F5’s first ever brand new bike!

**F5 Dave** · 9th April 2008, 09:23

The tacho works. I fed a signal generator into it & it was fine. Then I put the old ignition on & it worked if a little jumpy.

Then the new ignition & it didn't. But the dash would reset if I grabbed the front brake with the bike not running. Hmm, battery voltage is real low. Oh dear. Obviously the programmable ignition is sucking a bit of current (heard they do, they need a battery feed) & perhaps the tacho can't compete. Charging battery now, but must also check charging cct. It was working ok before, but. . .

**F5 Dave** · 5th May 2008, 10:22

Well another quick update, I've had very little time spare & it is easy to get disheartened when results don't fall in your lap after such graft for so long.
Other projects seem appealing. I’ve taken on a new racebike that is on ‘loan’, but I’ve found a raft of things I need to do to make it ride better.

Long story short I've got the 500 'getting there' this weekend.

I only had one set of leaner needles to experiment with, but they didn't really help. ok so after farting around with several combinations of needle & pilot (often have to trial with diff options when you change needle diameter) I decided that it now felt too lean at low throttle (felt stuttery & unwilling rather than blubbery), yet clearly it was still rich & pouring out spooge. Hmm. Had a think & thought maybe I'm throwing too much advance at it, so programmed in a flat curve not too far from stock static. (Zeeltronics programmable ignition, every RZ or RGV should have, quite cheap too).

Viola! It liked it. Even convinced it to idle, took it for a ride & now it's much better, not perfect, but it was so far from perfect it was a vast step in the right direction. Felt silly for wasting too much time & chasing jetting when it was the timing for some part of it. I’d been using the 31k curve & advanced it on the dyno for the full throttle tests. However the jetting down low was so far off as I got the carbs I hadn’t noticed the timing change there.

As an aside getting the tank on & off it a pig with the braced frame. OK when don't have to do it very often. So what I did was make a temp tank from an old 2 stroke oil res cable tied to the fairing stay & an inline tap. Makes it a damn site easier. Pity getting to the idle mixture screws is still a pain.

So it runs ok at idle but 1/8-1/4 is a bit messy then cleans up & runs quite well. Exciting even. I changed back to the stock needles & it kinda liked them more ½ throttle on & wasn’t that much worse low down. So still some sorting to do, would like some larger dia needles with a sharper taper to try next. My test track is some pretty tight windy roads but there are a couple of straights further on & boy it does get up & boogie, but only for a few sec until have to slow down.

Sadly I have to prepare the race bike for a national meet in a couple of weeks so won’t have too much time spare. Next I think I’ll program in a closer to stock curve & get that a bit close & see if that picks it up a touch. If I can clear up the ¼ throttle (without changing hella expensive slides) I’ll then get it back on the dyno for a play.

oh yeah I replaced the rotary switch on the calibrator & it appears to work. Going to look at the Tacho soon to see if I can get some more gain on the input. The Zeeltronic pulls the input of the pulsar coil down a bit & the R1 tacho seems to need >12V p-p to operate it, I trialled it with a signal generator so it works fine with a triangle wave & then turned the amplitude down till it stopped working. On the scope it was 12Vp-p, whereas on the bike it was only getting to 8V with Zeel & just 12 stock ignition.

**Deviant Esq** · 5th May 2008, 17:30

Good stuff Dave, always good to hear about positive signs. Keep the updates coming along.

**F5 Dave** · 3rd October 2008, 08:34

Golly well I haven't updated much here so here is an update from August & this week.

Late August:

Well I went for another test ride & the bike went futt. Long walk back to get the van, only time I haven’t taken my cellphone. Thought I’d trashed the engine with the noise it made.
Turned out the pulsar coil had fallen off it’s mount (it’s been given a whallop & broken internally so it vibrated apart).

So I replaced the coil & put the std ignition on (+ stator position back to std) for a test & went for a ride. Maybe it was going a bit better at wider openings where the needle is thicker. Maybe.

Then it goes fut & dies again. Further away. But this time I have my cell phone. . . And no coverage in this backroad. But a kindly local lets me use the phone. Ride of shame back. Odd thing is it is stuck in a higher gear & will go into neutral but then fall back into gear. Oh great, this is what I need.

Side cover off again. The shifter fingers are hanging up a bit. Gear selection is smooth & light, but seems prone to occasionally hanging up. Consider pulling the engine down. I adjust it so the lever is more central & grind the rivet as the pivot finger was prone to tightening up in one direction. Better but still gets caught sometimes. Often g.boxes are a bit odd on the bench. Should be ok when bike runs (it is).

So why did it stop? I have spark, compression & gas in the bowls. Not a dickybird when kicking though. Maybe I should go back to the Zeel? Hmm, here’s a couple of broken wires out of the CDI where it has some solder joins from previous owner (never solder, always crimp). It was close enough so the plugs would spark but not fire under load. Join back up & starts 2nd kick.

By this time I have some new DEQ needles, they are 2.73mm at closed. I fit some smaller pilots & start it up. Immediately it is idling too fast (I’d had to turn the slide screws up almost full to get it to idle on other needles.

Bingo. That means that it is starting to work properly near closed. We’re getting somewhere. Turn them down & go for a ride. Much better, not perfect by any stretch, but much better. I want to try some leaner pilots as it is still too rich off closed. Off to the bike shop as I have a gap in my range.

By the time I’m back it is raining again & for some reason the bike will fire but die straight away. Time for new plugs, these have fouled several times.

So, progress, but still slow progress. The main thing is being willing to try the leanest needle earlier when running small carbs. Oh the rev counter is working again as on stock ignition. I’ll swap it back to Zeel after I’ve got jetting closer as it’s nice with the tacho. Does feel a bit restrained at low revs, but I need way more advance.

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**F5 Dave** · 3rd October 2008, 08:35

This week

Well a bit more progress, after some promising starts my bike just decided to spring another issue. I swapped pilot jets but a misfire was occurring. Back with old jets, still there. Swap on Zeel ignition, didn’t really want to start. Then noticed the pulsar coil was a distance from the flywheel again. Maybe having the sidecover off means I whack it which getting it up on the bench & then the flywheel clouts it. No play in flywheel I can see or notice when bike runs.

So back to the zeel & swap through the jets again & try a nice flat ignition ‘curve’. Runs the best ever. Still some hesitation off closed throttle & for some reason doesn’t idle any more, almost but. . . Do some more thinking & decide I must play with the static timing as I had the stock ign on last time it idled.

Weather is really improving here so should get some more time testing. Glad of small temporary gas tank, couldn’t be taking the main on & off this many times.

Bit more success I seem to have got my Tacho (R1 Dash) working. I had put a 6k8 resistor in parallel over the input resistor to increase the gain that the zeeltronics ignition had suppressed the input from the pulsar coil by. I had got it working on the bench, but it was really touchy, if you gave it too much gain the revs doubled on the tacho, in some error state. But my initial measurement was perhaps a little off (hard with a sketchy pulse read from an old scope 4ft away while you kickstart a bike that isn’t running very well.

So I added another resistor (12k) on top of the other one & hey presto it seems to work, well even. Have to take for a ride to see that this is retained through the rev range as it was cold engine inside a garage late at night. Will make tuning a bit easier too.

**F5 Dave** · 10th October 2008, 08:30

Ok well I finally got the last pilot jets in my nearly complete range from 38 to 62, of course these (45s) were the ones I needed with these lean needles.

Ok quick testride. It works!! It is now definitely in the ballpark carburetion wise. It’s not perfect but some tweeking with the idle screws & the ignition should sort the low throttle fueling, but really only fine tuning as I’m fussy. I have yet to fully decide if I go for slightly less taper on the needles but this is fairly close.

When I get some time I’ll throw it back on the dyno & see what the curve looks like & tweek the ignition curve & maybe retry the mains (last dyno run I had 1 145 in one side & a 150 jet in the other) I have fitted 2 150s when I got them.

Next will be pulling the mufflers apart & sealing them a bit better (they oozed a bit when it wasn’t running well & try to quieten it down a touch for the certification & road licensing. Hope we can get that through ok.

Now at this point I do have to say that I am a bit disappointed in the low end power. Bear in mind that I have been testing it on mossy backroads with a dreadful (until I get dyno testing finished) rear tyre. Now the tacho works I see I was spending a lot of time ~ 3-4 thousand rpm, but even so I did want some more grunt there. Ignition curve should help. I expect the YPVS style PV TSS (in Auss) are working on would be the cure. Failing that I may have to revisit the pipes.

Good times though.

**vifferman** · 10th October 2008, 09:49

Good news, Dr Dave!

We eagerly await the Next Exciting Instalment.

**koba** · 27th November 2008, 22:09

yeah, any more goss?

**F5 Dave** · 28th November 2008, 09:23

OK so update:

I fitted a new rear tyre (150 bridgestone 090). Now the chain rubs heavily. Poo. Ok so a straight edge seems to indicate that the chain would rub anyway? Wtf! Maybe the cushdrive was from a VJ21 with skinny tyre? Who knows? I skimmed the spacers & moved the wheel over a touch, seems straight with front wheel so should be ok. The sw was thinned to fit the frame so who knows if it was really central on both sw? So now the chain missed both frame & tyre, but by a scant few mm. Phew!

I’ve put it all back together. It now sounds ok, hopefully quiet enough for VIN check.

I’m in the section of time where I now try & decide if, after all this time I submit it for testing. Have I missed anything? Is there a ‘fail’ that I am overlooking because I’ve been on it so long? Must run a weathered eye over it maybe with a mate to criticise anything dodgy.

I’ll post a pic, but when I've got the camera out & bike at the same time.

**koba** · 29th November 2008, 20:59

Originally Posted by F5 Dave

I’ll post a pic, but when I've got the camera out & bike at the same time.

egerly awaited.
I'm not sure if I can spell or not.

**F5 Dave** · 4th December 2008, 13:57

Ok well I’m holding a piece of paper with the VIN number for it & they’ve riveted a plate to the frame. This is a step forward but not the whole game.

They failed the inspection on the rear brake pedal that hits the pipe (but long after the wheel would be locked up). So I can either adjust it to a high angle, give it a strategic bend without looking bush, or fit a braided line that would remove ½ the travel. Also I had a split ring instead of a split pin on the clevis. But that’s cool, easy fixes. The guys there were actually really helpful.

Also I now need an LVV certificate (here in NZ) to say that the mods (like a 500cc engine & RGV front & rear ends) is kosher from an engineer. I’d expected this & is next step.

The bigger issue is that I thought I had all the paperwork I needed from the seller in Auss. I had a receipt & a Bill of lading with the frame number on it to show that it had been imported. But I also need proof that it was registered in Aus (by this guy).

Oh dear, this could be more than a little problem.

However I called WA licensing & found that they still have records. . . Just they can’t give them to anyone but the last owner. This is April 07 I bought the bike.

Found his cell phone. It rings. He answers!!
So this is the bit where I wait & hope nothing else is an issue.