16.  To all my loyal blog viewers
Been busy poor old rickman took a back seat. Had to press cagiva into action albeit with new offset yolks, r6 forks (with my own secret springing tweak), 19 inch knockon rear wheel, 19 inch spool hub front, both shod with maxis finest rubber. to cut a long story short it transformed the bike I still am not on the new limit so more to come whoopee.








  Gary Nixon genuine wheel

wheel forks yolks tyre all new

tyre cutters are brill

flat track lair

15. The clock is ticking 53 days to the first meeting !
 Better get the engine together then.

The pistons cleaned up and inspected . Then they was inserted into the bottom of the liner (the least worn part of a bore) there was  0.004in. clearance that is the recommended minimum clearance so thats all hunky dorey.








 



new piston ring being checked for end gap funnily enough all 4 compression ring were spot on but both oil rings needed a smidge removing.

 

 

 

Little trick to fit "tight" gudgeon pins into alluminium pistons. Pour boiling water onto piston they are used to much higher operating temperatures so they wont mind. This expands and enlarges the g pin bore and allows the cold (preferably fresh from the freezer) g pin to slide into position. Do not forget to place the circlip facing the center of the engine in first as its easier to put the last circlip in the uncluttered side of the piston facing out .

14. fork off (well the lugs anyway)








 
  B4


 Here we have a R6 Yamaha fork leg (you guessed it another  ebay "bargain").
As front brakes are not used
the lugs are surplus unsprung weight. I dont want to be dragging these useless lumps around a race track all year they can be discarded.

Steady in vice and hack away at the freeloaders.

Shorn of lugs

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tidy up in lathe. Did you know fork sliders are oval. No i didn't either.

Obviously time to do the other one now - must dash

13. POWER TRAIN OFF THE RAILS.

With the engine central in the frame and the dula box trapped by the rear mounting plates (likewise centraly, in line astern) . The NEB clutch sprocket is inboard by 20mm (just over 3/4 inch). This is not exactly satisfactory. I fear the primary drive chain may complain about this situation and quite rigitly so. I suspect the standard norton clutch would not have this problem but i need the NEB because its the real deal for getting off the line.
 Now if i space the rear right plate outwards the 20mm offset and the gearbox moves with it we will put the powertrain back on the rails.
Over to the steelrack to find some nice aluminium then a casual stroll to my mate Mr Myford.  This is the sort of jobs lathes were invented for. 20 minutes to drill and part off all the spacers is what it takes. Lathes, every home should have one.

Spot on! its amazing what a few spacers will do.
















12. FRAME SHENANIGANS.



The engine could wait for a while i have to check if i can get an engine in. I saw a Dula 2 speed gearbox for sale and rang up SPEEDWAY SERVICES for a bit of advice. "its a modified amc gearbox they used to race big weslake sidecar motorcross using them, pretty indestructable realy" came the reply. That is what i wanted to hear, box bought. 2 speeds is not a disadvantage in flat track racing, at Buxton the shortest track we used last year i used 2nd all day. At all other tracks i shortshifted up into 3rd before turn 1 and it stays there until the flag (or i fall off) so if geared right  2 speed will do nicely . The engine plates arrived from WASP and i went for a trial fit.


she fits with a bit of fettling. By the look of the barrel studs the engine should slope forward. just the way i like it

old suspect cases used as a dummy

clutch actuating arm fouls engine an easy fix

Note Dula gearbox . The bulbous right kickstart casing is gone along with the kickstart and mechanism and a fair bit of exess weight. Gear lever is directly attached to gearchange so its direct no slogger, no slop, just sweet.

With the engine central in the frame the undrilled front mounts could be drilled. 

 

Marked in situ then removed and drilled on milling machine just
 measure gaps and turn up nice alloy spacers to keep motor middle for diddle.

11. Don and Dericks frame up.



Two brothers going by the surname of Rickman were having considerable success scrambler racing. During the winter of 1958/9 they designed and manufactured a new frame to race and the rest as they say is history. The frame has been produced ever since by several different chassis constructors. This is not a flat track frame it has a lazy steering head angle (27 deg) being made for jumps it is well built and strong but  that makes it a bit on the heavy side we are talking dress size 12UK not clinicaly obese.
One builder of the frame kit is WASP MOTORCYCLES they build to all original specifications only in the finest 4130 chrome molytubing. The tubing is brazed together as in the old days oddly this is still the optimum technique after all the years of manufacture. Then the whole frame is bright nickle coated. As you may have guessed this is going to be my frame of choice. Ebay turns up almost anything sooner or later.

Known as the" Mettise" (French for female mongrel) Surely "magnifique" would be more appropriate.

 

May i introduce the Rickman Wasp chassis. This item of aesthetic beauty was advertised as a Matchless G80 frame but i reckoned one old British engine is roughly the same size as another so i should be able to squeeze a Triumph in somehow.  I bit the bullet and here we are. She has never had an engine in her. I rang the very helpful man at Wasp motorcycles with the frame number and he confirmed it was a G80 frame they made in 2006. I enquired if they did Triumph preunit  engine plates this they said they did but two things to note.

1. the mounting plates are only available for amc gearboxes

2. the Triumph and Matchless frame downtubes are subtly different so they would not be a bolt in fit .Between us we decided if they left the front plate frame mount holes undrilled i would take care of any discrepancy.

 

 

 

 

10. Dave Nourish to the rescue.


With regard to the flywheel and the" hairy" camlobe competing for the same bit of space at the same time. Who do i know thats been here before ? Dave Nourish the supplier of the cams, manufacturer of Weslake race engines and guru of triumph/weslake race engines. Daves advice "You need about 0.015 inch (fifteen thou) clearance to take acount of crank whip at high revs. Just turn it off the flywheel outer". So cases apart and rods off. Stroll over to my favourite colchester lathe. Bung it in the 3 jaw chuck. Stick a revolving center up its oilfeed bore. Bang a dial test indicator on flywheel. Yup running true. Touch 45 deg tool on put 0.020 (twenty thou) cut on for good measure and feed it in. Approx 40 seconds later clearance problems gone. Cam and flywheel will no longer be bound in an intemate relationship and just be close neighbours independantly going about their own business. How civil .

No point in asking an experts advice if you dont act on it.

9. Crank case conundrum.




After consulting my yellowed ancient copy of " Triumph twins" by the prolific scribe Mr. Haynes to make sure i wasnt missing anything obvious. The case joints cleaned HOT TIP USE CARB CLEANER IT REMOVES EVERYTHING SO EASILY. Bearings oiled, case joints gooed up cams located eazy peazy. Now slap cases together bish bash bosh job done.

Just a splash to protect new bearings on start up

Hylomar good enough for Rolls Royce

Case supported on wooden rest. Ease it in baby

What are you looking at here? Its the cam it scuffs the flywheel. That race cam again. These little incidents occur when deviating from standard but if you want a preformance upgrade you have to expect things like this and deal with them.  Better put my thinking cap on.

8. Fit the rods .
As i mentioned a while ago the Morgo rods are suspect and i have decided to retire them off.

THUNDER ENGINEERING in Leicester do a nice line in top quality rods for several british bikes and at a reasonable price to.I rang them to sound them (and the rods) out. They instantly put my mind (and wallet) to rest, the bloke i spoke to was 101% petrol head. So here they are.

thunder eng lightning rods

oozing aircraft grade quality

 

Time to stop admiring and fit the things. An instruction sheet was provided so once crank journals were cleaned . Bearing shells fitted noting locating tabs were all snug in grooves. A drop of good quality oil was applied to each bolt. Double check rods and caps are matched up (etched by hand by Thunder Eng) Now fit rods and caps. Slide in bolts and screw up finger tight.

 

 

The instruction sheet said to tighten to 43 ft/lb into alloy!  Proof enough its good stuff. Being cautious i tightened alternative bolts up with my torque wrench, going up in stages until all 4 were torqued up as stated.

 

Now thats what im talking about.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

7. Crankcase mods for racing.
Metal has to be removed in the camfollower block bores this is because unlike triumph they are on an angle and need a bit of meat removing. Once the barrel goes on, temporarily put in the cam followers and make sure they are free to do their thing without binding or jamming.

brick on a stickbri

Cams supplied by nourish racing are z cam inlet and 320 deg exhaust. Dave advised me that should give the results i was looking for.I.E. mid range to top end grunt , torque over the range without a kick at top end.However these "hairy" cams are significantly bigger than the triumph ones and bigger than the clearance in the cases subsequently they bloody well wont revolve. Tip if you dont have one already buy a rotary grinder.Its like a big dremmel. Using the grinder i releived the cases intil the cams did revolve.

Subtle relife gives the cams a bit of elbow room.

Once all the grinding has been finaly sorted time to put the new bearings in. When heated the cases expand more than the old bearings. So simply heat up cases then pick up 6 inches or so and drop onto wooden surface. The old bearing drop out. while the heat is still in the cases quickly remove your new bearings from the freezer (having unwrapped them and deposited them at least half hour previously) they should just plop into place.

6. tlc just got serious.

simple but effective

 While checking out the cases threads 2 appear to be stripped . No big deal. Dig out the cases second chance - the helicoil kit. This kit puts a threaded insert into the original hole to replace the damaged thread with a new steel one of original size. Only three steps to it realy.
1. Drill with drill supplied in kit. preferably on pilar drill to keep it all square .
2. Tap with special tap supplied in kit.
3. Insert helicoil insert with tool in kit. The insert has a tang to drive it in with. Turn in until approx 1 to 1.5 turns under surface and snap off and remove tang.
Job done .All threads ready for assembly.

special tap does its work

5. Clean out the sludge trap

 
 This crank was purchased off a chap that lives in Scunthorpe and he is apparently one of charlies angles! Anyhow he is a thoroughly decent bloke and sold me his tribsa while i was at his abode but thats another story. It is important the sludge trap is thoroughly cleaned every time the crank is out especially after a regrind. first remove slotted cover screw. Always a difficult one this. Just weld a bolt on and remove with a spanner. Makes it a lot easier dont wory about the screw bin it.
 

 

Next remove the bolt holding the flywheel onto the crank as this protrudes into a location hole in the sludge trap tube. With all the hardend engine sludge it is difficult to remove the tube without damage. They are realy cheap anyway so i run a tap down it put an oversize tube or old bush over the tube bore screw a bolt in. Then draw the tube out

 

 

t

 

This is the culprit. Shouldnt give it bad press realy if it wasnt in all that trapped gunk and grit would have been blown onto the big end shells.Credit where credits due its multiplied the life of the crank.

 

4. Blinking in the daylight.

 

 Well after years in the dark its what you immagine. Meet my saviour a matched pair of Triumph  1956 6t  alternator , big bearing cranckcases. the big bearing bit is absolutly essential for this build they are far stronger. You can see a bulge just under the timing chest this signifys it as big bearing job
Now they have been exhumed a bit of prep work is in order.

A. run a drill up the threads very carefuly to get all old gasket goo and general detritus from the last 50odd years out to stop fixings "bottoming out"

B. screw a plug tap down the thread to bottom this cleans and refreshes the thread ready to take a fastening of the correct length and gets a nip on the casing as desired.

Picking over the purchase

3.     Madame e-bay came up trumps. A nice chap in Holmfirth sold me a blown 800cc Rickman motor with a spare original Rickman 700cc set of barrels. The crankcases were repaired and well tired. No crank. The 800cc barrels had a snapped liner - it looks like the rod did it ! On the up side the cyl head appears to have escaped unscathed, the 700cc bores have no wear rings at the top or any grooves, pistons even appear something like and a sexy pair of Morgo rods ohh no they have been polished over the knock.
Nothing else for it but "drum roll"

 

Brake out the emergency Triton engine spares bought and secreted away 30 years ago (i kid you not) for just such an emergency.


My lovely assistant Debbie Mc.Gee attends to Triton spares after a 30 year slumber

Add caption

Pick a course of action and triumph

14. fork off (well the lugs anyway)








 
  B4


 Here we have a R6 Yamaha fork leg (you guessed it another  ebay "bargain").
As front brakes are not used
the lugs are surplus unsprung weight. I dont want to be dragging these useless lumps around a race track all year they can be discarded.

Steady in vice and hack away at the freeloaders.

Shorn of lugs

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tidy up in lathe. Did you know fork sliders are oval. No i didn't either.

Obviously time to do the other one now - must dash

1. flat track rickman triumph race build project.

In the 2013 season i have raced with the flat track uk race club. I have enjoyed every minute of it. To those of you not in the know it consists of up to 12 riders racing around a speedway track a minimum of 6 laps.  A gate start just as in speedway makes for interesting first corners. Front brakes are banned for obvious reasons and back brakes manditory essential for "backing it in".

My unillustrious first year was on a freebie (cheers neil) cagiva 600 river it served me well and let me find my feet and a modicum of confidence.