The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

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Michael L
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#406 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by Michael L »

I had a beautiful Kawasaki Z1B in the late 70s. It was quite a jump from my Yamaha RD200. It felt very powerful and I loved to wind the throttle open on motorway slip roads in 3rd gear. Sadly it was let down by it's handling and brakes but was otherwise a very nice machine.
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#407 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by steve s »

The back end is very 70s
My lav from late 77 has the same tail...
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Nick
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#408 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by Nick »

Originally registered in 1976. So its an historic vehicle now, next step is to register it for zero tax and no MOT.
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ed
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#409 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by ed »

I never did understand the mot thing with respect to older vehicles.
Surely with relics the mot should be more important?
Am I missing something?
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Nick
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#410 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by Nick »

ed wrote: Fri May 03, 2019 1:48 pm I never did understand the mot thing with respect to older vehicles.
Surely with relics the mot should be more important?
Am I missing something?
I do agree with you, but its so rare that something actually changes to mean I pay less that I am not going to turn it down.

I guess part of the reason is that most 40 year old vehicles either don't have the parts to test (air bags, cat converters, OBD based checks) or would fail when new much of the current MOT. Its still an offense to use a vehicle in a non road worthy condition and that can cost a £2500 fine and 3 points.

On a related subject, I was checking on line a MOT history of a car the other day. It failed a test because the air bag warning light was lit. It then passed on retest with a warning that the air bag warning light was faulty. I guess they just took the bulb out.
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Mike H
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#411 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by Mike H »

*DO* check with the insurer though, they may insist on the vehicle having a current MOT for cover to remain valid. This tends to be what's happening now where MOT is waived due to age. DVLA might not care any more, but the insurance companies do. Anything to get out of paying out if there's a claim. This gets complicated if the bike is off the road for any reason and can't be ridden to get to an MOT, e.g. it's in bits for a rebuild. Possibly insurer wants an SORN instead. Think I read that somewhere. Whatever, basically need to discuss it with them.
 
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Nick
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#412 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by Nick »

My insurer

"In the terms and conditions of any insurance policy, there will be a clause which states that the vehicle must be maintained in a roadworthy condition. In the event of an accident that leads to a subsequent claim, the vehicle will be inspected by an engineer. During this inspection, the engineer will advise whether the incident in question was caused due to unsatisfactory maintenance of the vehicle or not."

Good point though Mike. Course the above clause is just as valid if you have a MOT, as there is nothing stopping a fault happening the week after the MOT and the week before the claim. So in reality nothing has changed.
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#413 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by Mike H »

Thanks that's very interesting.
 
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#414 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by Neal »

Just been through this with one of my cars. Had to wait until April1st before the tax classification could be changed to historic and yet it was MOT exempt at the start of the year. As said the MOT is not an indication a vehicle is road worthy, good point about the insurance small print.
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#415 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by Neal »

Oh, nice bike Nick, enjoy!
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Dave the bass
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#416 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by Dave the bass »

Awww, nice, another old bike back on the road that means something to someone, brill.

The bars look quite high and the seat looks very high at the back end, is that how they came? Personally I'd lose the rack too if it were mine, which its not. And I like racks usually :)

EDIT. Is that the bike that lived in boxes behind 'a spare kitchen'?!
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#417 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by Nick »

The seat is a bit high. The rack was there to replace the unobtainable grab rail. And yes, its the one that was in the box of bits. Here is another to compare. And that reminds me, must get some mirrors.

Image
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#418 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by Mike H »

Racks like them were all the rage I remember. As were also the obligatory chrome crash bars. We all had 'em. And sometimes they were needed :shock:
 
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#419 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by Dave the bass »

Monday just gone was a momentous day....
https://www.dropbox.com/s/q1axgpcecli2b ... 3.mp4?dl=0

Whahey! It runs. It was a pickle to get going though. Unbeknownst to me the ignition coil I was using (of unknown origin or history TBH, a VERY bad move in retrospect) was breaking down internally when under load. It'd produce a spark at the plug if you removed the LT manually but at engine revs it just got hot and died. Live 'n' learn. I had to borrow the coil off the Indjun Bullet! The 58 year old Monobloc carb kept flooding for some reason too so I had to to strip the carb and check everything (again) after I'd treated it to nice new bits a few months ago when I totally stripped and cleaned and replaced all the seals and gaskets anyway. I didn't find anything wrong but when I connected up the fuel line again it was fine (of course), most odd.

I don't know if anyone here has been inside an ignition coil before (and what with this being and electronics-type forum anyway) so being an inquisitive little fella curiosity got the better of me after work today, whats inside that ignition coil that caused so much grief on Monday? Lets have a look...

This is the underneath of the coil, it's been well-used by the looks of it, in retrospect that should have rang alarm bells but I didn't know as much about ignition coil failure as I do now :) Learning by experience I think its called.

Week 43 1971 I reckon?
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Prize open the top and work the terminal plug out...
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...and these make up the core of the transformer...
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Here you can see one of a pair of the thin wires leading from the LT side of the coil, the larger silver colour braided winding termination is the connection to the HT socket on top of the coil.
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I started unwinding the primary LT winding...
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The paper layers are insulation, to me it looks like its got very hot as shown by how dark the paper is getting the more I get closer to the central core, it 'smelt' hot too. The insulation varnish/lacquer is breaking up in places too, another sign of over-heating I believe....
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...and this is the other 'end' of the primary winding.
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Lets go into the secondary (HT) winding, woweee, its thin, there's thousands of turns of this very fine wire, see it where my pointer is erm pointing?...
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Close up...
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Unwind that and it terminates to this braid that is in contact with the core material I think..
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Thats the other end of the secondary. Cool eh? To sum up I reckon the oil has leaked out over the years and its overheated leading to horrible HT breakdown when under load.

These are the sort of things you do when you haven't got telly :)
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Greg
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#420 Re: The Audio-Talk Motorcycling thread.

Post by Greg »

It sounds right to me, except you’ve managed the unusual feat of getting an Amal Monobloc to allow the engine to tick over relatively smoothly.

As for the coil, back in my day I seem to recall me and most of my RE mates had substituted the original for something car based. Can’t remember what, but no doubt associated with our conversions to 12V and the use of RS solid state rectifiers. Well done Mr Bass. 8)
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