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3 hours ago, monkeyseemonkeydo said:

The beast made it about 4.5 hours of the 5 total before cutting out. It was seriously dusty and I think the carb just got choked up with shit. Eventually got it back running after the event had finished but it definitely needs a bit of TLC...

Yes, the air filter appears happy again.

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  • 2 months later...
On 10/18/2018 at 10:09 AM, Joe Sheehan said:

Long time, no post.

I rode to Croatia and back on my RSV4 Factory this year. It was sick.

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How are you finding the RSV4? My mate loved his but then it dropped a valve on the warm up laps at a Silverstone trackday, he wasn't that pleased. I can't remember the exact year but his was an early one, they seem to have a lot of engine issues compared to the old V twins.

Edited by LEON
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6 hours ago, LEON said:

How are you finding the RSV4? My mate loved his but then it dropped a valve on the warm up laps at a Silverstone trackday, he wasn't that pleased. I can't remember the exact year but his was an early one, they seem to have a lot of engine issues compared to the old V twins.

I love it mate. The early ones did have teething issues, they had a recall as the nut on the end of the crank would undo with time but the aprc ones are all good.

I've done 20k miles on mine now and it's on 40k plus now and I've done all sorts on it. The front end is incredible you can brake so hard and late and it turns exactly where you want it.

They do go through valves like nobody business if left unchecked though.

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Good stuff! Yeah I hear a lot about those nuts, I follow Aprilia Performance and they just seem to live off RSV4 engine rebuilds! He ended up selling his as a mint non runner for £4k, yours sounds a bit better though! 

Are your forks Ohlins? I've got the Gen 2 RSV1000R with the radial calipers, same forks my mate's RSV4 had, but some idiot before me tightened the pinch bolts up as tight as he could and now they're cracked across the front of the axle clamps, ideal! Gutted I didn't spot it when I bought it.

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On 19/10/2018 at 11:29 PM, LEON said:

 

Oh that's frustrating. I didn't get my valves sorted when I should have, about 9k overdue and it needed 16 valves and an exhaust cam. So they definitely do require the servicing.

That's gutting about the forks but it's sadly all too common! Have you sorted replacements? I actually crashed mine last year and trashed the forks so replaced them with some R forks but they are shocking. I kept popping seals on the stock ohlins forks so I'm going to get some of the Sachs forks from the non factory model and install ohlins cartridges. I'd look into it for yourself, although the bling factor is good.

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2 hours ago, Joe Sheehan said:

Oh that's frustrating. I didn't get my valves sorted when I should have, about 9k overdue and it needed 16 valves and an exhaust cam. So they definitely do require the servicing.

That's gutting about the forks but it's sadly all too common! Have you sorted replacements? I actually crashed mine last year and trashed the forks so replaced them with some R forks but they are shocking. I kept popping seals on the stock ohlins forks so I'm going to get some of the Sachs forks from the non factory model and install ohlins cartridges. I'd look into it for yourself, although the bling factor is good.

Damn! That's mental considering the V twins barely need any maintenance. I don't think he quite knew the maintenance required! 

It is a b*****d! But I got the bike pretty cheap and I'm not looking to spend anything on it if I can help it. I read about one bloke who got one new Ohlins lower leg for £300, I don't really fancy that. The crack is all the way across the width but depth-wise it doesn't quite go all the way through to the axle. Ah well, it survived one track day!

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I don't know, I presumed it was a scaled up version of the sxv550 motor which was a complete aprilla design. They kept destroying valvetrain as well if I recall correctly :)

Got the rotax motor in my ccm, tuned to over 150% output it's still bombproof on good service intervals (I did oil at 1000 miles). In standard tune I reckon you could lubricate it with toothpaste and fuel it with rancid butter and it would still work :D

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A noisy tappet is a happy tappet ;)

If it's noisy (within reason) then the valve is closing fully, if the clearances are too tight and the valve isn't fully seating then it will burn the seats out.  The 604 rotax engine (aircooled 598cc single) is rather agricultural and heavy but very simple to work on, I wouldn't expect the newer lumps to be much more difficult.  Doing tappet clearances shouldn't be too much hassle or is it buckets which need a selection of shims to get them right?

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  • 3 weeks later...

Anyone here happen to know if the reserve lever of an old enots petrol tap can be disassembled? It appears to be stuck and is in desperate need of a seal.

The On-Off part is straightforward but I'm absolutely stumped with the reserve.

 

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  • 1 month later...

So I managed to pass my mod 2 which is awesome. So sold the Honda Varadero I had and replaced it with a Triumph Speed Four as a fixer upper over winter.

Slightly higher miles at 40k which concerned me but runs great albeit very lumpy at under 3000 rpm. Hopefully an inline 4 will be relatively reliable for miles to come.

 

So far I've-

- Done a top yoke conversion for renthal bars. I tried to get used to the clip-ons but they weren't my cup of tea.

- Changed the fuel couplers in the tank to brass ones as they were leaking a bit.

- Changed the vacuum hoses as one was split.

- Fork seals changed and fork oil changed

- Front mudguard was cracked so I've repaired it then used plasti-dip to respray that. Also sprayed the pillion foot rests, throttle cable body on the levers and mirror mounts....all badly corroded.

This week it's a swingarm swap as the other one had the worst corrosion on ever... surprise it didnt turn into dust as soon as it was knocked. Exhaust manifold removal to get to the sump and replace the exhaust studs which are also beyond saving.

There's lots more to do after that too. 

 

I'm pretty happy with the way it's going so far and excited to get back on it in summer.

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Moved it back into the guest room as I pulled the engine to send the big end to the UK to to have a new conrod and oversised bearings. Found my conrod which I thouth I was sending as exchange lying under some bubble wrap after I sent the parcel..

 

Should receive carb spares coming tomorrow and more spares by the end of the week.

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Don't judge the bar angle :P
It's fixed with cableties and string, can't get those BSC screws easily over here.

 

Bit miffed as I drove 400km last weekend to fetch a speedo drive that *should* be correct. Rudge used gears that no one else seems to have used (1:75 ratio, 8-14 cogs) and the chap selling it thought it's correct. Also found a brake pedal in a box which he gave me for £15.
Back home I took the speedo drive apart and realised that it had the easy to find 1:1.5 ratio. I luckily hadn't paid yet and told him I'm not ready to pay the price he asked for when I can get a housing off ebay for £80 or something.
Now he wants both items back and I did the drive there for nothing at all. :rolleyes:

Looking into having gears made now, but I've got no clue about anything. A friend of mine could make CAD files but I'm unsure about two things: Material and price. 45° helicals, original they're hardened steel but I'm wondering if nylon gears on a steel spindle would be a suitable replacement? There'd be multiple people interested in one as the 1:75 ratio seems so rare.

Edited by Topsy
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I in need of some paint advice.

Originally I had planned to be using a booth and doing it "properly", but it looks like I won't be able to. After my mate had a ton of trouble doing his tank, his buddy currently is not that enthusiastic to help others out for an entire weekend.

I'm a bit lost with paints though. I'd like to go out and get some rustproof & primer, enamel and clear and brush it on, especially for the small parts it shouldn't be an issue, but the selection seems so vast that I don't know what I'm looking at. They can hardly all be decent?.. Plus everything seems to be called enamel now?
If there's any paint component I should watch out for or if someone has any other ideas I'm happy to hear them.

I don't expect to be doing the mudguards and tank that way too but I might end up having to do that.
I did have a vision of having some very dark blue between the pinstripes on the tank and maybe rear mudguard too, but I'm not going to go mixing my own paint and brushing it on if I can't use a booth anywhere.

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  • 2 months later...

I went along to the track day at Brands yesterday with my dad's mate to get an idea of what goes on, also took my bike to get it noise tested. Scraped a pass with 102.6db so I'm going to re-pack the cans before I go back.

Some amazing machinery in the garages, a lot of beautiful bikes. Interesting to see virtually everyone using tyre warmers, might buy a pair. With sessions only 15-20 minutes it makes sense I suppose, you don't want to be coming in as soon as your rubber is heated up.

I took a few pics of people riding, although I have to say the big fences don't make it easy. I think I last went there in the mid 1990s and there was just the little waist-high fence then!

 

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  • 1 month later...

Did a trackday in February, 16c and sunny would you believe. Then got rained off from Oulton Park in March, now going to Nurburgring on the bikes for Easter weekend. Will report back with a POV video of the Nordschleife now I've bought the hero 7 black. Looking forward to seeing how clear it is with the hypersmooth tech.

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