Electric starter conversion

fiatfan said:

This proves it guys; I´m in the wrong place :cry:
Tommy

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No, you are not. Just do your homework and have some patience.

I have a complete unmolested Mk3 crankshaft for sale, contact me off list if interested.
The starter gears are regularly up for sale on eBay. NOS primary covers are being advertised on eBay UK right now. Ancillary parts are easy to come by.
Recently a NOS set of Mk3 crankcases was advertised on eBay. You could order a set of new cases from Steve Maney, at a price of course.
G/B cradle is available new from AN.

Cheers,

Knut

mdt-son said:

fiatfan said:

This proves it guys; I´m in the wrong place :cry:
Tommy

Click to expand...

No, you are not. Just do your homework and have some patience.

I have a complete unmolested Mk3 crankshaft for sale, contact me off list if interested.
The starter gears are regularly up for sale on eBay. NOS primary covers are being advertised on eBay UK right now. Ancillary parts are easy to come by.
Recently a NOS set of Mk3 crankcases was advertised on eBay. You could order a set of new cases from Steve Maney, at a price of course.
G/B cradle is available new from AN.

Cheers,

Knut

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Hei Knut! I know where you can buy the parts, but that´s always in a place far far away....(shipping costs, just saying) Here in Scandinavia we don´t have much of these parts, or bikes for that matter. As "Ashman" so correctly pointed out, the bulk of the Nortons sold went to the US, hence the possibility to find parts or bikes there is much better. Also it seems you still can find bikes that have been sitting in a garage or barn many years for pretty little money, if lucky. That´s not the case up here.
As for the parts, I now know that I need AT LEAST the crank, left side crank case half, and the complete transmission. Even if I could find these parts in the US, at a fair price, the shipping cost would make that deal go down the drain.
So I´m currently leaning towards the long kick starter, but you never know....

Tommy,

Shipping from the States is no problem at all and doesn't cost a fortune either. Contact me off list and I will pass the information. All AMC/Norton crankcases are handed. Attempting to mix used cases will not succeed.

-Knut

Ok, next crazy idea :twisted: ! Had a little chat with a friend who is a good machinist and former Norton owner, we talked about my wish for an electric starter, and my ideas around this. So he asks if the starter couldn´t be placed on the right side of the motor? That is in the place where the ignition once sat, and run a chain down to the intermediate gear. I´m pretty sure someone must have tried this somewhere, as people have always made "upgrades" on every part of these bikes. IMHO this seems to be quite possible, at least theoretically :? . Does anyone know anything of this type of "improvement"?
Tommy

Jim Comstock, aka comnoz, was working on such a conversion a couple years back, along with his gear drive system for the camshaft. I don't know how far he got with it, or what the current status is. I'm guessing it got shelved along with the cam drive, particularly since Jim is usually way overloaded with other Norton work, but with Jim you never know. I'm continually amazed at how much he accomplishes. He must have more hours in his day than the 24 the rest of us have.

He posted some info on the project at the time, so you might find a bit more with a good search.

Ken

Am sure I read somewhere that Norton themselves explored that avenue before going with the system used on the mark three. The system used by Triumph drives through the timing gears a friend of mine has the parts and a couple of a starter motors and like much of his other triumph stuff I was stunned by the weight of the motors. They are hugh compared with the modern Alton motor or CNW units. I once was talking to Steve Maney on the subject of starters he said he was thinking of making his own as he didn't like the use of sprag clutch an was not sure the available after market systems could reliably work with his 1007cc engine. When I asked about the large triumph unit he was of the opinion due to the limited space available for reduction gears the motor would turn slower and require far more torque hence the size of the Triumph unit. He was also sceptical the cam drive gears and keys of a Commando could cope.

fiatfan said:

Does anyone know anything of this type of "improvement"?

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That "improvement" was very nearly implemented on the 1971 models using a Lucas M3 starter motor, unfortunately it regularly self-destructed during testing, often wrecking the timing-side case in the process, so the idea was shelved.

This is just why this forum is so great, you wonder about something, or just through out a wild idea, and you´re immediately taken down to earth or you get very interesting and valuable info :!: Thanks guys, this time the latter suits perfect, not ready for the "down to earth" yet .
My thoughts on this is to make a bracket which is welded or bolted to the cradle, and take as much load off the timing side as possible. Maybe just a bushing and a seal, but the load when starting is to be taken up by the bracket. Please note this is just floating around in my half empty head yet, so it´s not a fully functioning conversion, yet 8)
Tommy

I have seen a Matchless single where the owner made a lovely job of fitting a large gear to the clutch basket and a bendix type starter above the gearbox that engaged to it like most cars do. So there was no sprag clutch to worry about and you get the gear reduction of the motor pinion to large clutch gear. If you used the Iwis chain that Andy has you may with the help of your engineering friend be able to fit something like that to the clutch. You would then not have to worry about over stressing timing side. Just a wild idea to think about.

toppy said:

I have seen a Matchless single where the owner made a lovely job of fitting a large gear to the clutch basket and a bendix type starter above the gearbox that engaged to it like most cars do. So there was no sprag clutch to worry about and you get the gear reduction of the motor pinion to large clutch gear. If you used the Iwis chain that Andy has you may with the help of your engineering friend be able to fit something like that to the clutch. You would then not have to worry about over stressing timing side. Just a wild idea to think about.

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I saw somewhere that Old Brits made a starter conversion that had the starter on top of the gearbox, just as you describe. But there was a lot of stuff around that construction, and you had to buy a new cradle and a new inner trans cover. I sort of liked the idea, but it was pretty expensive. They don´t make them anymore.
Tommy

If you look over the Old Britts site on the new e-start page, you'll see that if you have time, skills, equipment, money & patience, you could replicate it.

Time, skills, & equipment = money. Patience can't be bought.

So, really, all you need is money.

The concentricity of the ring gear on the basket is one of the biggest critical points.

Unless you run a belt, sealing the inner primary case is also pretty important.

Running an outrigger bearing is a plus.

Spyke starter is easy to mount with minimum mods to the tranny cradle.

A honkin' big AGM battery is an absolute.