to be dusty. Also, when we went to look at a particular trike for sale recently, it was at the owner's mechanic's house. He runs a VW repair and restoration shop out of his house. Cool guy and I envy his situation. Anyway, he had some chrome pipes of the same style that are on Sponge Bob except that they still have chrome on them and Gabby bought them for $50. I'd put those on, too.

I had the bumper off and the jack under the engine when I started removing the four nuts that hold the engine and transaxle together.

Hello, there is a missing nut on the bolt that also holds the top of the starter. And the other top nut was backed almost off it's stud. There was a 1/4" gap between the engine and transaxle.

Well, that would certainly explain it. This would let the engine and transaxle intersect at an angle and explains all the symptoms.. The input shaft of the transaxle runs inside a roller bearing in the end of the crankshaft. This misalignment would put that in a bind, so it would seem that the clutch is not disengaging. The starter was not only farther from the flywheel than expected, it would also be flexing away from it on the bottom bolt.

I found a replacement for the missing nut and tightened everything up and verified that the clutch would disengage. I then went ahead with the shocks (which required a run to two parts stores to find bolts to fit the lowers) and the pipes. There are no baffles in them, so they are significantly louder than the old ones. Gabby is pleased.

Another Long Overdue Update on the Dragon Trike

The clutch issue was resolved by continuing to swap out pressure plates until I found one that worked.

The one that finally worked is one that was on the free parts shelf at the BTW clubhouse. It was coated with a fine layer of rust, but it cleaned up perfectly and more importantly, it works. I neglected to get a picture of it, but it was one similar to this.

It is still an absolute mystery why the one I bought didn't work, but my instincts indicate that it has something to do with the mix-n-match nature of the engine and transaxle combination.

In any case, it's streetable, though the shifter is a pain to deal with. I plan to install one of these, or one like it

I have dedicated a number of hours tuning on the EFI system. At first, I was fighting a bad O2 sensor and now I'm fighting what I can only conclude is erroneous injector specifications. All indications are that they are 245 cc/min injectors. Using that number, every iteration through the basic fuel equation returns a ReqFuel number of 22 or so, which it then divides amongst two injectors. Trouble is, the engine will hardly even idle if the number is below 30 and it doesn't run with a decent AFR until about 44. The astute observer will note that the number that works is exactly double the number given. This leads me to wonder if I should  keep thinking that I should be able to trick it into by telling it my injectors are half the flow they are, hoping for it to come back with a 44. It apparently doesn't work that way, for telling it 125 cc/min comes back with, like 28.

So, ignoring the set up and using 44 as the ReqFuel number gets the thing running.

I've been using TunerStudio instead of MegaTune. I like it better overall. The dashboard configuration is very easy to customize.

With MegaTune, I would have to swap out one gauge or another when I was working on various pieces of the tune, but with TunerStudio's dashboard, I have all the gauges showing at once. I need to play with their layout a bit, but they are all there!

TunerStudio's VE Analyze Live! feature is a pretty cool autotune facility, however in my case, it seems to want to lean out mixtures that are already lean, where I would expect it to richen them. Perhaps I have some settings wrong. In any case, it's still cool to watch it change the numbers and to see the engine respond to the changes.

With continued vigilance, I hope to have this thing reliably on the street in the next few weeks.

Denied!

Rule One: Test before you put it ALL back together.

Monday night, I got the rest of the engine wiring and hoses on, the exhaust, the bumper... Started the engine up (it cranked for about one second and lit off without touching the throttle... I love EFI).... All looked good.

I knew I would probably need to adjust the clutch cable before taking it for a spin. That's when I noticed that the clutch arm does not budge. At all. Well, it wiggles with the minimal play that the shaft has naturally, but otherwise, it was completely immobile.

Long story short, on Tuesday, I called AMS to consult with Steve again. He recommended that I remove all the new parts and bring them in, along with the old parts and as much other information as I could gather. Tuesday night, I fooled with it for a while, still looking for something, but pulled the parts out and got them ready to go.

This afternoon, I took everything in to AMS and we determined that everything should be all the right components. He suggested a couple of things to check concerning cable adjustment and clearances. I also consulted a couple of BTW folk. At this point, it's a mystery to all, but my mission is to measure and test to see if I can find what's not making up.

So, when I got home and got started, about 8PM, I first checked that the throwout bearing, fork, cable and pedal were all moving freely.

 Reassembled, same thing.

I pulled it apart again. I did some measuring. I put a straight edge across the mounting face of the transaxle and measured to the face of the throwout bearing. It was 2.68 inches. I also put the straightedge on the face of the pressure plate collar thingy and measured to the engine block face that mates with the transaxle. It was 2.81 inches. These two together should mean that, once assembled, the throwout bearing should be resting about 1/8" from the pressure plate. This corresponds with the expected range of motion for the assembled clutch.

I verified that the clutch arm has it's full range of motion while disassembled.

I also compared the old and new throwout bearings:

Though they are constructed in rather different ways, all the dimensions that matter appear to be identical, or at least compatible.

While I had it apart, I attempted to use a steel plate and some clamps to verify that the pressure plate can indeed move when pressed. It does. There was not a reasonable way to press the clutch and verify that the clutch disk is released when it is pressed. I have in mind a custom tool that could test that, but I was not prepared to fabricate such a tool just then. I put it all back together again, with the old throwout bearing, and verified that nothing had changed.

"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Albert Einstein

While I had the camera ready, I documented the free play in the clutch arm while assembled and it corresponds with what I would expect.

So, I have decided that unless some radical new information comes to light before bedtime Thursday, I am not going to be able to drive the trike to the benefit/show this weekend.

I will, however, tow it in to the show. We are auctioning off a donated paint job and this trike has the paint from a previous auction and we hope to drum up lots of interest in the auction!

Clutch Reassembled

I dropped by Automotive Machine and Supply after work to procure parts and consult the oracle. Steve verified my concerns that there was supposed to be a collar on the pressure plate for the throwout bearing to contact and further that it's absence is the real reason the throwout bearing jumped the tracks. He also verified that the play in the input shaft is normal, though he agrees that I should change out the seal.

So, $86 dollars later, I have a new clutch cover and pressure plate, as well as the clutch fork and such.

Besides, the old pressure plate and fingers were more damaged than they first appeared:

Note the bent fingers at the lower right. They were not really apparent with the cover installed.

The installation of clutch fork included the usual minor trauma. Installation of the clutch cover gave me a new problem that make me chuckle.

My clutch pilot tool has a ring for a handle and it was too big to fit through the collar on the pressure plate. I applied a bit of heat and a bit of sculpting and now it fits.

Otherwise there were no particular difficulties with the physical installation, other than the usual big hands in a small space issues...

After the delays, I got the engine bolted on and decided that it was late enough that I didn't want to tear in to the wiring, fuel, exhaust and bumper. They will have to wait for Friday or Saturday...

Transaxle Work

I got all but the four bolts pulled off Tuesday night, then finished pulling the engine out last night.

It looks like there was no really serious damage done by the rogue throwout bearing. The fork was pushed too far and the throwout bearing jumped off it.

You can see the broken finger and a piece of a chewed up spring clip laying on the bottom of the bell housing. The remaining clip holding the throwout bearing has been ground against something as well. At the time of the event, the engine was still running, but in the process of towing it home, the broken finger apparently jammed between the flywheel and the bell housing, preventing me from starting the engine.

Once off the fork, it appears that the bearing landed such that the fingers on the clutch pressure plate rubbed against the bearing carrier. You can see the galling on the bearing carrier in this picture:

 It remains to be seen whether the damage to the pressure plate fingers is significant:

Some pressure plates have some kind of disc attached to the fingers, like this:

... but this one never has, at least not while I've had it. I'm not sure whether or not it's missing, but since clutch operation seems reasonably normal without it, I'm going to assume it's ok without it.

Speaking of assumptions, I took a guess that some fairly severe looking play in the input shaft of the transaxle might have been a factor in the damage done. Upon clearer thinking, I now realize that this shaft is not left hanging out there, but is rather supported by the pilot bearing in the end of the engine crankshaft. Duh! I am going to replace that seal while I'm in there anyway...

Picking up parts on the way home tonight; it's entirely possible that I may have this thing mobile tomorrow...

Long, Hot Summer

It's been a long, hot, busy summer. Now that it's cooling off enough to be able to work outside without medical intervention, I have a lot of projects to get caught up on!

Another delay, though a welcome one, was our friend John visiting. Besides being a fascinating conversationalist with a number of truly interesting stories from each of the 44 countries he's visited, he is a tireless and skilled worker who would have to be tied down to *not* work around the house. He did what is basically 4 projects, but also myriad related and unrelated work, the whole of which is that our driveway and garage are cleared out and ready to use! As in, the first time since moving here, including the time Gabby was here before I was. My tools are all indoors! I wont know how to act...

As for projects, I have three MAJOR projects... four, really...

First, and only because it's probably the easiest, I am replacing the airshocks on Sponge Bob Square Trike with coilovers. The ride is expected to be rough, but then so is it with 100 lbs of air in the shocks. The trouble is, that 100 lbs of air is 20 pounds in about 30 minutes and down that low, it rides goofy. It has a shimmy or shuffle or whatever you want to call a side to side motion.

Second and third is to get the clutch/transaxle issue on the Dragon trike (possibly named Puff at this point; I like the irony, but the word doesn't scan well... needs a couple of sylables) solved and tune the EFI system. It only had about 10 miles on the engine when the transaxle trauma occurred. It's in basically default running tune.

Fourth is to get Buzz running. I have a new Motion Pro carburetor sync tool that needs breaking in. I'd like to get him running and put him up for sale. I'd like to do EFI on another bike, but I think it needs to be a bigger one. It's hard to match a modern motorcycle throttle body to a older small displacement engine. I could probably fabricate an intake manifold for a single TB from an ATV or personal watercraft, but it's so much easier to just bolt on one that will work. I think I'd like to tackle a Yamaha XS750 or XS850 triple, using Triumph intakes...

Vacation, With Moderate Drama

Short version: Went on vacation; discovered an old problem that I made for myself; no broken bones, bloodletting or other trauma.

My most lovely and cool wife was on a road trip for work week before last. While she was gone, it was my plan (plan: n. a specific project or definite purpose that will not go as intended) to get the dragon back on the road, but it was just too freakin' hot to enjoy working outdoors enough to get off my duff an do it.


Trikes did well with two exceptions.

We had minor electrical trauma on the Harley. It was a goofy symptom. It would cut out momentarily at not quite random times. We first blamed it on bad gas from a Valero station in Hico, TX. After multiple refills, often with Seafoam added, it was still doing it. It would get bad sometimes and not do it at all others.

I finally decided it was more like a loss of spark than a fuel issue and it occurred to me that the alarm immobilizes the bike by interrupting the coil. We tolerated it for another day because I didn't want to risk tearing into mostly working wiring and making something *really* break.

We were in Pedernales Falls SP, under a bit of shade, with the seat off the bike. I dug in, found the two connections, saw that I had used crimp connectors and gave them a tug. They came loose with very little effort. I know better and have been bitten by crimp connectors before, but at the time I was putting in the alarm, I'm sure I justified using crimp connectors "just this once".

So, I soldered those two connections and checked the starter lockout connectors, which are also crimped, but crimped better. Gilbert ran great the rest of the day and all the way home today.

The other exception was really the escalation of another known issue. The yellow trike has air shocks. It seems to only want to handle correctly with them fully inflated, to 100 PSI. Trouble was, they would leak down over a couple of days. More trouble now because they leak down in a few hours. I pretty much top them off at every stop, if it's been a little while since the last top off.

At least I can top them off with a portable air compressor. Almost none of the air hoses out there will inflate over about 70 PSI, and most are more like 50 PSI.

Transaxle Procured

After work on Friday, I picked up the replacement transaxle. From the part number, it appears as though it may be a 1971 or later model 12 volt transaxle, rather than, as it was advertised, a 1963 converted 6 volt. Yea me!

I had a busy weekend otherwise, so I didn't get to install it. I moved it around a few times, but that was it. Chances look pretty good for getting some work done on it weekday evenings this week.

Big Update, Continued

Sorry these updates are taking so long. Here it is Wednesday and I'm just now writing about last weekend...

Saturday morning, later than hoped but earlier than expected, we headed for Star Of The River. The trike sits low to the ground and the bumper and trailer hitch are the lowest point when the front wheel is on the stinger, a hitch made to carry the front wheel of a trike so that the trike can be towed like a trailer. Sitting still, it was only an inch or so off the ground. Every bump, intersection or driveway forced hard contact between the hitch and the ground. Mere blocks from home, the reinforcing ring around the receiver had been knocked loose, held now only by the top edge. *My* welds attaching the hitch to the bumper held. The Chinese welds on the hitch did not. One point for the home team.

The dirt roads leading into the site were often sand, but usually crushed stone, about 2" chunks. The tire ruts meant that the higher center of the road spent maybe 60-70% of the time in contact with the hitch. There was not much to be done about it.

Everyone liked the trike; though some questioned why I would make it so complex, put so much *stuff* on it to fail. Shrug. Hey, it's my hobby. How do you expect to have road stories if your trike runs 100% of the time?!?!

So, on Saturday and Sunday, I was able to putt around the campsite a little, gave a couple of rides. I was careful to park where I could pull forward to leave as often as possible, for reverse was unobtainable. Third seemed the best bet in most instances.

Due to the condition of the roads, I took it all the way up past the bad stuff, nearly to the highway and parked it there. Gabby took me back down to the truck, where we finished up our packing, then headed out, me on Sponge Bob Square Trike. We stopped at the gate, loaded the Dragon on the stinger and headed for home.

Monday afternoon, after Gabby went to work (no such thing as a holiday there), I tore into reworking the shifter.

My original plan was to cut off the old shifter hanger and replace it with a new one I picked up long ago, then reinstall the shaft with new bushings.

I even got so far as to repair the cuts before two things stopped me.

First, I actually would need two shifter hangers because the builders put in two in a row to proper support the shaft before the first U-joint. Second, the U-joints they used, even if I dressed the welds down, would not fit through the bushings.

 I decided instead to install the shaft and tighten the rings down to eliminate the clearance.

Yes, this makes it a metal on metal sliding contact and it won't last forever, no matter how well I remember to maintain it.

Still, and I'm sure anyone would agree, that it is WAY better than the way it was.

Another shifting problem is the tendancy of the shifter assembly to flex on it's single supporting rod, so I added a piece of quarter inch round rod as a brace. I then found that it would then flex in only one axis, so I added another to lock it in three dimensions.

As an aside, I have decided that I definitely prefer gas welding over wire welding. There's no spatter and very little residue, unless you didn't clean the metal well before you started. The puddle is easier to control, for me anyway.





Even after these mods, it was still hard to reach 1st and 3rd. I found that there was some previously unnoticed interference between the frame and the coupler on the shaft going in the nose of the transaxle.

This is the clearance before I cut away a little more of the plate.

After the cut, still rough. Sorry, I didn't take any more pictures after a cleaned it up!












This cleared the way for all four gears and reverse with little or no difficulty shifting.

Well, some difficulty. In reading about shifting troubles, one of the symptoms of clutch disengagement problems is to sit in neutral, idling, with the clutch out. Push the clutch in, count to 3 or even 5, move the shift lever. Any gear grinding at this point indicates that the clutch is not fully disengaging. I do have a bit of that. It's much easier to downshift while still rolling; not so easy at a full stop.

I remember that the input shaft to the transaxle had a substantial amount of play in it. I could see how the clutch disc might "droop" down, allowing the top edge to contact some moving parts, even with the pressure plate disengaged.

Well, I will have a chance to investigate sooner than later.

With the trike streetable, I rode out to meet Gabby when she got off work. On the way there, I played with acceleration (which it does quite well, once past a bad hesitation off idle) and verified the speedometer against my GPS. I got to her office early enough to have to wait for a little while. There really is not a comfortable place to sit on the trike except the driver seat, not for me anyway. My...ummm...  manparts are quite crowded if I sit in the back seat. Also, since I have still not put the steps in place, my feet and legs hang, putting that much more pressure *there*. I did find a compromise that works for a short wait, perching kind of on the side of rear seat.

On the way home, I played a bit with speed, dropping back, catching up and dropping back again. Then, as we approached a particular intersection about 1/3 of the way home, I was trying to downshift and I suddenly got a continuous grind, whether or not the clutch was in. I shut off the engine, found neutral and restarted the engine; still grinding. I ended up pushing the clutch way too hard and apparently unseated the throwout bearing, for the clutch pedal lost all feedback. The grinding continued. I shut the engine off and found that, except for neural, any gear I put it in would grind when I moved the trike manually. Definitely *something* up in the transaxle.

Gabby went on home to get the truck and stinger and we got the trike home with little more difficulty. I was even able to push it up our steep driveway (with a running start) on the first try.

I priced rebuilding and/or replacing this transaxle, and while $450-500 seems reasonable compared to other transmission work I've had done, $150 for a good used one on Craigslist is even better. I should be picking it up tomorrow or Friday.

I'm home sick today. What I thought were allergies hitting me Sunday night after we got home has become an upper respiratory infection or some such. I crashed on the couch about 6:30 Tuesday night, moved to the bed about midnight and slept till about 11AM today. I even cat-napped a couple times before Gabby served a wonderful Asian style salad with blackened salmon for lunch. That was the boost I needed to get in here and write this up!

Over the next day or two, I will be pulling the old transaxle out so that I can put the replacement in as soon as possible after I get it. I really hope to be back on the road for tuning for the weekend.

Big Update

Short version: I got the trike on the road with an iffy shifter. Rode it a little on Saturday and Sunday. Worked on the shifter on Monday and got it much more functional. Then the transaxle ate itself.

First, a couple of pictures of it all ready to go!

To get it to this point, I did a bit of work after I finally got home Thursday night and pretty much all day Friday, as in it was after midnight when I did a short test ride.

In no particular order, and maybe even earlier in the week, I had to:

1. Put Fix-A-Flat in a rear tire, which of course required a trip to Wal-Mart.

2. Change the front tire and tube since the old one blew shortly after filling to pressure. The old bead was rusted through in a couple of places. The old wheel is MUCH thicker than expected. I'll bet that the little rusty pitted spots on it are not of any significance. The wheel needs balancing, though.

3. Built and installed the throttle cable.

4. Found and installed appropriate new spacers for the five standard bolting locations on the body, which of course required a trip to the hardware store. Quite by accident, I raised the fuel tank just about exactly as high as would fit under the body. In fact, the metal cross brace in the body clears the tank by about 1/4".

5. Installed a license plate light.

6. Wired the trailer connector.

7. Miss wired and corrected the body wiring. I had put male pins in a female connector shell. When I tested the signal lights, they were wrong in many ways. Left signal flashed both left and right tail lights. Right signal flashed the left brake light. Tail lights were completely dark. When I corrected the wrong connector shell, I had reversed the order of the pins.

8. Even after the connector fiasco, the headlights and taillights did not work. The problem turned out to be a connector pulled off the back of the fuse panel, but determining that involved removing the body, or actually would have been easier had I actually removed the body rather than simply tilting the back of it up. *That* is not as easy as it sounds. In any case, I was able to address a couple of wiring routing issues that may have come back to bite me later, so it was not a completely wasted effort.

9. Fixed rough and iffy connections on the older of the two taillights.

10. Decided to postpone the installation the keyswitch due to the need to permanently mount it. Used a small handlebar mounted switch, which of course meant a trip to the motorcycle parts store.

11. Installed the speedometer sensor and a magnet on the front wheel. I set the circumference to 1287 based on my measurement with a steel tape. According to my GPS, it's pretty close, maybe reading 1 MPH high, at least in the limited testing I could do.

 

12. Connected the tachometer input to the EDIS module. Pin 2 of the module connector has a pulse that corresponds with the firing of coil A. The speedo has a setting for number of engine cycles per signal. Since coil A fires once per revolution, you'd think that setting would be '1', but what they really want to know is how many of the total cylinders fire for each signal, which for a two coil wasted spark four cylinder is half. Half the cylinders fire for each signal, so the value it wanted was '0.5'. There is also a shift warning light/redline indicator that flashes the tach bargraph when you exceed the setting. I have this one set to 4000, assuming a redline of 4500 RPM.

13. Installed the shifter and what a pain that turned out to be. I knew that I was going to have to cut fiberglass in order to bolt the body on in the new higher position and, difficult as it was to do, I got through it. However, it didn't seem to matter how much I adjusted, whether I left springs in or out, the reverse lockout plate in or out.... I could never make it actually hit all the gears at any setting. I got it to where I could hit 1st, 3rd and 4th for my test ride. By the next day, I was lucky to find and keep it in 3rd. There will be a separate blog entry about the problem and repair I did to the shifter, but I will give away the ending here. It works better now, but I can pretty much guarantee it won't last and the next thing to do is much more complicated, but should help end all the problems with it.

14. Installed the bumper. I originally fitted the bumper to the end of the shock bolts. In other words, the bolt goes through the frame tower, the eye of the shock absorber then the bumper flange, followed by a washer and, perhaps obviously, a nut. While this is functional, having the  bumper flange between the tower and the shock absorber would be much stronger, having no leverage to bend the bolt. It required springing the upper arms of the bumper outward to attach the second mounting point, but it was not too tough. Not fun, but not too tough. The lower mounts were similarly not too bad, though I had some frustration getting the bolt to line back up with the threads on the second one. While I have not yet installed locking pins on the lower mounts, neither does the bumper move. I won't skip them, but I'm not motivated to jump right on them, either. hehehe

15. I connected the F-Idle lead from MegaSquirt to the N light on the speedometer, though I have not yet tied any logic to it.

16. The alternator light will need some kind of logic to make the LED light correctly. The problem is that my LED is connected between a shared ground and it's own lead, but what is needed for the indicator is a connection between +12V and the alternator. If I connect to the alternator lead, I get a bright irritating warning light when the alternator is operating normally. I think I a simple optocoupler will suffice; I probably already have one that will work. In the mean time, the 2W indicator bulb is connected adjacent to the alternator and is functioning correctly.

When all this work was done, I had not only missed my deadline of 3PM for getting it inspected, but I had missed the deadline of getting it on the road before dark, or indeed, before it because Saturday. I was taking a test ride at 12:40AM Saturday morning, much to the dismay of my neighbors, I'm sure.

Shifter Trauma

The trike was a hit at the event. Sadly, I could not take it anywhere due to the shifter issue. I had to fight for any gear I could find and leave it there as long it would stay. The site had what could best be described as decent dirt roads and most any significant bump would make it jump out of gear, a clear symptom of the problem.

After we got home last night, I sat down and looked at Jamar shifters. I think I can adapt one to my situation if replacing the stock shift rod hanger doesn't work well enough. I think it likely will.

The ones on the trike (it has two to support the length of the initial shaft) were cut in the ring. I think someone chose to do that rather than go to the rather frustrating trouble to properly replace the shaft bushings. To do it correctly, the shaft needs to be pulled out, new bushings installed and the shaft put back in. Because of the welds on the u-joints on this shaft, they don't fit though the installed bushings. With the ring on the hanger split, you can bend the ring open enough to slide the bushings into place. Trouble is, the ring is weakened when bent and more bending makes it worse. It gets so weak that normal shifter motion can push the ring open. Eventually, it will break.

I have a new shift rod hanger. It should be easy enough to pull the shaft out, cut off the old hanger and weld on the new one. I may need to dress the u-joint welds a bit to reinstall the shaft, but next time it will be much easier.

After that, I hope to have it roadworthy enough to do some tuning on the engine. With what little riding I was able to do, I think it goes lean at higher throttle openings, which only makes sense. I couldn't experiment there in the driveway :)

It's not intolerable...

There will be a much more detailed breakdown of all the good and bad, but here's a quick assessment from my short test ride.

The engine did pretty well, better than I expected, really. It was drivable. It felt like a standard 1600 with a 009 distributor, a little balky off idle, but it pulled pretty good. At least in the gears I was able to use.

Earlier today, I discovered a problem with the shifter and sure enough, I had to deal with it. In my ride, the only sequential gears I got was 3rd and 4th, and I was going much too slow for 4th. I never actually engaged 2nd or reverse, but I ground them down a bit.

The clutch and brake both take more effort than I'm used to, but I don't suppose that's actually a problem.

The worst thing is that the bars are VERY close. Turning to either extreme caused them to meet me in the ribs.

On the other hand, it seems to fit Gabby pretty well.... :)

Almost made it

I tried very very hard, but I just didn't make it before midnight.

It is only about 12:30, though!

I'm about to take a late night test ride... I'm sure my neighbors will appreciate it....

Closer... closer....

I finished the body wiring, complete with split sheathing...

Headlight and turn signal connectors

Keyswitch connectors

The need to vigorously clean the fiberglass in order for tie downs to stick is apparent. I suspect they still may come loose, at which time I will epoxy on some kind of cleat.

Under seat span

Termination point. Connectors are hanging below

Also evident is my desire to wrap the wiring in *something*. There split sheath, two colors of spiral wrap and one braided sleeve in the this picture.

Tail / Stop / Turn wiring

The two tail light units were slight different, one being quite old, supplied with the trike when I bought it. The older one had a screw in it for ground; the newer one was missing the push on terminal for the turn lamp. I used short jumper wires with connectors to work around both issues.

The taillights need a gasket to properly fit and seal, but they meet the 10 foot rule quite well...

I got about 2 more inches of altitude, and thus fuel pump clearance, for the fuel tank. I started the engine several times, and almost immediately, it was running extra lean andshopwing low fuel pressure. I presumed the filter was probably clogged. Since the tank should have been exceptionally clean after applying the POR15 liner, I wondered if the liner had dissolved due to the alcohol content of our modern gasolines. I fumbled around until I found a light source to inspect the inside of the tank. I discovered that I was suffering not from liner dissolution or clogged filter, but rather a dearth of fuel. Some of those tests must have burned VERY rich.

Besides the other fuel tank bracket, you can see where I elected to put the obnoxiously loud airhorn. It was nearly $50, but wow can it be heard.

I installed a couple of Mr Gasket sparkplug wire loom. Because it's chrome, it doesn't show up very well in this photo, but it looks really nice in person.

Relocated fuel filter; it was too close to the axle and the line was too close to the moving clutch parts. I also rerouted the power lead to the fuel pump.

The raised fuel tank comes pretty close to the shock tower, but at least that's the stationary end!










That's all I have pictures for. I also connected the IDM pin of the EDIS module to the tach input on the speedo. I had to adjust the count for 0.5 rotations per signal, but it reads RPM now! I also set a 4000 RPM shift point. At the appointed RPM, the tach bargraph will flash.

I'm almost positive I did more than this, but I think I am too sleepy to remember them just now....