Longest Day Up

So stripping the carbs has been met with some success, and some not quite so successful bits. I managed to get one of the two steel rails that join the carbs off, the other I just can't shift despite soaking in Silkopen over a week and using a bit of shock on the JIS screws that I'm definitely using the correct tool upon Slides and bowls have come off OK, and I'm just removing the component parts, but everything is covered in this salty scale. It's part road dirt but mainly I think the effects of E10 petrol at a guess and water that's attracted to the ethanol polling and doing damage. I might be wrong but that's my theory... Everything is either covered in filth and scale, or has been chewed up though. I only just managed to get one of the pilots out, it had really been attacked in the past. Weirdly this pilots spring was fine, the other one was a completely furred in, had to tease it out with a pick, brake cleaner and a tactical tap onto the bench i...

As it was running so badly it was time to get to the carbs and see what state they were in. I was just planning to see what condition the filter was in and try balancing them. Hopefully that might bring an improvement? First thing to do was to get the tank and then the side panels off, the latter made a lot more awkward by having the luggage rack in place. Annoyingly I'd had to lie the ZX6r down on it's side to get the oil pump off without draining all the oil, and of course I'd stupidly done that right in front of the ramp. That meant that all this work was done stooped over or sat on the floor, having a ramp has spoilt me.   There's enough room to get to the airbox screws by lifting the panels thankfully, but once I did that I found that this might be a bigger job than I first thought...   Yeah, so that's going to be a problem. I've ridden the bike about three miles, I'm pretty certain that Steven (the previous owner and successful LDU challeng...

I've ordered a new steering head kit from Pyramid, it will replace the old loose ball bearings for caged rollers and when I get a chance I'll install it. It shouldn't take too long, but these things have a habit of taking much longer than they should...  For now the next thing to do is to fit the shiny new Black Widow exhausts . Right hand side first as I've already removed the OEM one that had rusted through. The cans and link-pipes were really well packaged, the silencers inside their own cloth bags. Included in the box was the silencer mounting strap and rubber, nuts and bolts, spacers and clamps all of a decent quality and seemingly well plated which was really nice to see. Also included was some (brief) fitting instructions, baffles for each can and a tube of Holts exhaust assembly paste. Basically, everything you could possibly need. Of course I immediately took the baffles out because of course a small capacity parallel twin is going to be as quiet as a...

So that was some steps forwards and I guess time wise, the steering bearings mean most of those steps back. What hasn't been a setback is a package arriving on my doorstep on yesterday. I'd approached Black Widow Exhausts to see if they would be happy in helping in the cost for a pair of new silences and linkpipes for the bike. Both were obviously beyond all help, I'd asked a number of local welders and pipe manufacturers if repairing the old ones were feasible and was consistently told that it was 95% rust I held in my hands. So, after a few emails and phone-calls I'm pleased to say that this box has turned up at my house, and I couldn't be happier. Thank you Chelsie and Black Widow Exhausts , I appreciate it a lot. Knowing the rotted exhausts are being replaced is massive weight off my mind, I wasn't certain how I'd get the bike through an MoT with it blowing so badly. There's only so much you can do with exhaust bandage, paste and ...

  I got back on Monday and in between child herding/parenting I have managed to achieve some good progress. Really good progress in fact, up until I realised something else had gone wrong. Anyway, the right hand fork leg needed rebuilding, and the paint had merrily cured since I've been away so onwards!   Which with a little effort and rewatching the youtube video led to this: I was quite pleased with the way it turned out, hopefully it's oil-tight. I'll find out on the shake-down ride I guess. Brooks Barn had been kind enough to provide a pair of discs with a hefty discount so they were the next ingredient to the front end mix. I wanted to be certain that they were installed upon the hub as straight as possibly so I ran a tap through the disc brake mount threads in the hub, lubricated with plenty of brake cleaner and swizzed out afterwards using the compressor my friend gave me a few years back. Thanks Al!  Off with the old and preparing for the new: And ...