Twinmax - don't make me laugh

Steptoe

What a waste.
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I read all the praises of the twinmax , and thought i'd better upgrade from my 20 year old mercury gauges -
What a waste of money, overfussed load of crap - doesn't set up as good as my old gauges -

i use the twinmax, then put the gauges on to compare, the gauges always get me that last extra "bit". Then do it the other way around, and the twinmax can never show the mercury gauges are out -
 
are gauges better than a manometer between the cylinders ?

Twinmax - for people that don't know how....
 
:D Steptoe,
I bought a Carbtune at the start of this week and I read all the Twinmax v Carbtune posts. I have to admit that the fact you were using a carbtune and seemed pleased with it, and your customers seemed pleased with the results was a factor in helping me make up my mind. My bike was dealer serviced at 600 miles in June. I (at 1800 miles) checked and set the valve clearance and balanced the throttle bodies and replaced the 10/40 oil they put in with 15/50. From seriously considering selling the bike (and probably taking a major financial hit) due to vibration and lack of performance I am now much happier and will be keeping it for the forseeable future!!!! :D I have to say this change of mind is mainly due to info. gleaned from this site
Thanks
Bigmixer :ukgser
 
Rugged Path said:
:shout I seem to get the impression you think I have wasted $85 on a Twinmax.
Well, I have wasted a bloody lot more on my wife. Nuff said!

Does she still vibrate a lot then ? :D

I think the twinmax is fine. Makes for a quick easy job , packs up small and stops the vibrations so it does what it says on the packet for me anyway :thumb
 
I had an old set of Morgan Carbtune gauges with the mercury in them and they were fantastic. Not too sure the new ones with the S steel rods in them would be as good as there would be drag between the tubes and the rods and you can't get the Mercury ones anymore. Anyone else got good experiences of the new type. John Morgan makes the gauges in belfast so they are handy got. :)
 
Well, after trying to stick two mercury sticks to my tankbag and do an adjustment under load (yup, while riding), I decided that a twinmax was the way to go.

I get an endresult that's a lot better than any of the bmw and non-bmw dealers that have worked on my bike.
 
reaperhome said:
Well, after trying to stick two mercury sticks to my tankbag and do an adjustment under load (yup, while riding), I decided that a twinmax was the way to go.

.

Tried that -

then got back and put the mercury gauges on and set it up properly :eek:

Have you compered the difference between the two ?
or do you only have experiance of using the twincak
 
Steptoe said:
Have you compered the difference between the two ?
or do you only have experiance of using the twincak

Lets be honest here. Us hamateurs are cack handed enough balancing with the Twinmax, we'd be lethal with a mercury manometer.

I get my bike serviced by a good independent and it runs like a sewing machine when I get it back. After three or four months of commuting into London it gets ratty. I stick on the Twinmax and bring it back to reasonable, then repeat every couple of months because I don't do as good a job with the Twinmax as a person with more experience and better tools would do. On the other hand if I do something stupid I won't fill my front drive with broken glass and mercury.

If I had a garage I might have thought about something better, but I probably wouldn't make a better job of it than I would with the Twinmax. Actually I would have bought a proper Carbtune because if I had a garage and more money I would probably have the man in the Snap-On van round every week and I wouldn't be able to get the bike in to the garage for tools :mmmm
 
Steptoe said:
Tried that -

then got back and put the mercury gauges on and set it up properly :eek:

Have you compered the difference between the two ?
or do you only have experiance of using the twincak

I've not used a mercury stick myself. But after balancing by a bmw dealer (and rebalancing because I wasn't satisfied) I found I could do the job a lot better myself with a twinmax.

Don't get me wrong, I take your word for it that a mercury stick is more accurate, but until I've got one I know I can get my engine running a lot better with a twinmax than the dealer witch their bmw equipment. After the tuneup while riding and getting a 'perfect' ballance between 3 and 5k rpm it was running better then I've had experienced on dealer serviced 1150's I've riddin before (1150 rockster and a 2004 GS and my own 1150GS from 2000). Witch better I mean less vibration, maybe better fuel economy and an engine wich pulls strongly and evenly from below 2000rpm in 5th. Ah and surging was at the same level, which is kinda good considering that the other 1150's where twinsparks.

So, for me the twinmax is a good device. Maybe not perfect, but good enough to get a better result than the 'professionals' at the bmw shop.
 
Just a thought. At work we use water filled manometers that read up to 1000mm water gauge, would these work?
 
Mzokk said:
Not too sure the new ones with the S steel rods in them would be as good as there would be drag between the tubes and the rods and you can't get the Mercury ones anymore. Anyone else got good experiences of the new type. John Morgan makes the gauges in belfast so they are handy got. :)

I've been using the "new" type for the last 5 years, and never had a problem. They're just as accurate and easy to use as the mercury ones.
 
trotsky said:
On the other hand if I do something stupid I won't fill my front drive with broken glass and mercury.

Not in glass - plastic tubes.

You can invert the gauges, they don't leak .

I'm sure the mercury has nothing to do with the extra ear i've grown on my neck .
 
I still have (and use) a set of gauges I brought over 20 years ago.

I remember trying to balance all Six carbs on my CBX1000 back in the 80’s, what a job… got 3 ‘balanced’ the 4 then 5… just as the 6th was coming right the other 5 would go out.. took me bloody hours but, I wasn’t going to let it beat me though and got there in the end :)
 
Just a thought. At work we use water filled manometers that read up to 1000mm water gauge, would these work?


yes - you'd need 2 side by side and accurately aligned.

or use a bit of clear tube with atf in between the cylinders like moi
 
ATF? WHAT'S THAT?

As these are water columns, are they likely to have erratic movement, unlike the heavily damped mercury type?
 
ATF - Auto trans fluid

5mm bore pvc tube - 2m long

form into 'u' shape

voila

oil - is self-damping - so no
water is less so, so yes

do you want a picture ?
 


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