And so it resumes

Johno23 said:
So when you bought new std carbs, you didn’t go for “Premiers” these are std carbs but have a heavier slide, much better float which makes it easier to set level , and the big plus is the pilot jet system has been redesigned and gives perfect idle. Getting these was the first thing Norman White told me get even if I did nothing else, fit premiers.
Click to expand...

I’ll have to check the receipt. They probably are Premiers because they’ve got the black plastic floats that are easy to adjust the heights on.
 
Right then, it now ticks over evenly on both cylinders after a bit of juggling with the throttle stops and airscrews. Right now the airscrews are only 1 turn out and I’ll leave it like that because at least it’s not making the plugs soot up.

I’ve disconnected the alternator leads and checked the output to find it’s giving zero volts even when revving it. I guess that means it’s time to replace either the stator, rotor or both. The rotor is dated 95 so it’s a bit ancient but I’m tempted to just bite the bullet, replace both and fit a Podtronics reg/rec.

The negative side to this is that it’s dead money if/when I fit an electric boot conversion but that’s had to be stalled for a while and I want the bike up and running :D
 
OK I’ll stick my neck out - you have got the meter set to AC volts, haven’t you?
 
Ok, after ChasF put me right I checked the rest of the charging system, couldn’t really isolate a problem so phoned Andover Norton and ordered a Podtronics reg/rec and mounting plate. I also asked Simon who’s a bit of a guru on Commandos about the throttle cables and he suggested that I check the free length, check my part number from the invoice and phone him tomorrow because they do two sizes and the ideal adjustment should be somewhere in the centre. That’s one for tomorrow then.

That left me with most of the afternoon to kill so I started to get a bit curious as to why it’s been running hotter on the LH cylinder (apart from an intermittent misfire on the RH side) so I checked the valve clearances, found the LH side were both a bit loose so adjusted them to be 0.001” big. I like a bit of clearance on a new engine.

It’s been bugging me that I static timed it as per the Pazon instructions yet when I strobed it I was 20 retarded so I decided to investigate further because even though it works on a wasted spark system a big error might affect one side more than the other. At this point the light on my strobe decided to throw in the towel so I went back to static timing and when the red dot on the ignition rotor was in the correct firing position the physical scale on the rotor/casing was 20 degrees retarded :nenau

It’s been kicking back enough to put a puff of smoke out of the air filter every so often indicating seriously advanced timing which is probably where I’d moved it to if the static was right and the strobe wrong. At that point I ordered a new strobe then removed the ignition rotor, set the alternator rotor in the correct position to the scale, put the ignition rotor back with the red dots horizontal and positioned the backing plate as per the instructions. I’ll fire it up tomorrow and see what happens but even though Pazon claim the system will work with the voltage as low as 8v something might not be functioning correctly while the reg/rec is snotted. I’ll check the voltage at the ignition before trying to start it because for reasons beyond me it might be dropping off somewhere between the battery and the ignition. Another issue could be coils were clamped tight and apparently they shouldn’t be so I could have damaged one :blast

I’m back to hating this bike.
 
I love the sheer emotion of this thread.

I am repeatedly tempted to buy an old Brit - I just love their looks. But reading this is a really good sense check - like a vision of the future - that more than once has stopped me hitting 'buy now'!

Keep at it, it'll be a glorious day when you roar off down the road on her.
 
The Other PaulG said:
I love the sheer emotion of this thread.

I am repeatedly tempted to buy an old Brit - I just love their looks. But reading this is a really good sense check - like a vision of the future - that more than once has stopped me hitting 'buy now'!

Keep at it, it'll be a glorious day when you roar off down the road on her.
Click to expand...

It’s the going round in circles that’s the hard part but given that it’s the first British bike I’ve had to do this amount of work on that’s not a surprise. With hindsight I’d have been much better buying a running bike that needed a fair degree of restoration work because a lot of the issues I’ve had have been because I’ve either trusted things to be right when they were already done or been second guessing what the previous owner had as his next step.
 
That’s it for a few days. I was waiting for the reg/rec to arrive and now I’ve ordered the correct length throttle cables. The ones fitted are 1/2” too short which, according to Andover Norton, meant it would never run right. That’d explain why it was running rich and I was struggling trying to get air through the pilot jets in the right quantity :blast

I like ringing Andover because they know the score with these bikes so I’ve had a chat about the PW3 cam I’m running and mentioned that I’ve got a set of 240 mains in case it needs jetting up when I finally put it on the road and they said straight away to start with 260 jets so they’ll be in the post with the cables.

I also decided to try the single 12v coil conversion I had on the shelf and that made no obvious difference but I did manage to sort my strobe out and when I had it apart I realised that the dial where you set the advance on it wasn’t doing anything so I fixed that and now it’s showing up dead steady at the correct advance so I’ll leave that until the carbs are back on. I might stick with the single coil but it’ll need a bracket fabricating because right now it’s just lashed in place. It’ll give me something to do over the next day or so :beerjug:
 
I’m half a step forward after 3hrs on the bike today.

I’ve now got it idling and firing on both cylinders though I’m far from convinced the timing is right, I might set the bike running and see what advancing it while the bike is running does for things but that’s going to be tomorrow. It’s now got 260 main jets in and I’ve put the needles on their lowest setting(top notch) so the plan is to take the tops off and lift them a notch to see how that affects things, at least it responds to tiny adjustments on the air screws and both exhaust headers are the same temperature which wasn’t the case before. It’s also stopped smoking as much as it was plus the plugs are dry. Happy days :D

The only reason it’s not a complete step forward is that I’ve got a new reg/rec fitted and it still isn’t showing any increase in voltage across the battery when I blip the throttle plus the charge light stays on. I’m going to disregard the light for now but it should be showing a voltage increase so that’s a bit frustrating.

I think I’ll fit the side panels, bolt the tank down, fit the seat and bung the headlight front back on then squeeze it past the collection of dross in the garages and run the fucker up the road if it pulls away ok on the patio. There’s only so much you can do without a road test and it’ll just be 100 yards up the road and back :hide
 
I think you should cut the plastic cover on the harness where it connects to the alternator, I think you’ll find the problem there. Probably poor connections there with all 4 wires being connected together.................just a thought....:rolleyes:
 
That’s the full step forward now completed.

I’m mildly pissed off with myself because the fix was a 10 minute one and the original charging system would have been fine but because I don’t learn from my mistakes I simply assumed that there’d be no really stupid, dumb fuck, idiotic mistakes made in the new wiring harness and I was wrong :blast

I knew there was power coming from the alternator and I knew none of it was reaching the battery so as previously described, I ditched a few parts and fitted a Podtronics reg/rec and it still wasn’t putting a charge into the battery. I’d connected it up using the existing terminals from the rectifier and that should have been fine so I posted on the Access Norton forum asking if I should be doing anything with the feeds to the capacitor and zener diode but that came back with a don’t worry about them.

Eventually I decided that basics are good so I checked whether an AC current was going into the Podtronics unit and shock, horror there was fuck all! I then checked for continuity along both wires in the harness from where the alternator feeds in to where it comes out for the rectifier and they were both ok so I stopped to have a brew and scratch my arse while I pondered the mystery. It eventually dawned on me that the only place there could be a problem was where the bullet connectors from alternator and wiring harness join so I cut the rubber boot and plastic wrap off for a look and there it was, there wasn’t the expected insulated connector with female sockets for all 4 bullets, there was just a pressed steel plate that effectively joined all 4 wires together. What the fuck was that all about? :nenau

I’ve now put hard joints between the wiring harness and the alternator, put heat shrink around each insulated joint and tested it to find that there’s AC current going into the Podtronics, DC coming out and everything works :hapybnce::chickendance:bounce1

I’ve knocked it on the head for the day but I need to wrap those hard connections in self amalgamating tape then clip it all out of the way.

The bike starts without anything more than priming the carbs and giving it full choke. It ticks over reasonably well but does cut out occasionally if you don’t blip the throttle, it’s stopped smoking apart from when it’s on full choke and running rich and apart from bolting the tank down it’s ready for road testing. It’s not even registered in this country let alone have any of the other minor legal requirements in place so I need to do to that and move it to the garage where I can be a naughty boy and road test it :hippy

I still need to get the electronic speedo working but it might actually do something if the bike is moving so I’m leaving that for now. It’s getting power into it so there’s not much to do there but I’ve lost the instructions and wiring diagram. I’m still tempted to spend lots of money on analogue instruments because I prefer them but that’s a minor detail.

Yep, I’ve got my happy head on for the moment but tomorrow I’m going to try a mini shot blaster to remove overspray from inside the tank on both my Montjuic and the LC350 so that could go catastrophically wrong so I’ll start on the LC because it’s not mine :green gri
 
Johno23 said:
I think you should cut the plastic cover on the harness where it connects to the alternator, I think you’ll find the problem there. Probably poor connections there with all 4 wires being connected together.................just a thought....:rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Here’s another thought, you’re a twat :D
 
AndyB_11 said:
It’s not in the slightest bit harsh and he knows it.

He’d read on a different forum that I’d eventually tracked down the problem then spotted that I hadn’t updated this thread so got in while I was typing :doris
Click to expand...

Guilty as charged, sorry couldn’t resist......... pleased you got it sorted:thumb

Looking forward to the road test.....
 
Nippy Normans supply Touratech, Wunderlich, Desert Fox and many other makes of accessories.
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Baza 07
And so it’s Starts 🤞🤞
5 6 7
Replies
133
Views
6,753
Baza 07
Baza 07
And so it begins......
7 8 9
Replies
166
Views
30,449
Nutty
cherokee
And so it begins....
Replies
9
Views
3,488
(RIP) Tunneruk
(RIP) Tunneruk
Gargy
And so it begins.
Replies
11
Views
4,835
Gargy
Gargy
Jockser
And so it begins….
2 3
Replies
46
Views
29,296
bogman
bogman


Back
Top Bottom