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Onder said:
Well I did lube the O-rings, liberally. They are less difficult to turn uninstalled. But they are still way too hard to turn. I will say they dont leak
at the O-ring though.
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You could try a smaller diameter section but have a hunch the O-ring is also helping if not stopping the damper rod from rotating once set.
 
The space for an O ring needs to have a greater volume than the O ring, the seal comes from the O ring being compressed by a certain % and expanding sideways into the free space, all covered in the specs you can find online. If you over compress or it lacks the freespace to expand into then it will bind or jam. I don't have a set to measure the groove size but it would be good if someone does measure the groove width,the depth of groove ,the ID of the hole its being screwed into and the O ring size then it can be seen if the free space for the O ring is correct.
 
kommando said:
The space for an O ring needs to have a greater volume than the O ring, the seal comes from the O ring being compressed by a certain % and expanding sideways into the free space, all covered in the specs you can find online. If you over compress or it lacks the freespace to expand into then it will bind or jam. I don't have a set to measure the groove size but it would be good if someone does measure the groove width,the depth of groove ,the ID of the hole its being screwed into and the O ring size then it can be seen if the free space for the O ring is correct.
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I can do that in the morning, if the thread is not totally in lala land or locked.

(I have a 4 axis DRO to fit this week)
 
Time Warp said:
I can do that in the morning, if the thread is not totally in lala land or locked.

(I have a 4 axis DRO to fit this week)
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4 axis is top priority, could not work without mine, well I could but the dials are unreadable even with reading glasses and the variable backlash stops you from being sure you are back in the right place. Easy to just move the table around, I have added movement locks onto the axis they were missing off, so once the reading matches I can fix it all in position and the backlash is effectively eliminated.
 
kommando said:
4 axis is top priority, could not work without mine, well I could but the dials are unreadable even with reading glasses and the variable backlash stops you from being sure you are back in the right place. Easy to just move the table around, I have added movement locks onto the axis they were missing off, so once the reading matches I can fix it all in position and the backlash is effectively eliminated.
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Its a Ditron so should be reasonable quality....(One scale on the quill) Reading glasses are a pain (for the last couple of years) first it was the small font on blueprints but now it's working on anything with detail.... can't complain to much there are worse ailments at this age.
I am looking at the feasibility of building a gantry CNC over a table mill conversion, rigidity would be the main objective.

I will measure the JB insert O-Ring grooves in the morning.
 
concours said:
The FIRST THING I did was notice how stiff the adjusters turned. I figured a future failure point (the 2.5 hex) , so, I backed them off to allow greasing the O-rings. Now a perfect feel. Then a Sharpie (felt tip marker) line for reference while adjusting.
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Plus one on both of those!
 
Time Warp said:
Its a Ditron so should be reasonable quality....(One scale on the quill) Reading glasses are a pain (for the last couple of years) first it was the small font on blueprints but now it's working on anything with detail.... can't complain to much there are worse ailments at this age.
I am looking at the feasibility of building a gantry CNC over a table mill conversion, rigidity would be the main objective.

I will measure the JB insert O-Ring grooves in the morning.
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I looked at the Ditron and it does look good quality but I went the Yurily Toys route plus a unused old 10" Tablet with a bad battery but now just plugged into the mains. I used 4 glass quadrature scales for accuracy and it works well, finding how to mount the scales and then calibrating them takes the time but once done it saves loads of time afterwards.

https://www.yuriystoys.com/
 
Thank you to those who read my posts and understood the issue. Clearly there are those here who are interested in these bikes and making them better.

As I said, all things have technical issues. I don't fault the dampers. I only fault Don for not standing behind his product. I continue to receive PMs from others with a similar experience with Don. I see posts saying he's been great to them. So you roll the dice and you take you chances about which Don you will get.

I made my point and continue to appreciate this forum. I also fully understand the point that locking the thread as opposed to deleting does enable my opinion to persist, and I would like to apologize for the assertion that I didn't get an opinion. I jumped the gun there thinking that the original post would be deleted.
 
For more perspective about an apparent design fault we’ve now uncovered its was in the original design. So with that being said who’s fault is it?
 
Danno said:
Only difference is, Trump is truly an asshole. There is plenty of documentation for that, so it's not one of those disallowed opinions.
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As usual, you miss the point. My point is that Kyle wasn't arguing his issue with the product when he calls Don names, and neither are you when you call Trump names. Focusing on the issue and what is wrong with the product is how you convince the jury of peers that you are right, not your personal opinion of the other person involved.

I think the issue is much clearer to me now after reading page 2 of this thread thanks to "time warp's" posting pictures and explaining the issues involved. It seems to me if the O ring is tight or not well lubed that grub screw joint can break loose if the installer applies too much force to the hex key. I would guess there's some detailed instructions on installing these dampers that warn buyers what to do and what not to do... It seems to me there's some intuition involved in installing these dampers. It would be hard to judge how good the O ring fit is without having done it a few times.

In the past, I mostly recall people saying these dampers were one of the best things you can add to your commando. It seems that people are coming forward with much lesser opinions of them now...
 
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Being able to separate the wheat from the chafe is a prerequisite to using this forum. More chafe then wheat by volume, but much more wheat by weight than chafe. No value in chafe. Many times I’ve seen a small pile of wheat dismissed in favor of a large pile of chafe on this forum.
 
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o0norton0o said:
As usual, you miss the point. My point is that Kyle wasn't arguing his issue with the product when he calls Don names, and neither are you when you call Trump names. Focusing on the issue and what is wrong with the product is how you convince the jury of peers that you are right, not your personal opinion of the other person involved.

I think the issue is much clearer to me now after reading page 2 of this thread thanks to "time warp's" posting pictures and explaining the issues involved. It seems to me if the O ring is tight or not well lubed that grub screw joint can break loose if the installer applies too much force to the hex key. I would guess there's some detailed instructions on installing these dampers that warn buyers what to do and what not to do...

In the past, I mostly recall people saying these dampers were one of the best things you can add to your commando. It seems that people are coming forward with much lesser opinions of them now...
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The instructions I got from Don clearly state to NOT overtighten or bottom out the adjusters.

That being said, I can see the engineering flaw in the design (from the start), but also how as a matter of cost/time the grub screw set up was employed. As with most engineered parts for our bikes, we rely on a small pool of talented but volunteer enthusiasts to keep innovating. For my part, I don't expect a "retail" experience or customer service scenario when buying these parts, and yes, I do expect that some degree of fettling will be required.

Now that I know about this potential problem I'll just broach the brass adjuster for a 5mm hex next time have the forks stripped. Problem solved
 
I've never seen these forks, and don't understand everything I read here, but it does seem like a bad design to rely on loctite for all the torquing force. Could you not just swap the grub for a socket head cap screw that would bottom out on it's head, plain or with shims, and be rock steady under torque? Or, a longer grub screw with a locking nut.
Just a question, maybe way off base.
Jaydee
 
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As I see it the issue disquek has is mainly with the response(s) by the seller, madass. As previously stated, there is a design flaw with the forks madass sold. It appears there is a fix to overcome the design flaw that requires machine work. I would not expect to make this correction myself. Clearly, the liability lies with the seller.

This is the first I’ve seen any negative report of madass’s components. It would seem disqerk rubbed madass the wrong way. I’d tell madass to buck up and take care of the disgruntled customer. Not doing so has already exposed a flaw in the product which will cost much more in sales than the savings of ignoring this customer’s complaints.
 
I probably own the oldest set of (JRB) Lansdowne dampers here.

Never had a grub screw come loose.

The adjusters on mine can be turned easily using only the short end of an allen key. I presume the grub screws are fitted from above and would be pressed in as well as Loctited but maybe not?

 
LAB: I have an early Trident set I don't think John made too many. The Norton set is much easier to adjust than the Trident. I took both apart and cleaned and lubricated fully. When installed they seem more difficult to turn too. It would help if the socket was bigger.
 
JimC said:
No. I say you should reread the thread and pay particular attention to the posts replacing the grub screw with a cap screw.
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That's a proposed fix, but doesn't address the issue with people not reading the instructions.

A couple people (JimC and disquek) here are insuring that we never see another set of these dampers ever again. Why don't you re-read the original posts when Don VOLUNTEERED to continue to make these available to better John's family AND provide them to Norton owners. And then list out what you have done for your fellow Norton riders.

If you don't like the design then don't buy them. If you buy them and break them, fix them. Don't whine.

If you slice them up getting them out of the packaging and blame the packaging you have serious issues.

The reality is that most people will adjust them once and never touch it. And if you do it right it will be just fine.
 
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