XR11/73

[Suzukidave]

Dang .. you were in New York and you didnt stop in to visit me in Pa.

[garry55]

sorry Dave - only there for 4 days and so much to see.................

how far from NY are you?

[Suzukidave]

About 3 hours away that was some kinda snow storm huh

[garry55]

sure was - walking on 5th Ave with no traffic was eerie.
2nd highest recorded snowfall in NY according to tv reports.
It was plenty thick in Central Park

[Suzukidave]

We had record snow fall in Lancaster 30+ " not in recorded history has that much come down in one storm .

[garry55]

had a brainstorming session with my welders yeterday - a bit one-sided, but I tried to keep them onboard.....

we have now decided on the best way forward with the front upper engine mounts, and this requires losing the "s" from the end of "mounts" and centralising the remaining one. It is easier to fabricate, will look a lot neater than the previously envisaged side mounts and as a bonus provides a home for the 3 ignition coils.
I now have to make a new plate to fit the center of the cylinder head - so thats my job at work tonight.
Pictures (hopefully) to follow........

[Suzukidave]

It will be interesting to see what you have come up with

[garry55]

making the new front engine mounting............

firstly, the cylinder head plate. I Araldited an oversized piece of aluminium sheet to a spare cylinder head so it wouldn't move around whilst marking it out and drilling it........



the head plate mounting bolts are 8mm, whereas the holes for the cylinder head mounting sleeve bolts are 13mm. To get the holes as accurate as possible, I cut an old sleeve bolt down........



and used it to centre the 8.5mm drill bit thus...........



so that after a visit to the pillar drill...........



and a little bit of shaping (to clear the thermostat housing).....



I ended up with this...........



some welding next..............

[MikeD]

going to mount and torque that to the top of the cylinder head? you're are not concerned with broken cooling fins on the top surface, or overheating that center cylinder??

[Suzukidave]

The fins are just for show and its water cooled so shouldnt have any heat problems

[garry55]

going to mount and torque that to the top of the cylinder head? you're are not concerned with broken cooling fins on the top surface, or overheating that center cylinder??

Mike

the plate sits atop the head sleeve bolts so doesn't come into contact with the fins. 5 of the sleeve nuts have had their domed heads removed, then they have been drilled and tapped to take 8mm bolts. These bolts will secure the plate to the head after the head bolts have been torqued up.
Thinking about it, I might have re-invented Ram-Air cooling !

[MikeD]

With the idea that you are going to run longer bolts in I'd think you'd see uneven torque on that plate on top of the uneven surface of those fins, plus compressing them with that plate over time/heat cycles. Suzuki manufactured machined surfaces for the bolts to compress on for a reason. And even with the head being water cooled that cylinder is going to run hotter, but maybe not by enough to make a diff in the long run though :shrugs: No dog in the fight, but dunno, not for me but wanted to be sure I was correctly understanding what I was seeing. Will be interested to see how it comes out in the end though. Is the intent that the engine is going to be hung by the top of the plate? Which of the std engine mount locations are not going to be used?

eta: never hit Submit on this earlier today. now with the info that the the head bolts will be tapped and then this plate mounted to the top of the tapped bolt surfacethen this makes more sense. Figured I'd post the whole thing I wrote anyway for posterity

Thinking about it, I might have re-invented Ram-Air cooling !

lol, think the 380 engineers beat you to it well, re-invent, ok then

[garry55]

Mike

thanks for the comments. I take on board everything what people are saying, as what I am doing is fairly unique and I am no engineer - just a serial tinkerer !

The motor is hung from the frame via the 2 standard rear mounts, but as I am using a beam frame that has no cradle as standard, I wanted to emulate the original method of supporting the front of it.
I was going to go with 2 side-mounted plates picking up on rubber mounts attached to head-mounted plates, but now we have decided to have a single, central pick-up that will be both neater to look at and more practical when completed. Hopefully it will make sense when I post pictures of the plate / mount / bracket fitted to the bike. It was always my design brief not to have a cradle around the motor. Time will tell if I made the right, or wrong, decision !

[garry55]

the diy dry-clutch disaster................

I've been thinking about it since BDK announced that their conversion would cost the wrong side of $4300.
Mine will probably never work, but at least I'll have some fun on my way to achieving abject failure

an innocent, spare GT750 clutch basket earlier today,,,,,,,,,,,,,



having drilled the rivet heads off, it's time to apply some (very) basic engineering principles.......



the component parts of a GT750 clutch basket laid bare...........



I can throw away the 3 rivets and their bushings, the 6 springs, the backing plate and its thrust washer.
That's saved some weight already

[garry55]

today I took my collection of clutch parts and a vague idea of what I wanted and presented it to the boss of a specialist gear-cutting engineering company.
To my surprise, he was on board with it straight away. He recommended a few tweaks here and there, we consolidated the required measurements and I left without the clutch parts. He's hoping for a 4 week turnaround.



tinkle tinkle.............