What did you do to your Yamaha today?

Yesterday I put my new Chacal-special speedo cable in and in so doing spotted a nasty crack in the mounting bracket for my Vetter fairing. I took the fairing and bracket off (much easier than expected even with my crap selection of tools (more on that in a bit) and brought it in to work today. The mechanics welded and painted it up for me.

On the way home I'm stopping as Sears an picking up a 260 piece tool set. My days of holding bolts with oversized crescent wrenches are over. Pre-ordered it and got it on sale (thanks, Labor Day and random coupon code from the interwebs). Happy early anniversary to me, I guess. Very overdue purchase.

 

Finished taking carbs all the way down to nothing, lol I must be crazy!

Cleaned everything and am now ready to put back togather in reverse order. I am crazy!

Thanks to Chacal, Rickomatic, Bill and several threads.

Wish me luck!

 

Good luck ricklees, just take it slow, one step at a time, being very anally-retentive on cleanliness, thoroughness, and precision, and all will be well!

 

I rode it to fill in for my wife at work in the rain... and tried the clutchless shift thing on the way home(no rain) It was suprisingly smoother than I thought it would be.

 

Finally got around to replacing the clutch on the Turbo. The R&R was painless. Steel plates were in good shape and needed minimal cleanup. Got away cheap, $69 for new clutch friction plates and springs and $20 gasket.

 

made a little locking mechanism so i can lock my helmet to my bike, and i stared a tit and reved it up a couple of times, gosh it sounds sweet, if i could only drive it..

 

For the first time since I bought it 2 months ago,I just rode.What a great feeling taking the bike from a spider's nest on wheels sitting in someone's back yard and restoring some of it's former glory.

 

Rebuilt the petcock. Got all but two ehaust valves re-installed in the head after lapping them. Trying to get the valve stem collets back in while releasing the valve springs was rediculously hard untill I broke out the axle grease and "glued" them to the valve stems. Is that the way your supposed to do it or did I stumble across an ingenious sort of cheat?
Anyway, I'm headed off to upper Saranac for the weekend we'll revisit the xj when I get back.

 

Hmmm another NS rider onboard.... Nice


Just been riding it daily to work.... mostly in the rain ......

Still need to replace the levers and grips and SS brake lines (or just rubber if I can't locate a reasonably priced line soon)
.....

 

well i started it up again, reved a little bit, i did this about 6 times today.

 

I picked up a project 81 Maxim 650 on thursday, spent friday looking in the local boneyard for a few bits and pieces, and bought a few parts...filter, plugs,etc:

I pulled the carbs and went thru them this AM, while they were soaking I dumped the old oil and filter, gapped and installed some new plugs.

Put the carbs back together after supper, fired it up and then spent the next hour or so fine tuning the carbs. Got it to run pretty good, idel well after giving it a bit mor enrichment, it's at about 3 1/2 turns out.

As I don't have a seat yet I made a ghetto seat from a old camping sleeping pad and 1/2 roll of duct tape....looks real fast !! It was about 8:30 PM when I got to take it for a spin, of course thats about the time it started to rain, but I put 1 mile on it anyway. Should be a decent ride when I get the seat and front turn signals, need a few other piesed, but it's a winter project.....

Pretty satisfied with my day all in all.

Tommorrow my son is getting married, so I won't be able to play with it again till tuesday most likely. Looking forward to getting a real ride.

 

Rode mine off to hudson leather in ohio yesterday, bought me a tool bag to cover the front forks since im havin trouble finding the emblems, while i was there i got a paint ideal, came home and started. finished painting and decaling last night. need to finish clearing today!

 

Just went on a 200 mile poker run yesterday and had an awesome time! Got a little sun and wind burnt though

 

havent done a poker run in several months, been too busy working on the bike on weekends.

 

Finished complete rebuild on carbs, put them back on bike.

I need to address the gas tank before i start it though.

Bike sat for 9 years with full tank of gas, stupid me!

 

I use the same trick to keep the acuating rod in place when replacing a GM fuel pump.

 

Ages old trick.
Recommended procedure in Chilton's Manuals and in The Complete MGB.

I use a variation of the theme to hold-down Diaphragm Rubbers in the locating groove when I replace the Chrome-domes on Carbs.
Not only does it "Glue" them in place ... it also aids in making an air-tight seal.

 

I finally drove it, got it to about 85 mph, showed it to my grandma, found out I had a bad fork seal, and got asked by about 4 people why i would ever buy something this old, and needs some work to it, do i started it up and took off like a bat out of hell, that is after i idled itno second cuz its broke, but i know i showed the up lol. Yup, lots of power, im happy.

 

Actually I did this about a week ago. I went to replace the oil seal and o-ring inside my tach drive. Took a pair of pliers to loosen the cable from the housing and heard a snap! Not happy but live and learn.



I have a new housing coming. It should be here just in time to get the bike stored away for winter. Sorry for using the "W" word!

 

Sitting here feeling sorry for myself, since I can't ride. Then I decided to test my coils and use the multi-tester I bought in the spring.
Coil #1 Primary = 2.7
Secondary = 11.91
Coil #2 Primary = 2.8
Secondary = 11.48

Temperature was only 56*F (13*C)
From what I've read these should be acceptable readings. I didn't check the resistance with the caps attached. (Gives me an excuse to spend more time in the XJ shed at a later date. :wink: )