Dances’ clever cam drive

Fast Eddie · Mar 17, 2020

I just came across this photo. Dances’ gear driven cams on his USS 500 racer.

Dances, that is a really cool looking set up! Can you tell us what it was like? Pro’s / cons etc?

It doesn’t look like it would be unreasonably difficult for some enterprising type to offer a kit like this?

jbruney · Mar 17, 2020

That's good looking stuff there. Please enlighten us.

Blewdy Yaink · Mar 17, 2020

jbruney said:
That's good looking stuff there. Please enlighten us.

Yes, please.

swooshdave · Mar 17, 2020

What is the chain gear there for? Just as a spacer?

@Dances with Shrapnel

BritTwit · Mar 17, 2020

Now that's craftsmanship!
Excellent work.

Onder · Mar 17, 2020

Jim worked on a gear drive a while ago and gave up. Perhaps the dual gear approach is the answer.
Ive never liked the chain drive.

kommando · Mar 17, 2020

Two crank pinions ? and a gear copy of the gear behind the chainwheel. You could run a sensor off the teeth on the gear behind the chainsaw for an ECU.

acotrel · Mar 18, 2020

Nice to see something really innovative. I'd never have thought of doing that. I'd probably end up with everything running backwards.

guest76 · Mar 18, 2020

I’d like to do this.

But surely you’d need either a helical cut gear set or a split gear to keep them acceptably quiet on a road bike?

Either way, I’d be very interested!

Matchless · Mar 18, 2020

gtiller said:
I’d like to do this.

But surely you’d need either a helical cut gear set or a split gear to keep them acceptably quiet on a road bike?

Either way, I’d be very interested!

Matchless & Triumph twins don't make too much of a racket & they both use straight cut gears.

Triton Thrasher · Mar 18, 2020

Matchless said:
Matchless & Triumph twins don't make too much of a racket & they both use straight cut gears.

Triumph valve gear can be noisy. It doesn’t matter.

The Lightweight Norton Twins had spur gears there too, as did the AMC singles and countless other bikes.

Helical gears have end thrust, which complicates things.

swooshdave · Mar 18, 2020

I think I recall @comnoz even looking at scissor gears to keep the noise down.

Time Warp · Mar 18, 2020

https://www.accessnorton.com/NortonCommando/timing-is-everything.12219/

Bobolink · Mar 18, 2020

There was 40 odd years ago, (maybe still is) a similar set up available for Chevy V8 cam drive made by someone called Pete Jackson.

acotrel · Mar 19, 2020

swooshdave said:
I think I recall @comnoz even looking at scissor gears to keep the noise down.

A while back, I was in a friend's garage and one of his customers had left a Ferrari Super America there to be worked on. we decided to fire it up. After my wife discovered where the accelerator is, it burst into life. Those straight-cut cam gears really make a lovely noise.

swooshdave · Mar 19, 2020

Bobolink said:
There was 40 odd years ago, (maybe still is) a similar set up available for Chevy V8 cam drive made by someone called Pete Jackson.

You can buy them easily for the SBC these days.

$200

Dances’ clever cam drive

Fast Eddie

jbruney

Blewdy Yaink

swooshdave

BritTwit

Onder

kommando

acotrel

guest76

Guest

Matchless

Triton Thrasher

swooshdave

Time Warp

.......back to the 70's.

Bobolink

acotrel

swooshdave

Similar threads