What did you do to your Yamaha today?

Im breaking the bead on both rear and front tires to clean out some corrosion. The tires dont hold air for longer than 24hrs.

 

¡¡Hola a todos!!
Hoy desmontar los tubos de escape.
1- Los sumergí durante 24 horas en vinagre comestible y agua.
2- Limpié con un cepillo de alambre.
3- Pinté con pintura de alta temperatura color aluminio.
4- Fueron muy amables.

¡¡Saludos!!

 

I rode past my bikes on my sled.... kept the rpms down so I wouldn’t wake them up.

 

Wow, serious snow there.
It’s really unfair, we only get the occasional snowfall here - no-one has a snowmobile, or the need of one....

 

What did I do to my yamaha today? I drive a 5hr round trip tonight to pick up another 900rk to call it mine and add to the stable.


Neglected but not abused..... one owner, 9k miles

it’ll come back to life

dfox

 

I didn't do anything fun. Just sharing the misery...I've never seen a caliper pin stuck like this before. Lots of penetrating oil, a little heat and mild persuasion eventually led to scads of heat and beating the $h&t out of it. Enough heat to where the aluminum started to melt like a beer can. Might be garbage now, maybe not. I'll assess again later. These calipers seem to be unobtanium. In hind sight I probably should have drilled a hole in the back end of the pin housing and started an oil soak there. Or maybe put in a zerk and try grease pressure to force it out. It was ugly.

 

Is it a Maxim or Seca caliper? If it is a Seca I have 6 of them .

 

No, unfortunately it's a Maxim which seems to be more uncommon in spares. Still searching for a used one. I know there are new and rebuilt ones available, just trying to keep the budget down for now.

 

Which Maxim? For my 650 (single caliper, admittedly), I was able to get a decent looking one from ebay for like $40. Then another $90 or so to rebuild. Not exactly dirt cheap, but nowhere near the realm of Unobtainium. Add new brake lines and a master cylinder rebuild and the cost goes up - but my personal opinion is that the ability to stop is a nice feature.

Doesn't look like a 700/700X caliper - if it was, I've got at least one set of those laying around.

@Roast644 - I suggest that you post a "wanted" with the exact model of bike in the "For Sale, Trade/Swap, Wanted" section. Somebody probably has one.

 

'82 750 Maxim. I did find a left hand caliper on ebay for about $40. Haven't received it yet, but am expecting I will have to invest in a rebuild. The picture is the right hand caliper, and I'm still looking for that one. And yah, unobtanium is an exageration. Since they are available new, that clearly isn't the case. I was just trying not to spend more on the the front calipers than I did on the rest of the bike. My plan still is get it running, make sure there is no major issues, then begin replacing marginal stuff...brake lines, old tires, etc. Originally I was hoping to be able to do this with the existing calipers...plans have changed.

On another note, I have seen several times people suggesting "put your bike model in your signature line!" I can't figure out where to do that on my profile. Is it the "status message" box?

 

@Roast644 - if you go to the upper right, you should see your user name, "Inbox", and "Alerts". If you click on your username, you should see an option for "Signature".

 

Or, as a reminder to everyone —make sure to put the year and model bike that you ask questions about.

 

At least on the Seca rebuild kit for both calipers was like 23$ , unless you trash the piston that is only big cost , I drove mine out with a grease gun so no damage , a little scotch Brite and after cleaning out caliper was good to go.

 

I spent about two hrs today cleaning off dirt, no polishing yet..... and also removing gorilla tape and residue. Got it almost all done, had one small piece of the black decal break off with the tape ( too brittle at that point, I guess).... I’ll touch that up with black gloss enamel (Testors). After I finish the last little bit of the tank, I’ll start on the exhaust.

 

I just put a battery to it to see if it stuck or not.... nope, not stuck

 

750 Seca right side panel crack repair!

 

Almost three months unable to work in the garage as it is unheated ...well today after I stopped work for the day ( working from home rocks ) went out in garage upper 50's so wanted to ride but winter is not over yet. Started up both bikes , the Johnny Cash bike the tail light was INOP and Atari was lit up it had been intermittent last year . Finally got the time to look at it , checked power, brake light licence plate light worked , pulled headlight out and tail light worked , put it all back together since the harness came from another bike at least it was not hacked up . So I have the bikes on one side of the garage all I have to do is put the right mirrors back on and the yellow seca put the lexan shield back on , air tires back up , check fork air pressure and should be ready to ride.

 

Took a plastic scraper to the cylinder head and finally got the remnants of the old head gasket off, meaning she's finally ready to have the new one put on. Putting all of the nuts and bolts through some surface rust removal before putting them back on. Excited to finally get this bike finished up.

 

Got some milk delivered today
Only paid 11 euros

 

My girl was manufactured in February 1982, over the last month I cleaned the carbs, rebuilt the fuel petcock, rebuilt the starter and polished the chrome. Today I took her for a fortieth birthday ride. Happy birthday, baby! BTW...I was her first!

 

pulled apart 4 front calipers. Missing some washers, some "squeal plates" and need to replace a fair bit of stuff.

 

Started it up in the garage just needed motorcycle fix. Then lubed the clutch and choke cable tried to lube the throttle cable but one screw head is stripped so put another thing on the "to do" list.

 

Installed a new front master cylinder brake lever setup and bled the brakes.

 

I bought another bike this weekend, a 1980 650 Seca. The serial number on my restored bike is 000202 and this one is 000550 so they're very similar in age. I looks a bit tired but is mostly original. The starter button was munted so I've already fixed that. The bike runs however there appears to be an issue with the clutch, so that's the next thing to fix. After that it'll need a carb clean and tune as it bogs when accelerating and there's a fair bit of popping. Nothing that can't be fixed. It came with a bunch of spares including a full set of carbs and a bikini fairing. The fairing is gelcoat fiberglass & was made in Wanganui (a city in NZ). I'm told not many were made, but my first bike back in the 80's had a similar or identical fairing. So now I've got one bike to look at and one to ride!

 

Nice day yesterday so I went to work assembling the cams back in place on the 700X. A couple of the shim buckets seemed to sit higher than the rest, so after checking the shims for obstructions I tapped them down using a hammer and plastic screwdriver handle. A couple of the hollow 'dowels' wouldn't come out so I had to twist out with pliers. One had to have a long nose vise-grip inserted vertically, grabbing the wall, so I could tap the vise-grip pliers upward to remove. Unfortunately this meant dressing the gouge marks on the affected dowels and otherwise making them round again so they fit in the camshaft caps. Wouldn't be fun without problems.

 

Well I didn't technically "do" anything to my Yamaha today...at least yet, it ain't midnight. But I went and got the mail. And when you get stuff like this from Len at XJ4EVER it definitely inspires one to get back into the shop at the next opportunity! Woo-hoo! I guess I have no excuses now...

 

Wow great parts Len is great to deal with !!!

 

I'm on the brakes. Little or no maintenance can be seen in the photo. Still the seals do their job. The entire system has been disassembled and cleaned. Someday I will find the spare parts to renew everything.

 

Polished and buffed the tail light. Rhino lined the chain guard. Yesterday I welded in a battery box and touched up with some spray paint.

 

Well the nickel rebuild budget today turned into an entire spare bike, picked up for cheap. Another '82 750 Maxim that I can swap a few parts into my other. This bike is almost in better shape than my project, but somebody had started to bobberize the poor thing and then gave up. But.... Still has the original exhaust in pristine condition. Oh, and besides the extra bike I somehow picked up another whole set of carbs on the side, and a few other odds and ends. I probably need to join a support group to curb this habit.

 

Sorry @Roast644 , this IS the support group.

Glad you were able to find some good deals. For better or worse, bobber projects can be good source for parts.

 

Well I took one bike out of storage and rode around the block but it was raining and it was quite cold . Charged both bikes battery's up , started both bikes up , I have the Johnny Cash bike up for sale had a few tire kickers and a few low ball offers but strange no one has actually came by to look at the bike only seen pictures.

 

installed the battery did my pre-ride safety check added some carb cleaner to the fuel tank , then went for my first ride of the season to the gas station to put in some non E high test gas. went for a little ride .
after a few miles i went to my practice road and started honing my u turn skills did several u turns which then turned into figure 8's .
I did this for about a half an hour and went home.

 

Look where you're aiming to go I think is the secret. Someone on here once said they practice emergency stops after a winter layoff - something I thought was a good idea, so now I do it too. Will add u-turns to the routine.

 

Got a lot done on the 400 project. Cleaned and decreased the wheels and rear sprocket. Painted the swingarm and exposed parts of the frame with rustoleum. Jumpered the clutch switch in the headlight bucket. Cleaned the engine up. Sorted some wiring and mounted the reg/rec on the battery box.

Definitely needs a new front tire. Currently has a weather checked Dunlop 3.00-19 on it. Thinking about a Kenda 100/90-19.

 

First nice day in a few weeks , and I have three broke bikes , first pulled my yellow seca out got on bike , put kick stand up dropped in gear and neutral light stayed on, rode anyway felt great pulled great . The Johnny Cash bike number four cylinder is cold , and has spark so will have to look at the carbs . I met a guy last year with a maxim that was bobbed , I rebuilt the carbs last fall but never got a chance to synch carbs he brought it over , worked on it for awhile but I feel like crap right now so I'm not going to go any further today .

 

full pivot at waist to look where i want to go in the u turn.
e stops and swerve and stop are also in the menu.

 

I was able to get out for a ride yesterday, but got caught in a rainstorm in the way home..... pulled into my sister-in-laws driveway and garage seconds befor the downpour. I waited it out, then went the rest of the way home. Only damp legs from road-spray.

 

Carb cleaner in the tank? Better than Seafoam? How much and what kind do you use?

 

Only stuff I use is Berrymans B12 but only put a small amount . In fact put this in my cars as well

 

berrymans 12 a few ounces follow can directions I also use non e fuel high test on the first tank of the season to boost the octane incase the fuel has deteriorated.
carb cleaner for the first 2 tanks of fuel then no additives.
end of season I use seafoam and switch to the non e fuel to dilute the amount of ethonol in the tank for the winters rest.

 

Got my Vista cruise control and installed today will make long trip riding a little more less tiring . May order another for my yellow seca.

 

Pulled carb rack apart ,replaced throttle shaft seals, and fuel tube o-rings, and reassembled rack, need to heat up carb bowls to remove seized drain screws.

 

Found out why my rear wheel started to wobble..
Lesson learned, don’t skip (or damage) the wheel bearing spacer, it is in fact more important then it seems.

when I got this bike, and didn’t have much knowledge at all really, I critically damaged the rear spacer while doing a bearing swap
I did not re-install it and went ahead with new bearings and overhauled everything else

these only had 308 miles on them, shame, I hope I didn’t damage anything else.

Anyways, got my new to me 18” rear wheel from Germany matched with new bearings AND SPACER, tire, and paint

mounted that up with no problems, the axle looked good with no damage from the bearing mishap, also, the 18” rear wheel from Germany mounts up with no modifications to the bike
Also got a seca front fender stripped and ready for a mirror polish to match the tank, and I cut the original maxim front fender and fit it to the rear.

 

yamaha wouldn't have used a spacer if it was not needed. every component on the axle is used to locate the tire even the washers are spacers.
when you tighten the axel everything squeezes together. the tube spacer between the bearings keeps the races of the bearings in the proper position.

 

Tank paint
Gold base
Gold flake coats
Translucent blue clear still to come.
Here's the test piece.

 

I did absolutely nothing with my xj..... but I did work on other rack rebuilds that are in line, trying to get caught up for those who’s racks I’m working on currently .......

But I did take a few minutes to go for a ride......

 

Wow, that bike has two front wheels and one very wide rear??

 

That's a trike .