cleaning and corrosion

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stu

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With Winter on the horizon and the prospect of storing the 750 in a drafty freezing cold shed (outhouse) for 4 months been thinking about condensation, winterizing and protective finishes generally. My bike is clean but a daily user with unlimited time for polishing ( prefer the dull patina of stainless and alloy to shiny chrome anyway ) so what do folks use to keep corrosion at bay ? (other than heated garages) I read about putting an auto wax coat over polished aluminium to stop oxidization or cleaning with WD40 and clean rags instead of soap and water etc - both sound like good ideas. Any more suggestions out there ?
 
Seen in English magazines that someone can supply a large plastic bag - you undo the zipper, fit it over your bike and then use the vacuum cleaner to pull all the air out. With a good wax and polish, and oil changes first, sounds to take all the hard work out of it. Anyone tried ??
 
Find a trusted pal with a heated garage or bring it into the living room like me. What kind of a Norton owner would leave his/her cherished ride out in a drafty wet outhouse shed to shiver and condense water all winter ? If you have no choice, spray all metal (not rubber,paint,seat etc.) in WD 40 and wash it off with soap n' water in the springtime. Put it on the centerstand to get the weight off the tires to avoid flat-spots in the spring. Yes to a wax and oil change. Plug the exhausts ,resist starting it up, resist wrapping it in a tarp, pull the battery and put it inside and use an intelligent charger to it. Turn off gastaps. If you have the floatbowls with the drain screws then drain into cup then pour back into tank. Winter is a blessing to a Norton owner as you get to fix or upgrade or deal with things indoors at your leisure.
 
My garage stays above freezing with good insulation and the furnace being out there throwing off just enough heat. I remove the tank and drain it. I drain the float bowls too. I spray the entire bike with WD40 only because it is cheap on sale. (This is the only good use for that shit.) I throw a tarp over the bike just to keep the garage cats off if I'm not working on it. This year it will be layshaft bearing time. A waxing and polishing beforehand is a good idea if you don't run out of weekends before the snow flies. It should be kept that way all the time.

I pull the battery and charge it every so often. My old charger was never very intelligent but just got a new one last week and have been trying it out on all my batteries - Schumacher SC-600A I think - $32 on Amazon - I needed 6v too. What they can do now is impressive. I bought another cheap digital multimeter at the same time for $20. Reads exactly the same as my expensive Flukes.
 
If not climate controlled room or hermetically sealed container then short of cosmoline what'd I do is get a can of spray wax and hit everything that might oxidize with it then wipe off till polished when next able too. Btw wd/40 is just a cleaning solvent and temporary electrical drier. I've seen it float on a layer of corroding condensation over night, but just fine in climate controlled room or sealed container with a desiccant inside too. Make darn sure no ethanol gas is left inside anything. Putting up long term with old oil in it is not good practice as its like got some acid or oxidants in it so better to put in new oil or no oil for storage.
Over pressure the tires as they can leak down and take a distorted set. wd/40 ok in bores as they are inside a room not much exposed to mosture and flashes off in any left past a few days unless rather cold.
 
Just want to chime in on some info I found out when I went to look at the cyl barrels after an unrelated issue. I had the head off for a problem with a valve and afterwards I wanted to check the cyl hones just to cover that base. Well I found what looked like a stain halfway around the barrel on the left side.

The machine shop told me this was due to moisture sitting atop the piston resting agains tthe cyl wall. Most likely water.

I dont know how it got there but I was told this happens during long term storage.

To get rid of it I had to rebore and fit new pistons etc.

I have no clue how it got there or how long things had to sit to gather moisture in the barrel like that. I do feel though it is valuable to share the story since your talking a bout "winterizing" in a damp or wet atmosphere.

Do what you can to keep water out of the barrels! hahah
 
That stain might have been from fuel getting past the gas taps AND the float needles.

With our ethanol adulterated gasoline, I try to keep every gas tank of every engine that is not going to be run for a month or two, empty. I drain and siphon and I idle them until they are dry.

Turning off the taps on our British bikes is not effective - the taps slowly leak into the float bowls where hopefully the float needle and seat keep it from running down the intake port, past an open intake valve, and then to the piston and sump.

If the float needle and seat stop it, or just slow it, then the fuel in the bowl slowly evaporates only to be replaced with new seepage from the gas tank and that cycle is how carbs become full of gasoline gunk and varnish.
 
xbacksideslider said:
That stain might have been from fuel getting past the gas taps AND the float needles.

With our ethanol adulterated gasoline, I try to keep every gas tank of every engine that is not going to be run for a month or two, empty. I drain and siphon and I idle them until they are dry.

Turning off the taps on our British bikes is not effective - the taps slowly leak into the float bowls where hopefully the float needle and seat keep it from running down the intake port, past an open intake valve, and then to the piston and sump.

If the float needle and seat stop it, or just slow it, then the fuel in the bowl slowly evaporates only to be replaced with new seepage from the gas tank and that cycle is how carbs become full of gasoline gunk and varnish.
Click to expand...


Yeha your probably right, I was told that the bike sat for an extended period 5+ years before I got it.
 
iceteanolemon said:
Just want to chime in on some info I found out when I went to look at the cyl barrels after an unrelated issue. I had the head off for a problem with a valve and afterwards I wanted to check the cyl hones just to cover that base. Well I found what looked like a stain halfway around the barrel on the left side.

The machine shop told me this was due to moisture sitting atop the piston resting agains tthe cyl wall. Most likely water.

I dont know how it got there but I was told this happens during long term storage.

To get rid of it I had to rebore and fit new pistons etc.

I have no clue how it got there or how long things had to sit to gather moisture in the barrel like that. I do feel though it is valuable to share the story since your talking a bout "winterizing" in a damp or wet atmosphere.

Do what you can to keep water out of the barrels! hahah
Click to expand...

Re; "I dont know how it got there but I was told this happens during long term storage."

There are a other few pointers if you are storing a bike for the winter; drain petrol from tank and leave it in the sunshine to get all the remaining fuel to evaporate;
fill tank (if metal) with half a litre two stroke oil and swill around, to prevent rust, remove spark plugs and squirt 2T oil in barrels and turn engine over by hand to coat bores. Also drain carb float bowls.
When bringing bike out of hibernation, fill tank with half a gallon of gas/petrol and swill around and empty before filling with regular fuel/gas. Kick over engine with spark plugs removed with rag over plug holes, you should if done properly, have a blemish & rust free bores.
 
This is what they look like , if you store them at the bottom of a frozen lake for 50 years . NO Oxygen down there if deep enough . Possibly a bit inconveniant though . :p :idea:

2001 .
cleaning and corrosion


Hurricane O1 Z5252 which was presented to Major-General A A Kuznetzov, Soviet commanding officer in the region ( 1941 ).



http://lend-lease.airforce.ru/english/a ... /index.htm
 
If this was at the bottom of a lake for 50 years it has persevered remarkably well.
I don’t have a photo, but the last century at a Kempton Park bike swap-meet there was a Vincent Rapide that was recovered from underwater that was a real rust heap and fared far, far worse.
 
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