What have you done to your XS today?

Marlin72xs said:

That's amazing. How much does it weigh?

Click to expand...

That is on my list to do. I think it is under 250 lbs but will confirm and post as well as more pictures with the lights on it.

gracer said:

I've rode it less than 100 miles so far and have only been to about 55 mph. It tracks well and corners quite well. I like taking it to Motorcycles on Main in Mesa AZ the first Friday of the month. Nothing but praise so far among the Harley riders. I plan on riding it a lot during AZ bike week.

Click to expand...

It really is a beautiful bike gracer! Very cool indeed!

Pete

On the Friday before the last possible riding weekend of last fall my son borrowed my XS650's clutch cable as
his was broken and he needed to take that very last ride.
Well, OK, I'm sure you'll replace it before next spring and my first ride.
Fair enough, a replacement cable arrived in January.
Tried to install it. Discovered that the 5/16" ball inside the clutch actuator worm had gone AWOL during the borrowed cable's removal.
Vague promises of "I'll find you a new ball before the spring thaw." left me with an XS650 clutch cover, holding screws,
footpeg and gearshift laying around loose and losable until the replacement ball finally arrived.
So I went to a bicycle repair shop "Can I buy a 5/16" bearing ball?" Some problem with explaining that I only needed one of them.
Cost me ten cents. Plus the Dollar in the parking bandit. I can bury the mileage in the cost of taking my wife down town anyway.
So for a mere $1.10 I have reinstalled all the loose parts so the bike is in a state that it can be pushed about the garage as needed
to access the XS11 for the work it's been waiting for.

Got the top end off. and pistons out. everything looks brand new inside. We will disassemble the head on Wed. to inspect valve seats. The whole thing will be ready to be sent for ceramic coating by the end of the week. Took a Harbor Freight impact socket, cut it in half and stretched the socket so the stud puller would grab at the base of the cylinder head studs. It sure isn't pretty, but it spun those studs out, no problem. I was able to use my weak H.F. 1/2" impact. Had the I.R. is reserve but didn't come close to needing it.

Today I massaged the frame a little more and also welded in the new neck gussets and filled the hole from the neck stem lock. Still aways to go but it's getting closer.

I got my clutch dialed in and took it out for a spin around the neighborhood.

First i got the carbs syncec back to running, holds sync thru rpm range(needs throttle shaft seels but not bad at this point for a free bike)then adjusted the cam chain, wich had not been done since i rebiult the top end 1000 miles ago, then put stock airboxes back on, switched out bp 6 es plugs for 7's. New plug caps. Ran arond the hood for a bit. This free bike actually rides nice. Smooth too.

Results from hf soda blaster

Nice!

Not really too much, but did put the finish coat of GM Satin Black engine paint on the motor, yea I'm too lazy to try polishing up all that dull aluminum! Oh also managed to pull the 1982 Heritage bike out of it's hiding spot in the barn, that is the bike this engine is going in at some time.

The Heritage has been stored in my barn for close to 20 years and before that it was parked in a shed near Hillsdale NY where it had been abandoned by a farmers kids when they got tired of running it on farm roads. It is a very rough looking bike most chrome is rough as 80 grit sand paper but is about 90% complete. The muti-spoked rims are real bad looking so I'm going to be swapping in a pair of cast rims, might even use the 18 inch rear Kawasaki rear rim I have on the shelf just to be different!

Really liking the LED headlight @ 5am in the fog.

The boys redid the shop floor over the last couple days. Looks good from here.
I'll be anxious to get back to MN and check it out.

roy

73 degrees here, went for a ride, back roads to Annapolis and back. 50 miles on this paint shaker, my old ass is spent and so is the left muffler bracket. I think I'll bring out the Road King tomorrow. john

Repairs a broken stand today, earlier in the week I spent a couple of days going through the wiring as a short in the headlight bucket brought everything to a holt....found the problem in a brown wire shorting out the brake switch. The clutch cable had worn through the plastic and earthed out when touching the terminals on the brake switch. Plastic covering on the two terminals is gone...so bare prongs are my culprit

Warmed her up with a short run up the lane (not taxed at present) prior to oil change. Ashamed to say its nearly 3 years since the last one & only 730 miles covered in all that time. Put an "improved" sump strainer in last time, from the German XS shop, & was delighted to see it is still intact. Put it all back together with fresh 20/50 & decided against any of the replacement filter options for the time being. Was reminded that one of the sump plate bolts had sheared but it was still oil tight last time. Went easy on the remaining 5 bolts.
Also swapped the iridium plugs from left to right (read it on the forum)

Jimbo W said:

- - - Was reminded that one of the sump plate bolts had sheared but it was still oil tight last time. Went easy on the remaining 5 bolts.
Also swapped the iridium plugs from left to right (read it on the forum)

Click to expand...

hi Jimbo,
you could try using a left-handed drill bit to get the busted bolt tail out?
Note that the stock sump bolts are specials, they are weakened so that their heads twist off before the crankcase threads tear out if the bolts are over-torqued.
I recently bought a 1/4" sq. drive torque wrench but before that I've used a 1/4" sq, drive stubby ratchet to curb my sump bolt torque enthusiasm.
Got a link to that plugswap advice? I may well have accidentally swapped plugs side to side when I've had them both out but if so, I've never noticed any difference in performance.

The swapping of plugs thread likely refers to evening out the wear on the plugs. If you have a wasted spark ignition, both plugs fire at the same time, but one plug has negative centre electrode polarity, and the other plug has positive centre electrode polarity. Those tiny little electrons leave from the negative part and go across to the positive part. That means the negative part is the only part that the metal is eaten away. Therefore one plug has the centre electrode wear away while the other plug has the ground strap wear away. By reversing the plugs occasionally, the erosion will be evened out on the two plugs.

However, JimboW's use of Iridium plugs means he would have to drive his bike for maybe 100,000 miles to wear out those plugs.
730 miles in 3 years, means non-detectable wear on either electrode. Still the theory is correct.
The way that most people only drive these bikes for 3000 miles or less per year, means Iridium plugs (swapped over so the iridium centre electrode gets its share of being the negative terminal) will last about 33 years.

I've had the same regular NGK plugs in use, on my bike for about the last 7 years (14,000 kms), and having just looked at them, they have almost no wear. For the amount of driving I do with my bike, I just don't bother to swap plugs from side to side. I prefer to keep the same plug in the same cylinder so that I can monitor the combustion/mixture quality as time goes on.
Here is an example of wear:
Plugs 1,2 and 3 had negative ground straps, while 4,5,and 6 had negative centre electrodes.

Had a good day today. I got every stud out of the engine without damaging any threads or studs. Almost ready to send all the castings out for ceramic coating.

I couldn't work on my bike today. I was riding it!

I was shooting sporting clays, but wishing I was riding my bike. Hi Marty!