Gas, tires, oil.

I’ve been using my ‘89 sportster as a daily commuter for about 2 1/2 years, and while it’s had some problems, it’s never left me anywhere. I thought this had changed the other night, the starter had been making some strange noises when the bike was cold, but it had always started. But when I tried to leave work, it wouldn’t crank the motor. It made a noise that indicated that something was turning, but not the motor. Eventually I was able to push start it, and ended up taking the ‘55 to work for the rest of the week. Last weekend I pulled the primary cover.

When I hit the starter button, the ring gear turned, but not the rest of the clutch basket. It wasn’t obvious from the manual how the ring gear was attached, so I pulled the clutch as an assembly. The manual gives instructions that involve disassembling the clutch (using a special tool to compress the clutch spring), but not removing it as a unit. First I removed a snap ring and the clutch adjuster bolt and bearing.

Behind it was another snap ring, this was all that held the clutch on the transmission shaft, but I also needed to pull front primary sprocket. It’s held on by a nut that is torqued to 165 ft/lbs, so I used an air wrench to remove it (for all I know this is a terrible thing to do, maybe it wrecks the bearings or crank or something, but it’s what I did).

When I got the clutch off, it looked like the ring gear was just pressed on. I used an aluminum drift and hammer and gently tapped it off. It was fairly tight, but it was obvious that it had spun ruining both surfaces. Now I could have bought a new primary sprocket and ring gear, but left to my own devices I just rig stuff up. So I decided to just tack weld the gear on.

I spotted it in 4 places with the mig welder, then cleaned up the welds and any weld beads. The blue tape is covering up the alternator magnets, weld beads and grinding dust would stick to them like crazy. So far this fix has worked fine, but who knows, maybe the welds will cause the ring gear to crack and come apart, wrecking then entire motor and trans.

Harley front fenders are known for having problems with the rivets holding them on the bracket. On my trike, I drilled out the rivets and plug welded the holes and even welded the the edge of the fender to the bracket. But on my daily commuter ‘89 sportster, I first tried tightening up the rivets, but it didn’t last long. The parts that I peened over just broke off. As an emergency fix, I used a couple pop rivets and washers. Then there was the adventure with the new larger tire that caused me to remove the entire fender.
But now rainy season is approaching and I need a front fender. First I need to make sure it doesn’t rub against the tire. I adjusted my vise to the width that the bottom of the bracket needed to be to mount to the forks. This also prevents the bracket from just “veeing” out when I spread it. Then I used a hydraulic spreader and a portapower to bend out the top of the bracket.

Next I drilled out the rivets.

Then I replaced the rivets with stainless steel 10-32 screws and nyloc nuts.

Here it is mounted:

Still not looking forward to riding in the rain though.

So my front tire was bald, almost to the point of air showing through. I hate changing tubeless tires, so I brought it to a shop. On the way home, I thought I smelled something burning. Turns out the new tire was one size wider and was rubbing the fender bracket on one side. I decided not to argue with the shop, a wider tire is probably better and I needed to take the fender off anyway. I have previously shown the painting of the front fender and re-riveting it to the bracket. Unfortunately, it didn’t last, both rivets on the right side fell out.

I had put in a pop-rivet just so I could get to work one morning, but it really needed a permanent fix. Since it wasn’t going to rain for 6 months, I just took it off, planning on making a new bracket or getting a different fender.
So a couple weeks ago, I’m on my way home from work and I pull up behind a bus at a stop sign. It was one of those van-front, large bus bodies that the university uses around campus. Suddenly, I see the backup lights come on, it starts beeping and backing up. After staring in disbelief for a second (and when it became obvious that the bus was not going to stop backing up) I hauled back on the handlebars and backed up as fast I could. However, it was up hill and after a few feet the bus caught up with me. I hoped that the bumper would be low enough to push against the front tire, but it caught and grabbed. It rode up on the tire, squishing it flat with the weight of the bus. When it reached the forks I was sure the bike would be wrecked, but just then he stopped (maybe he finally heard the anemic harley horn blowing) and pulled forward. I wasn’t sure if the bike was damaged, so I rode up next to the bus at the next stop sign and yelled at the driver. We pulled off in a parking lot and took a look at the bike. Remarkably, there didn’t seem to be any damage, though I’m sure it didn’t do it any good. The driver said the car in front of him wasn’t moving and he was backing up to pull around it. He looked in his mirrors and didn’t see me (of course).
Now, if the front fender had been on the bike, it would have been smashed and made the bike unrideable till it was removed (at least). So was it good that fender wasn’t on? Maybe. But if the fender had been damaged, maybe I could have gotten a new rim and tire also. It could be that it’s actually damaged and is just waiting to blowout on the highway and through me under the wheels of a truck. I suppose that if I die in a horrible fiery crash we’ll know for sure.

Last weekend I pulled the exhaust off my ‘89 Sportster (to get to the sprocket cover, but that’s another story) and noticed that there was a crack around where the crossover pipe is welded on. The fact is, chroming can make steel brittle (this is why you shouldn’t chrome steering components).

I decided to weld it up with my acetylene torch. Now, I could have mig welded or brazed it or even arc welded it, but gas welding works great for stuff like this. No spatter like arc or mig and once you braze something you can never go back and weld it.

You can fill holes easily by gas welding, you don’t have to worry about starting and stop an arc and you can regulate the heat by just pulling away (sure, a tig welder with a pedal would do better, but not for the price of my torch and no sunburn). I am actually using tig rods and brazing flux, but it works.

Next time I’ll put a shade 5 lens in front of the camera so the actual welding can be seen better.

Lets finish up on this fender. Last time I showed the wet sanding, now I need to mount it so I can paint it. I like to screw this sort of thing down, below you can see how I made a jig out of some scrap wood. I’ve had bad luck hanging stuff from wires.

I’ve already shown the black base coat and marblizing on another piece, so let me talk about the clear coat. I’m using a ureathane clear, in this case UFC-35 from House of Kolor. Its a flow clear, really made for a final flow coat after a high build clear (UC-35). But I’m not going to be color sanding and buffing, so I’m just using it as a single top coat. I put on 4 coats, you need to wait between coats til the paint is just tacky. You can test a taped spot (or the jig in my case) with your finger. Below, you may be able to see tiny strings stretching from my finger tip. It’s ready for the next coat when it stops stringing.

Here’s a closeup after the last coat:

The paint wasn’t too bad on the fender, so I just wet sanded it with 320 grit wet/dry paper.

I put some water with a trace of soap in an old squeeze bottle, some people use a garden hose, but you have to watch that you don’t ding the paint with the nozzle. Others dip the paper in a bucket, but I have found that grit (sand, dirt or whatever) can contaminate the water and leave scratches.
I like to use a piece of thin plastic foam inside my paper to prevent finger marks from getting sanded in to the paint. Cut the paper in half, then fold it in thirds for hand sanding.

Afterwards, all the water must removed from any crevices, otherwise, it may drip out when you painting and ruin the job. Get the nozzle of an air gun as close as possible and repeatly work over the whole part.

Here you can see a few drops forced out from under a rivet by the air pressure.

Before I put paint on my front fender, I had to tighten up the rivets holding it to the bracket. On the same fender for my trike, I drilled out the rivets and plug welded the holes. On my daily driver, I just wanted it to not rattle, so I peened the rivets on the anvil. I put a piece of cardboard underneath to prevent chipping of the paint.

The bracket was starting to rust, so I decided to paint it too. I removed the rust and scuffed the chrome with some 120 grit on the DA.

Next time, wet sanding, marblizing and clear coat.

One of the few things I got done over the weekend was changing the oil in my sportster. I like to check the old filter for metal particles as a diagnostic tool. You need to cut it open because the oil flows from the outside in. First, pop a hole in the side, near the top, I used a screwdriver.

Then I use a nibbler to cut all the way around.

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I put about 40 miles a day on my sportster, and even at 53-55 mpg the stock 2.25 gallon tank (pic below) would only last 2 1/2 days before refueling.

So I bought a Paughco “Fat Axed” tank from Jireh Cycles (~$97), it was the biggest and cheapest bolt on tank for sportster I could find (4.2 gallons).

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With plenty of evidence from my rigged up volt meter that I needed a new regulator (that, and my headllight blew out, again, for the 6th time in 18 months) I finally installed it last weekend. First I unbolted it.

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