And for my next trick ....

If you haven't guessed; I'm cheap and tend to reuse that washer til there's nothing left of it then maybe one more time. One trick after flattening, check fit on the output splines before the sprocket goes back on, makes getting a good fit a lot easier, file and adjust the washer tabs, slots as needed.
 
..... and then make the sprocket nut tight, really tight, like 94 ft/lbs tight. The oil streaks emanating from your sprocket nut are an indication it's not tight enough. I got those for years, having my sprocket nut tightened to 72 ft/lbs. Last time I was under that cover, I brought the nut up to 94, and the oil streaks have disappeared.
 
...and make sure you remove any burrs from the sprocket, washer and nut.... and the spacer the sprocket seats up to.
 
..... and then make the sprocket nut tight, really tight, like 94 ft/lbs tight. The oil streaks emanating from your sprocket nut are an indication it's not tight enough. I got those for years, having my sprocket nut tightened to 72 ft/lbs. Last time I was under that cover, I brought the nut up to 94, and the oil streaks have disappeared.
Do you have a tool for holding the sprocket or leave the chain on and hold it in place using the transmission / brake?
 
Actually, I think the reference to my travails with my leaky drive shaft sprocket is here,

https://www.xs650.com/threads/mailman’s-xs2-a-full-on-restoration.51520/page-154#post-603227

After trying all different kinds of sealer, and trying a new replacement spacer ( fail ) in the end , it was a seal failure.
Even though the seal that was leaking was new, for whatever reason it failed. After jumping through hoops for months. The final answer was replacing the seal. Good luck with your job.
 
To hold the sprocket for tightening it's nut, I sit on the bike, put the bike in 1st gear, AND step on the rear brake hard. Usually, I'll pull the torque wrench a bit first before stepping on the rear brake to turn the motor over and bring it up on a compression stroke.
 
Update time. Removed the chain, knocked back the tab washer, and the sprocket nut wasn't even finger tight. So clearly that was part of the problem, but the seal still didn't look happy.
20211209_163128.jpg
The spacer had marks where it shouldn't so a new seal and an XS Performance spacer with an O-ring on the inboard side from Heiden plus careful cleaning and Hylomar application should have sorted that out. And tightening the nut to 125Nm which is just over 92 ft-lb in old money.

Onwards to replacing all the wiring ..... that turned out to be a more unenjoyable and expensive job than I'd anticipated. I got the modified battery box back from powder coating and started putting things together.
20220120_172344.jpg

I had to extend the leads from all the instruments, switchgear etc and decide where to join them to the body of the loom. I went for the space around the coil as there's enough room and the tank can hide a multitude of sins. Some things didn't really move so I was able to rob the old loom here and there. This is what I ended up with - not the prettiest in some places but it all works!

20220213_113508.jpg

20220213_113538.jpg
20220213_113621.jpg
20220213_113736.jpg

The final thing I wanted to do this winter was fit a steering damper. That's still in the plan - winter's not over yet! Cheers all -
Cliff
 
Well, winter is well and truly over and I finally fitted a steering damper! Just finished the job, in fact .... not even road tested yet ...

As I can't weld I decided the way to go was to use a fork mount on the frame tube. Having bought the damper and a single fork mount I found it was a pretty good fit on the frame tube, so bought another. This is the 120mm travel damper I chose:

20220706_134416.jpg

Mocking it up on the bike showed some interesting angles to deal with

20220708_124548.jpg

So I bought a sheet of 2mm aluminium from which to make a bracket - I figured a bit of judicious cutting & bending should do the trick. Don't you just hate it though when the price more than doubles after tax & shipping are applied?

1658844378592.png


Ho hum. Anyway, armed with a pencil, a sharpie, some unused computer punch cards from the 80's, kitchen scissors, hacksaw, files,etc and the Stones (gotta have music) I set to work. Here's an early step in the process:

20220726_120534.jpg

And yes, the whole thing was done by eye. I'm quite pleased with the result, I get full lock-to-lock travel well within the possible range of movement and the piston misses the exhaust by more than appears in the pics. Here's some pics of the finished job:

20220726_142155.jpg20220726_142212.jpg20220726_142252.jpg20220726_142310.jpg20220726_142335.jpg20220726_142350.jpg

And yes, I did tighten up that loose fork mount! It would have been lovely to have some CNC-machined bespoke super-tidy thingy but this will do for me and I actually rather like its homemade look. It remains to be seen of course as to how it'll feel on the road - there are 30 click stops on the damper; I've started 10 from softest. Gotta start somewhere ....

Cheers, all -
Cliff
 
Steering damper a success! Settled on 17 clicks from softest. I may need to beef up the bracket a bit but that's a job for the winter.

Yesterday I fitted the Goldline caliper and 13mm master cylinder - the cable tie is supposed to be a P-clip but I bought the wrong size. This will do for now.
Bleeding it was a right royal PITA but after leaving it overnight with the lever squeezed and a 60-mile round trip today (I was observing at a Classic trial), it's starting to feel like the brake it should be.

20220828_160418.jpg20220828_160550.jpg

Next will be the Tarozzi fork brace, on it's way eventually from CafeRacerWebshop and I now have a TX750 swinging arm which will be a winter fitment job.
I'm running out of things to upgrade!

Now it's time for a beer. Cheers all -
Cliff
 
I route my brake line down between the headlight ears and attach a guide on the lower triple tree where the splitter block used to mount .....

Brake Line Guide.jpg


BrakeLineFront.jpg


LineGuide.jpg


LineGuide2.jpg


This eliminates the need for a P clamp further down, the line is stiff enough to not need one .....

BrakeLine.jpg


83BrakeLineRoute.jpg
 
Have you had good experiences with caferacerwebshop?
Well, this is my first purchase from them. They are based in Holland so will be less expensive for me in the UK than buying from US-based Fast From The Past. I had this email from caferacerwebshop about a week ago:

"Hello Cliff,
First of all, thank you for your order at Caferacerwebshop and your patience so far!

We are mailing you because unfortunately your order has not yet left our warehouse. This means in most cases that one or more product(s) you ordered are temporarily not available from our suppliers.

We have already ordered these products but unfortunately have not yet received them.

At the moment we are doing everything possible to send your order as soon as possible.

As soon as the order leaves our building you will receive the track and trace code!

What can you do?

Perhaps you have already found a good alternative on our webshop?

If you want to wait for your order you can ignore this message.

If you want an alternative please let us know!

Thank you for your patience and hope to see you soon!

Kind regards,

Team Caferacerwebshop"

All very polite, and I'm in no hurry, so I'll wait and see what happens. Any dramas, I'll let you all know!

5T - a typically neat and tidy solution :)

Pete - more pics if you scroll up but here's a few extra for you. PM me if you want any more details/pics. In hindsight, 2mm sheet isn't really thick enough for the bracket but it's a useful starting point.
20220708_123603.jpg
20220726_142252.jpg 20220708_123624.jpg
 
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You may have an issue with the fork lower hitting that damper clamp upon full fork compression. The lower comes very close to the lower tree when the forks are fully compressed. Any way to move the clamp above the lower tree?
 
Good point, and at present I don't know. Looks like I missed a trick there in my enthusiasm to get it done. Now I'm thinking about it, I guess the fork brace (when it finally arrives) will also need to be taken into account. I'll have to have a fiddle about and no doubt need to make another bracket.
I'll look up how much fork travel there is on these 35mm forks.

Hmmmm .... I feel some more vernacular engineering coming on ....
 
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