R80/7 + a newb = a long road to cafe

before you know it: piece of cake.

now sparking the top cover...
that never occurred to me.

looking good. man your experiences are so similar to mine last year it's scary, haha. luckily for me, the previous owner had a new diode board installed, and it was beaten into my head before i started working on it to always unhook the negative battery cable (better from the battery rather than always unhooking the vent screw, as people tend to say it strips easily).

not sure what would be spaking from the top, i always have a hard time getting the bottom cables and rubber dohicky in the bottom groove of the cover plate when putting it back on. i guess not getting it in the groove and pinching the cables isn't a good idea. but i can't remember anything on the top of the cover needing any special treatment, but i suppose my diode board is different and situated differently.

the new brake cable is a pain in the butt to get on the master cylinder. i feel like i broke all my fingers until i figured out the best way to squeeze that lever back. having the "official" master cylinder feeler gauge is well worth tracking down if you don't already have it. makes adjustment of the master cylinder much easier.

when i redid my choke assembly i also found it much harder to move the lever, i think it's because i just tightened the nut to far down, as the bolt goes all the way through the assembly from what i remember. might have been easy to actuate since the nut wasn't even on? haha.

i need to get back to my bike and figure out my brake problem! i'm missing some odd nice weather!

have fun!

The top cover can contact the "battery" terminal of the solenoid whilst it's being wiggled back on. Good practice is to disconnect the battery whenever you are working on something even remotely electrical. Live and learn.

The 12mm box-end in the toolkit is perfect for that.

Explain more. If the clevis-pin that the cable-end fits into is not absolutely free to pivot in the arm as the cable is pulled, the cable will flex at that point and break.

Sparking from the top cover is the starter (+) wire, you'd be well served to remove the starter cover again to ensure that wire isn't sticking up to far (possibly rubbing the cover when installed).

I set a bike on fire neglecting this detail...

I think he'll be OK-- look at the second photo in Post#81 and it looks that the starter wire is positioned correctly. BUT, that is always a good detail to remain aware of...

I've been following your threads:) and I think you're right about the choke bolt just being to tight - Renner suggested the same thing offline. I'll loosen it up and see if that does it.

the pin is free to rotate, I just had a had time getting it into the cradle in the arm that depresses the "rod". Much as apt13 describes above.

I don't think anything is sticking up or in the wrong place. I think it was just as i maneuvered the cover on, a corner of the cover managed to hit the wrong wire just right. needless to say, I will be disconnecting the battery FIRST from now on

Thanks guys!
Spencer

..Spencer, I've been reading this thread since the beginning and I have a question : What size master cylinder are you
using for your dual disc conversion ?, i.e, the diameter of the bore.......and are the calipers 38mm or 40 mm ?...
thanks in advance, Dave.

those are excellent questions! I believe the new MC is 17mm (it is what Larry told me, but I haven't verified), and I do not know the answer to the caliper question, I'm not even sure what to measure. I'll try to look into it and report back...

spencer

....I have a '78 R 100/7 and my single caliper is a 40 mm.......they are stamped " 40 " right on the outside., don't
know about the 38 mm though.....the reason I'm getting into this : I'm collecting parts for a dual conversion and need
all the info possible. I want to go factory stock.

Hi all!

I have a small detour from my build thread: I bought a house!

So, in addition to your wonderful advice about not funking up my R80/7, please include advice/suggestions for a solid motorcycle work space. I have one half of a 2 car garage to work with (the other half is for scuba gear and misc stuff)

Thanks:)
Spencer

Hi Team!

Went back to work on the bike tonight. I practiced my level 9 (thanks Renner ) skills and practiced taking the top cover off without removing the clamshell or the snorkel. that makes life easier for sure:)


and verified that the wires weren't going to start a fire (you made me paranoid ignatz )

I made sure the snorkel was correct and the mesh was right and re-installed.


Then I tried to put a batter strap over the battery, but the recieving bolts were all rusty:


so i took the battery out and tried to clean them up, but it didn't matter the cover strap didn't seem to fit.


and those little nuts did not want to screw down. oh well.

Then i moved on the putting the air tubes back on! the left went on ok once I loosened the carb from the head a little, but the right tube didn't seem to want to fit. it's like it is 1/8" to short.

you can see the gap at the carb. but it is on and i doubt that will be a problem(?)

then while the battery is still disconnected, i put the front cover on after squirting some electrical cleaner around, and then drying with compressed air.

hooray for re-assembly!


THEN! I tried to be ambitious. I started draining the tank. i have a siphon with clear tubing, but only a very small portable gas tank, so i was going to ferry the gas to my car. BUT! i saw chunks of the liner moving through the siphon and caught one in a glass container to show you:



crap. and that was a small piece. What can i do with this gas? can i filter it through some cloth? I hate to just have to dispose of it... AND! what do i do with the tank? obviously the liner is deteriorating. I guess i need to get this tumbled or something?

I'm on hold till i figure out what to do with the tank and gas...

Thanks everyone!
Spencer

OK! did some reading looks like I want a box of nuts, and HD CYCLE TANK REPAIR KIT from POR15.

still don't know what to do with the gas with chunks of liner in it...

A little paranoia is good sometimes, especially when it comes to flaming /7s. But everything looks good on your setup and you should be good to go. It was a hard lesson for me to learn when my '77 burned, and I do my little part to help make sure that doesn't happen again. (I didn't have ADV around when my "conflagration" occurred)

Looks like you are becoming rather adept at taking things off and putting them back together... You'll find that the airbox/carb tubes haunt you until one day it just "clicks." It helps to curse and stick your tongue out while you maneuver everything into place!

RE: the gas tank liner in the gas - like others have suggested, use this for lawnmowing of your new yards, etc. You can strain it with cheese cloth or similar.

My '93 GS had a bad tank liner due to years of bad gas sitting in it (POs fault), so I drained everything then plugged it all up and used a 5 gallon bucket of Evap-o-rust to chew up all the grungies. I didn't reline the tank or have a sonic treatment done since the exterior paint was perfect. I slapped a few fuel filters inline to catch the big stuff, and now I just keep the tank as full as possible to prevent new rust. As long as you run it regularly it shouldn't get worse. But if you are thinking of a repaint, then by all means get a sonic or chemical treatment done first, then reline. Otherwise the fuel filters and the float bowls will tell you all you need to know about the condition of the tank.

I do use Stabil fuel stabilizer (Red) every tank, and have recently started to add Stabil marine treatment (blue) to combat the effects of Ethanol.

Yep, POR-15 is pretty much the industry standard. Drain the tank, peek inside with a penlight and see exactly what condition of the liner is in. It may not be bad enough to need immediate action. Pull the petcocks and clean the filter socks.

Go down to an auto paint supply store and get a few "funnel filters". Disposable mesh filters used to filter auto paint being poured into a paint gun. Filter the gas with that and put it in the tank. Useful also for straining used oil to see what grunge is in it.

The short version: 1/4-20 nuts work for cleaning, but better are drywall screws-- wood screws with an attitude. Pour a couple of handfuls in and shake, shake, shake. Clean, dry and re-coat.

as one noob to another, i completely ruined the lovely paint job on my wife's cb360 doing the por15 routine. it had a kreem liner on the inside that was rotten and coming apart. but i ruined the outer paint in the process. so I'm just saying be careful and mask it off really good if you wanna keep the paint nice. i used drywall screws on the inside of the tank and took the tank to a car wash to spray it all out on the inside there are a billion links online about how to clean out tanks. dish soap and drywall screws do wonders. i was amazed. anyway, i never got around to finishing the por15 process cuz i screwed up the paint so bad and i got in trouble and...well...you know...wives. figured we'd end up boiling the tank and start over new with a new paint job and coating eventually.

i have a question and i apologize about the thread hijack, but my bike doent have the rubber tube deals on the air box. I've just got the L shaped tubes on each side with a hose clamp on each end, but not the thicker rubber hose chunk, where it looks like people put a 2-up hose clamp? whats the deal with that? i see it both ways in photos.

I ordered the Por15 kit:) I'll try it out next week I hope. till then I'm going to work on getting the gas filtered and in my car, and I'll do some tumbling with screws and such. I'm not terribly worried about the paint - I read the instructions and I think I can handle the por15 process. besides, I DO like my faded red/orange paint, but I think I'll be getting some new paint in the future anyway.

the rubber bits on the air tube - on mine, they are supposed to be there. the tip of the air tube JUST covers the oring in the clamshell recieving collar, and the rubber boot covers the whole thing - one hose clamp holding the rubber the clamshell, one to the tube. there is NOT supposed to be any rubber from the air tube to the carb. to the best of my knowledge, mine is correct. I can't speak to other airheads...

ignatz - what do the fuel additives do? is one to "lead" the gas for these old engines?

Thanks all:)

No lead substitutes required for early/mid-80s and newer bikes...

Stabil stabilizer (red) keeps the gas from "turning" due to age, and the Stabile marine formula (blue) fights the effects of Ethanol.

When gas turns it get gummy and loses combustability, and Ethanol has a habit of attracting water vapor. I like in a very humid area, so need help fighting water attraction in my tank.

...Spencer, in post # 113 it shows your carburetor sleeves installed wrong....both sides of the carburetor should have
the rubber sleeves and your black tube goes to the airbox without anything, just a clamp. I think I'm right, Dave.

From what I''ve seen BMW went throught several variations of this arrangement.

I think Spencer's got it right for his year/model bike.

Dave - I'm 99.9% certain I've got it installed correctly - my guru friends Mike, Renner, and Ted P. have all advised me:)

but this is why i told apt13 i couldn't speak to other airhead models about it, damn variations on a theme

Thanks for looking!