Boxerfan said:
Hi Peter,
Best of luck sorting that little lot out! I do think a small, modern master cylinder offers possibilities for a better layout than that which NVT saddled us with. Will you still be able to use the kickstart?
Cheers, Jon
Hello Jon
One of the reasons why i,m doing this is to try and make my MK3 as user friendly as a modern machine, The seating position on an interstate is, I,m sure you will agree, not as good as it could be and moving the footrests back should improve things somewhat.
I don't like the 'loop over' style of brake pedal (or gear pedal on right foot change machines) so often seen on rearsets made to install without altering the position of the master cylinder or kickstart.
The only version of rearset i have seen that does move the master cylinder is the one made by Norman Hyde. That then entailed the kickstart being repositioned to a lower angle and i didn't like that look either.
Since i have put together a reliable electric start i decided to remove the kickstart altogether when i rebuilt the gearbox before christmas.
This then led onto designing rearsets that don't have to accomodate the kickstart plus i really like the look of the standard brake pedal!
The space between the gearbox and the alloy Zed plate cries out to be used for the master cylinder and after a few days of thinking this is what i came up with.
The mastercylinder is a Grimeca picked up from our local autojumble for a fiver, all the rest is from materials i had to hand, The footrests are now done. I,m using pillon folding pegs wearing standard front footrest rubbers, modded slightly to tuck them in as far as possible,
At the same auto jumble i got a gear pedal from a suzuki (I think, could well be mistaken) this is going to be changed as it is not long enough to be comfortable to use, its 3/4" too short and i can't move the mounting for it any further forwards as the pivot will interfere with the primary drive case.
As i have mentioned, I rebuilt the gearbox before xmas. Since i got my bike i have been gradually going through everything on her, the front forks and the gearbox were the last things to tackle and to that end i obtained a spare box, intending to overhaul it in the autumn and fit it over winter. This gearbox was sat in my kitchen for a few days and when i got to take the cover off and see what was needed, it struck me that the clutch operating lever doesn't follow the path of the clutch cable entry to the gearbox. Along with the cable nipple not being able to swivel enough in the clutch lever it is no wonder the clutch cable nipple is prone to breaking off, the path the lever follows constantly flexies the cable until it fails.
I took the little cover off the box in the bike and found a little powdered aluminium on top of the clutch lever where the clutch cable had worn it off the gearbox cover entry hole
I then modified the operating lever to introduce a proper swivel function to the cable (this deals with the cable flexing issue) but not the poor cable route, i have an idea to deal with that, but that will have to wait till i,ve finished the rearsets.
Then when i opened the gearbox cover on the bike to fit said lever, i struck 'gold' in the box oil so instigating the box overhaul a bit sooner than planned!
Upshot of all that is, i have now got a two finger clutch, the cable binding on the gearbox cover entry hole and the bending at the nipple end will have increased the effort to pull the clutch in. That should get even better (eliminating the cable binding on the entry hole) with the next clutch lever design.
Regards
Peter
