"The Sears"

by Old Iron Rider

Monday, May 24, 2010

More Small stuff

Just goin through some more small stuff... Here is the new compression release for the Cannonball bike... It's a lot beefier than the original and should last cross country...
The left side slides into the compression tower in the motor case...It's a 10-24 thread. The right side has a new angle fitting to it that is bigger and stronger... It's tapped to 1/4x24.





As you can see, the carb looks like it's got very limited miles on it... The float almost looks NOS. Just to be on the safe side, I'm replacing it with a float from Competition Distributing...




One more small item is rocker lubrication. Since I'm using the OEM rockers I want ot make sure that greasing is fast and easy... I love the original twist oilers, but when you want to make sure grease is going where it's got to go, nothing beats a modern fitting.. It's also a little cleaner to work with...



Friday, May 21, 2010

The Small Stuff...

Well while waiting for my coveted spot at the motor machine shop, I decided it was time to take a look at some of the small but important stuff needed for the Cannonball... Stuff like light brackets, rods, light setups etc... The first thing I did was check my 1915 sears catalog to see what type of lamp brackets were available to the Sears way back then.... I found this setup the to be the best overall...


For the first 'trial' version, I'm going to place the light supports on the outside of the bracket. The supports I made a thicker than the OEM and wil be hardend so they don't snap 1/2 way cross country... Their final angle has not been set as I want the bike mocked up to dial that degree in... FYI: I'm no machinist, so these were made the old 'old' fashioned way - vice and 5lb hammer ! Here's a look :
>Next project on the day was to start to replicate the original clutch and compression release rods. The original ones are beautifully rusted and a little bit on the frail side. Better to err on the side of caution and prepare new ones for the run... Here is the clutch rod finished. As you can see, I've used modern ends that are slightly larger than OEM. Larger and hopefully stronger...



The Clutch rod:


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I'll tackle the compression release next time...