1990 CBR1000FL...Sat for 14 years, alone....

[Egon247]

I did try and get them to move, I just had visions of them being so far back in the calipers that I couldn't get hold of them to get them out again.

There's no easy way to hold a caliper in a vice, is there? They need to make them square.

Edited November 12, 2024 by Egon247
Hold. Not cold. Lol

[Punts]

To remove seized brake pistons, make up an adaptor for the fluid input with a grease nipple.

Pump the pistons out with a grease gun, up to 6000lb controlled pressure and no damage to the pistons.

 

[Egon247]

Hmmm. That don't look right, does it?

[Simon Davey]

Kinky.... 

[RideWithStyles]

Unfortunately not.

Could be ok inside and the plates, just the seals affecting it?

depends on how much of a cheap bas7ard you want to be by just changing the Master link…

[Egon247]

I've just looked and a new chain n sprocket is £100 so I'll add it to the ever increasing list!

[Egon247]

Went to the local Honda dealers to just have a mooch about. Nice guys in there (21st moto Swanley, Kent). Ended up buying some bits cos i'm impatient.  

Bought a genuine oil filter, sump washer and a couple of other odds and sods. Seems the genuine oil filter comes with the tool to remove them, which is nice. One more tool added to the collection.  

Been falling into the rabbit hole of chain rivet tools. Its a bloody mine field, isnt it? They range from chinesium ones at £10 all the way up to the actual DID one at about a ton!! 

Might just buy the sealey one at £40 and have done with it. Alongside my DIY carb balancing thing that i'm making (couldnt get the thing to start at all on wednesday, it really didnt sound happy, i think the rebuild has put the carbs all out of kilter, which is entirely understandable!!) i'll have a garage full of weird things that i'll use once in a blue moon!!!  

 

Exhaust heat shields are off and have been attacked by the wire wheel of justice, then some etch primer and some Halfords VHT grey - the exhausts are going to get the same treatment i think, theyre a bit ropey in OEM silver/rusty bits....

Found a complete brake rebuild kit for the front from wemoto at a very reasonable £80. Even the dealers suggested it as just the pistons alone from Honda came to £240!!!

The calipers are currently in the airing cupboard after a few coats of "subaru" gold (think 1990's VFR).

 

Jees...then the master cylinder gets the treatment after that. 

 

Just need a decent lottery win i think...  

 

[Simon Davey]

Gotta love shopping for parts

M&P usually have a lot to spend small money on, I got my calliper rebuild kits from them, they have a massive eBay store. 

[Fiddlesticks]

3 hours ago, Egon247 said:

Might just buy the sealey one at £40 and have done with it

I bought the Sealey Vs779 (about £32 from Amazon) - no complaints.

[RideWithStyles]

If you move/remove the carbs for any reason THEY HAVE TO BE REBALANCED, no if or buts…

[Egon247]

Especially so when theyre full of gunge and cack.  

 

[Egon247]

Diy manometer/carby sync tool in progress....

 

Went down to the garage all excited to make up the manometer and found the bike looking like it had wet itself.

Seems the fuel tap has given up the ghost and needs some attention. After clearing all the clag out of it , I did wonder if it would be ok.... apparently not.

Edited November 28, 2024 by Egon247

[Hairsy]

36 minutes ago, Egon247 said:

After clearing all the clag out of it , I did wonder if it would be ok.... apparently not.

 

I feel for you. They do that a lot - let you think you're having a good day and then present you with a new problem.

 

Looking forward to seeing how the manometer works out. 

[Egon247]

3 hours ago, Hairsy said:

 

I feel for you. They do that a lot - let you think you're having a good day and then present you with a new problem.

Yup. Like buying a new chain link (temporary fix btw) and then having to buy the tool to go with it

 

[Egon247]

Oil change done. Not really photo worthy as I imagine most of you guys will have seen that before.

Ordered a fuel tap repair kit in case it's actually salvageable. 

And tried the carb balance thing. 

I need to change my pants now....

[Hairsy]

2 hours ago, Egon247 said:

Ordered a fuel tap repair kit in case it's actually salvageable. 

 

If it comes to it, I replaced the fuel tap on one of my CBR600s with one from AliExpress for around £15 (I think). It arrived in the same box as one that an Amazon seller was knocking out for £60. It worked perfectly.

 

In my case, it was a sealed unit but I know that many can be taken apart and rebuilt so I definitely think you're doing the right thing - better to have a rebuilt OEM than a Chinese copy.

 

But at least it might give you a plan B if you need one.

[Egon247]

Ok, just in case you're interested in the vacuum balance thing, i''l run through what i did. Rightly or wrongly. This is how i did it.

 

Bought 10m of 4mm fish tank airline, a few T pieces and a few inline joiners.

Cut some small pieces to join the T 's together and then the in line's to the ends. 

Then fold the remaining hose in half, cut it, then in half again, cut it. makes 4 long bits.

Bag of cable cleats (the nail type) and mount it to a bit of wood, making it look all pretty.

long bits of pipe go on the two T and the joiners.

 

Then stand back and wonder how the hell you're going to get enough red Halford's gearbox oil into a 4mm tube to make it work.

 

Stomp around angrily while you try and figure out how to do it. 

 

Find an old trigger spray, dip the suction tube in the gearbox oil and wedge the tube against the nozzle and away you go.

Drill a couple of holes a bit further up and bang a cable tie through it to hold up the pipes....

 

Then wait for about 3 hours for all the sodding air bubbles to go away to leave you with the weirdest looking thing you've made. (other than the children)

 

Now comes the fun bit. Warm up that engine.....

The CBR1000f has little take offs on the carb tops, by the diaphragms. pull the rubber caps off and poke on your tubes....

"Cool beans" i thought.  HAHA!!

 

No.... What i should have done is eyeball the carbs on  the bench with a powerful torch behind them so that they might have been somewhere near.

 

What i did wasn't that. i started the engine and nearly sucked up the cool looking red oil into cylinder 4 like a engine seeking snake, sucking air into all the rest of the tubes.....

 

Which wasn't what i wanted. 

So off came the carbs (crow bar again) and eyeballed.

Back on, try again.

Better but looking like a 1980's spectrum game, they were all over the shop BUT NOT in danger of going into the cylinder. 

 

Then find the adjustment screws. AND A SCREWDRIVER LONG ENOUGH TO REACH THEM WITH EASE!!!!!

 

Now with the gauges, you're in no danger of oiling up the intakes/smoking like a red arrow so you can fiddle to your hearts content but with these, you gotta stay awake. 

LIKE 3 ESPRESSO AWAKE.

they're very, very, very sensitive. just looking at them in a funny way will make them move. seriously. 

 

I managed to get them to within 2-3" of each other and stable, but adrenalin won me over and i called it a day. 

 

You CAN do it yourself. You CAN build one. BUT, its quite stressful. LOL.   

Edited November 30, 2024 by Egon247

[Nick the wanderer]

Older ones used mercury, heavy so it didn't fluctuate so much.

[Hairsy]

That's really interesting - thanks for explaining it. And well done on persevering. I love it when we find budget ways to do things.

[Egon247]

Long day at work today, broken up by fitting the repair kit to the fuel tap and looking at the fuel gauge.

 

So while the tank is sat on its nose (sans fuel---question about that in a minute....) i thought I'd have a look at the fuel sender while i was fitting the repair kit to the fuel tap.

The fuel tap kit is relatively simple to fit, being just two diaphragms and a spring. Unscrew the four screws off the back, ease the parts out, clean out the crap that's accumulated in it since i cleaned it out a couple of weeks ago (uh oh....) and reassemble. simples. Only the big black switch didn't want to change position from OFF to RES or ON. seems the little switch didn't like me fixing it, and after a bit of fiddling, changed its attitude and then played nice. Phew.

The fuel sender.....oh dear. so its not worked since my brother had it. Always seemed like a weird idea on a bike anyway, but hey, if its fitted, it might as well work....

C R U S T Y.  Yik. took the metal cover from over the resistor and most of the contents of the universe fell out....  

Multimeter connected to the plug and open circuit....should read from 4-100 ohms. 

The copper wiper was still intact as was the wire winding just the little bar that holds the lot together was allowing it all to slip around. Minor adjustment with a little hammer and a vice and its wiping. 

But wiping over dried varnish. so that came off with some food grade spray (anything food grade = shite. i work in a food factory!!) and some 1000 grit. 

I imagine the original had a coating of super shmoo that has long gone. just going to try it and see if it works now. if it doesn't, then no loss, I'm sure there's a second hand one on eBay. 

But now reading 6-110 ohm. I can live with that.  

 

Thought there was a random bolt in the tank too, shook it around with the sender and tap out, only to find the Datatag. LOL  

 

 

 

So E10 fuel question..... what colour is it? only when i got the fuel out the tank it was yellow. I haven't seen fuel in a while but I'm sure its supposed to be clear/light blue yes? maybe its cleaned off some of the varnish maybe......

[Nick the wanderer]

Fuel E10 is yellowy..

[Egon247]

36 minutes ago, Nick the wanderer said:

Fuel E10 is yellowy..

Awesome, thanks nick. I've had it on my hands, had it all over the wife's engine but not looked at it in a translucent container before. Odd colour.

 

[RideWithStyles]

Turns more yellow the older it gets, water will be absorbed till it can’t contain any more then will sit at the bottom and go cloudy/misty, then it will gel up….then its really bad.

[Egon247]

So what youre saying is, if it looks like a coffee fuelled day at the office, then its probably bad news...  

[RideWithStyles]

Got to love abit of ingenuity when absolutely necessary but that carb balancer is way…..to big. .

More like Redbull with egg whites and clear jelly bits .