RD350 Project Mustakrakish

[bostontrackrat]

Haha! Thanks!

And yeah, everyone should! You cant breathe life into an old machine without a little magic! 

[bostontrackrat]

For a LONG time, I've been dreading the ignition part of the equation.  I'm not afraid of wiring or electrics, I understand them well, but it was probably going to be one of the biggest ticket items on the project, and my wallet has taken enough abuse already.  I was cross shopping the MZB/Powerdynamo/Vape system with the HCI.  I was leaning heavily towards the HCI system because I'm not going to have a heavy electrical load on this bike (Literally just headlight and tail light), and I liked that it was going to save me over a hundred dollars.  Well as luck would have it, one morning 2 weeks ago, I searched facebook marketplace for "RD350" as I do every morning while having coffee, and some guy down in CT had posted a pile of RD350 parts left over from his last build for 75 dollars.   In the box, no word of a lie, was a complete Vape system!   I met up with the guy the next day to pick it up, super nice dude.  We chatted bike for a bit, and he said he pulled the system off a fully running RD, so he knows it works, and it only had a few hours on it.  He's just getting out of RD's right now, and trying to get into an RZ350. 

So here's the loot.





This next part beggars belief.  You see in that picture how there was an ignition switch with a set of keys?   The little key was a match to the steering lock and seat latch on my original bike that didnt come with any keys!  What are the odds of that?

[Organicjedi]

  wow! So lucky.

[bostontrackrat]

Final Old Update!

I finished cleaning up the gasket surfaces and dropped the top case half onto the bottom with a new layer of Yamabond, a got everything torqued down nice and even.  Made sure the crank still rotates nice and smooth.



For the fuel tank I got a brand new petcock from HVC Cycle, as well as a complete fuel cap assembly from the guy on facebook that runs the "RD 350 Buy/Sell/Trade USA" group.  I cleaned that all up and put all new seals in it from Economy Cycle.



I also installed a brand new Motion Pro turbo throttle, and a 13mm Magura master cylinder.  I followed the brake ratio chart on Vintage Brake's website to help me pick a master, as I got to say, the brake feel is excellent!  I also tossed on a spare brake guard I have, since I eventually plan to run this is USCRA anyway.



Here's how she sits now (more or less).  I did take off the cheesy metal grill from the headlight after deciding I didnt like it.  You may notice the rearsets.  I'll take some close up pictures of them soon.  I adapted a set of Rizoma rearsets off of my buddy's Ducati 848.



And I recently loaded her up in the truck and took 'er over to the police station to get a VIN verification done so I can get my VT plate.

[NoRiders]

Just picked up on your thread. Coming along very nicely, some good  parts on that. That ignition was a good score.....we need something like that every now and then to lift the spirits and take the load off the wallet haha!

Looking at the front brake braided line...is it long enough for fork extension, do you reckon?

[85RZwade]

Super cool! Back in my youth, when the rocks were still hot, we all had to have an ME33 and ME99. I worked with a guy at Wenatchee Honda who bought a brand-new 1985 CB700SC and levered a set of Metzelers on it before he ever rode it!

[bostontrackrat]

Looking at the front brake braided line...is it long enough for fork extension, do you reckon?

Yep!  Good thing to think about.   In this pic the weight of the bike is supported by the center lift/jack.  The forks are fully suspended.   I've also put it on the ground and cycled the suspension a few times to make sure it doesnt bind in any weird way.    The line IS a tad shorter than I'd like it, but I just had it laying around so it's falling under the "Good enough for now" category.  I'll get a slightly longer one in the future.

Super cool! Back in my youth, when the rocks were still hot, we all had to have an ME33 and ME99. I worked with a guy at Wenatchee Honda who bought a brand-new 1985 CB700SC and levered a set of Metzelers on it before he ever rode it!

Yeah, they look the business, but these tires are very old (for tires).  Date codes put them in the mid-90's if I recall.   Enough for a little carb tuning up and down the street and around a parking lot, but I'll be getting fresh tires before I do any riding.  I'm leaning towards the BT45's.

[SoCal250]

Looking good! 

That was quite a score on the ignition!  Wow

[sav0r]

The bike is looking great!

I have BT45's on my 350 and they work great. It seems the Avon's are liked better now, and I've used Avon's on many race cars and absolutely loved them (Hoosier's Bro), but for city riding with a fair amount of twisties the BT45's have never let me down. They work in 30 degree weather, they are great in 100 degree weather. No complaints here.

I forgot to say in my last post that I am a huge fan of Matalocalypse. My wife got me into the show, but we've always been into the the Adult Swim type stuff so it was a natural fit. The music production, IMO, is fantastic in the show and I wish it was still on.

[JB Weld]

Nice build 

I had BT45s on mine. The only complaint I had was the front chopping prematurely.

[85RZwade]

  with JB; had a few sets of BT45s, and my fronts have always cupped. No better or worse on my RZ than on a Nighthawk S that I shouldn't have sold.

[bostontrackrat]

This Intermission brought to you by the Honeydo List

On my way to the garage one night this week, my wife asks if I can fix her vacuum cleaner.  The little brush attachment stopped working.  I gave it a quick jiggle and it's stuck solid.  So onto the workbench she goes.



That's not looking great.



Belt comes off, and gets a quick soak in some oil.



A brass wire brush made surprisingly easy work of the rust, and in the process of brushing, both gear shafts loosened up.



Then put it all back together with a nice coating of silicone lubricant.  I gave the gears a few good spins to make sure the lube worked its way down the into the shafts, while also being careful not to get it directly into the motor.



Bolted it all back up, attached it to the vacuum and she spins good as new, and the wife decides to keep me another day.

[bostontrackrat]

Back to work on the bike, I've been beating my head against the wall trying to get my piston to wall clearance sorted out.   

First order of business was a trip to Harbor Freight to purchase a set of telescoping bore gauges.  I quickly figured out that my regular calipers were going to be of no help inside the bores.



As you can see on the notebook there, I take 3-4 measurements and take the average of that to establish a value, like a good little engineer.

However, I then realized my measurements were not very consistent from one to the next.  I called up a friend who runs a shop nearby and he suggested that the calipers are not getting a real good reading on the bore gauges, and potentially putting inward pressure on them.  This is especially true because you're relying on physically sliding the caliper to adjust them, making it more likely to overshoot your 1 thousandths steps.   So back to HF to buy a set of micrometers.  (also gave me a much more stable reading on the pistons)



Throughout this process I was also picking the brain of Chuck Quenzler over in his Team Scream subsection.  That dude is SO nice to help give so much advice to people here on the forum.  He suggested that my clearance was too tight and they needed to be opened up a tad.   So I borrowed a bore hone from my buddy and got to work just shaving a liiiitle bit off the walls.



Well now I'm starting to get out of my depth, at least in terms of equipment.   After being very careful to not over do it (hone a little, measure, hone a little more, measure again)  I have found that in some parts of the bore I'm measuring a pretty decent clearance, and in other parts of the bore I barely have any.   When looking down the bores with a light, I can see that the cross hatching on the wall is uneven.  In some parts I have a nice fresh cross hatch, in other parts the dusting of old surface rust is still visible.  So I'm not getting even application of the hone.  Chuck saw the picture and basically said he wouldnt touch that kind of hone with a 10 ft pole, and why havent I called any shops nearby?   I stubbornly try to DIY everything I can, but I admit that I'm beat on this one.     My local friend with the shop referred me to the machinist he uses (both guys are also in USCRA).  I called him up and said to bring them out on Saturday.    Hopefully all goes well.

[pdxjim]

Know your limitations, and leave the critical precision shit to the guys with the proper tools and experience.

My local guy Garrett GRA2strokes charges $50 a hole, and I know it's gonna be perfect.

No shame in paying the experts for their knowledge and fancy tools, and you'll probably save some money in the long run.

[sav0r]

That's definitely the wrong type of hone for the job. You want a precision hone like this. And if your cylinders aren't straight, as if often the case, a precision hone isn't the right tool either.


https://www.lislecorp.com/specialty-tools/small-cylinder-hone