pete roper

If you don't want your new motor to go the same way as the last one I'd suggest adding a sloppage sheet. I'm out of them but another enterprising soul is going to be taking over production so they should be available soon.

Sorry but it sounds like it's beyond help. Start looking for a new donk.

Gavin and Ishtar, yours are on the way. Docc and Kosta, I'll get yours out probably Monday as I've come down with the flu. Bleargh!

Still got a couple left if people want a plate. $120AU plus $37AU postage to the US

This brilliant scene always reminded me somewhat of my experience with skinheads Chuck. Dylan Moran at his best.

Being a weedy, White, middle class dipstick I always found that if it looked like things were going to get ugly and we were going to go head to head with a bunch of room temperature IQ skinheads I always found it handy to latch myself on to a very large West Indian bloke, preferably with big dreads and a thousand yard stare on top of the muscles! You tended to not get punched as much with someone like that watching your back!

Drove past one of the mosques where the shooting occurred yesterday and am staying in a motel only about a km away. There are still three armed cops outside but they, and everyone else, seemed fairly relaxed. It's amazing what an incredible amount of solidarity this tragedy has engendered in NZ and the prime minister and the rest of the parliament have behaved with a level of strength, leadership and decorum that should be a blazing torch for other polities around the globe. When I look at the enormous, raging clusterfuques that represent most other English speaking 'Democracies' at the moment it is reassuring to see that the system can work and it is possible to say no to bigotry and hate. Would that my own country would embrace such high minded and common sense ideals. Sadly I fear that successive governments of all stripes have allowed racists to crawl out from under their rocks without being stamped on immediately. That, along with social media platforms that allow isolated individuals to band together and reinforce each other's hate have made a fertile dung-heap in which bigotry can thrive. In my youth I spent a fair bit of time at anti racism marches, sometimes even punching on with racists. I was really hoping to have left all that behind but now, in my sixties and half a world away from the country of my youth it looks like I may have to do it again! That sucks! I've got a dicky heart, fuqued lungs and can't walk very far nowadays, (A packet of darts a day for fifty years will do that to you!) but shit like this is important! For our kids and the future of mankind.

I would add to the consensus. 0.4 is almost 1/2 a mm and while I don't think it would do any harm it would contribute greatly to the 'Two cheese graters fornicating in an iron tank' racket from the top end that you will be able to hear above the noise of cats screwing from the belts.

It's interesting how much simpler the second generation Hi-Cam is compared to the original. While Carcano's swansong is undoubtably a tour de force in 1960's design terms it is also complex and, in many ways, a fragile thing. The Nuovo Hi-Cam in comparison is not only incredibly simple but also astonishingly robust! If they hadn't chosen to save a few dollars a bike by downgrading to flat tappets and rendering the top end a ticking time bomb it really could of been an 'Engine for the ages'. Alas it wasn't to be. The bean counters did for it and now we're seemingly stuck with boring, Uber-conservative, dreary motive units until after I'm dead! I weep!

$120AU plus postage which last time I sent some was, from memory, about $30AU. I'm on holiday in NZ at the moment but I'll price up freight when I'm back next week. On the subject of the Quota and other non V11, non 'Broad Sump' models I really believe that unless you are going racing a sloppage sheet or windage plate is overkill. With the V11's it is the combination of the shallow 'Broad' sump and the low gear ratios in the bottom end of the box coupled with the naff oil pick up location that makes the plate at the very least a wise investment if not a necessity.

I just did a run and have four left if people need them.

Yup, there's no way to drift in the new race with the shaft in place. Internal extractor would have to be very specialised as there are only two small cutaways in the register for the rave and the rest of it the register is wider than the bearing.

If your swingarm bearings come out in chunks you need to replace them. If you want to you can spend ages chasing aftermarket ones but I've had no success as the 'Usual' design for these in RS format won't fit or work. Buy new bearings and new seals for the frame and then start the painful bit. First up you need to remove the driveshaft. This is retained by an expanding circlip on the gearbox output shaft. Get a podgy bar or large screwdriver and lever the front yoke back against the clip. Then use a copper hammer to deliver a mighty blow to the front yoke in a rearwards direction. This will pop the yoke off the circlip and the shaft will drop off, (It helps to have an assistant to hold the shaft.). Then you have to grind up a long, sharp edged, drift that can be poked through from the opposite side of the frame and be hooked up in the small cutaways in the bearing registers in the frame underneath the outer race of the bearing. Once you are sure the drift is engaged a few mighty thwack with a 4lb hammer should spit out the outer race from the frame. Clean it all up and then repeat for the other side. The new outer races can then be driven into the frame using an old outer race to biff them in. New seals can then be glued into the frame, packed cones inserted and the shaft put back onto the output shaft, (Make sure it is pushed on with sufficient force to ensure the circlip slips into place to lock the shaft.) after which the swingarm casting can be fed back up over the shaft and slipped into place. Once the swingarm spindle is inserted and tightened into the swingarm the castellated preload collar can be inserted and tightened down just far enough to preload the bearings. After which the two pinch bolts can be tightened, the boot re-attached and cable tied in place and the rest of the linkage and arse end of the bike reassembled. It's getting the outer races out of the frame that is the biggest shit of the whole job.

Jaap, don't be daunted, it's really not that hard. Tie the front end down. Jack the bike up under the sump using a scissor jack and something to spread the load to get the rear wheel off the deck. Remove the exhaust, rear brake and wheel. Remove the side plates that hold the footrests. You have to disconnect the gear linkage rod and rear brake light switch to do this. Now you can tackle the linkage bolts. Note when you remove the one that goes through the shock to the swingarm there is a top hat bush in the swingarm. Don't loose it and remember it goes in from the inside adjacent to the shock eye! Don't forget the wishbone that pivots in the frame also has a bearing at the front that will need the same treatment and check the wishbone carefully for signs of damage. Take both wishbone and linkage over to the bench and carefully press the inner races out of the bearings. Not all the way, just far enough you can get a good squiz at the needles. If they look OK but just dry get a glob of grease on your finger and massage it into the needles before pushing the race back through the bearing and out the other side about the same amount. Repeat the greasing operation. Do this to ALL of the bearings. It is best to do this over a piece of white sheeting or the like as if you push the inner race too far it's likely the rollers, and there are lots of them, will tumble out. The reality is that if they do they will probably be rusty and buggered anyway. Note that in the wider parts of the linkage there are two sets of bearings side by side so be careful pressing out the inner race. If you find the bearings are rusty and beyond use, (On a 2008 bike, if they have never been inspected and greased this is highly likely.) you'll find it is about the same price to buy the entire linkage as it is to buy all the bearings, races and seals and then press the wretched thing apart and rebuild it. The savings in time/labour cost make it far more sensible to buy a new linkage. Just grease it properly before installing it. For now though leave it as you need to remove the swingarm. First clip the two cable ties that connect the rubber boot between the swingarm and gearbox. Remove the bevelbox after disconnecting the reaction rod. Then undo the pinch bolts that tighten the swingarm onto the castellated preload collar that preloads the swingarm bearings. The collar can then be undone and removed. Although a 'Special Tool' helps it's perfectly easy to undo it with a 'C' spanner as well. Once moving it usually unwinds by hand but wrap it in a rag as the corners of the castellations are sharp and ouchy! You then need to undo the swingarm spindle which requires a 14mm Allen socket or you can double-nut a suitable bolt to wind it out. Once loose it can be withdrawn from the left through the swingarm. Once it is out of the way the swingarm can be slid off down the driveshaft and removed. Take care with it. It is a very light casting and is only really designed to be strong in one plane! Do not biff, drop or otherwise abuse it! Once the swingarm is out of the way the swingarm bearing cones can be plucked out of the frame. Unless you are very lucky the chances are they will look something like the ones shown in the post above. If you are lucky make sure the inner seals are facing the right way and are secure in the frame and simply re-pack the bearings with as much bloody grease as you can get into them and stick them back in the frame. Check the shaft trunnions for tight spots or wear and if they're OK just spray a bit of chain lube up the splines and start reassembly. If, as I suspect, you find that the bearings are 'Donald Ducked' and the races are rusty and worn you'll need to replace them and this is where you'll enter a whole new world of pain! I'll cover that a bit later if you want me to? Pete

Funny story. Couple of years ago they set the drug bus up on the hill coming out of Queanbeyan and were pulling over everyone. I was on the Griso with Mistral Hi-Pipe with dB killer in and the bloke in front was on an R6/R1 type thing. He had not only an open pipe but had tried that thing that 'tards do of mounting his numberplate inboard of the wheel in front of the shock. Oh my! That was fun seeing him get the third degree as they defected him on the spot, made him unscrew his plate, drug and piss tested him and then told him to @#!#$# off and walk home! They drug tested me but probably only because when they asked me if I'd ever taken narcotics I said "Shit yeah!" But then explained the last time was probably close to forty years ago and it was really shitty sulphate and I was ripped off! Not huge on the sense of humour that one! No issues with the noise though. Even though my Griso sounds like cheesgraters fornicating in an iron tank!

But shitty ribbed tyres are 'COOL' Phil! Get with the programme! It doesn't matter if it handles like a fridge or you get coated in road shite because it doesn't have mudguards! It's 'COOL' because back in the 'Good Old Days' that's what motorbikes had and of course worshipping stuff that was considered barely satisfactory when we were young is all the rage because everything back then was wonderful! Or not......

Definitely smallblock. V35 Imola 4V maybe? Or V75 Targa? Given its somewhere in SE Asia I believe it is most likely a 350 variant.

Royalties can go to MSF. I am blessed with so much that I don't need the money from a few plates to fund my retirement. I'd prefer it went to a good humanitarian cause.

Austria? Australia? WGAF as long as there is beer, motorbikes, comely wimmins and games you play with a bloody great hammer called the 'Terminator'! (I kid you not! There is a croquet mallet called 'Terminator!)

Beers, Wines and Spirits.

I fear that we'd have to go to the bowling club for that, (Shudder!) but unlike 20-25 years ago when all the pubs in Queanbeyan were Friday night bloodhouses and DIY rhinoplasty centres most of them have been very nicely renovated and serve not only good scoff but some decent BWS! All is not lost!

Oh dear. Someone posted a pic of a podgy bar! We're doomed! In a desperate attempt to do something to entertain ourselves in retirement Jude and I have been looking for a 'Sport' or 'Passtime' to get involved in. We know loads of people who are in to lawn bowls but they are all dull as ditchwater and as sharp as bags of wet mice so we ran away from that but in Queanbeyan, just up the road, there is a croquet club! Now yer talkin'! They give you a WEAPON, a bloody great hammer! Tops! Pete

No spark or injector pulse screams phase sensor.

As I've said, add ten bucks to the cost and donate it to Medicienes sans Frontiers and I'll be fine with that. If you can undercut the thieving turds at Guzzibits? So much the better. I know they have a 'Good reputation' but they are thieves and scumbags and I'd be happy to see them go bust.

The design does what it needs to do, I haven't bothered modifying it. Crankcase pressure is always going to vary due to the 90 degree, shared crankpin design. The only way to reduce it would be increase the volume of the case or enlarge the vent. Pete