Shaking down an old dog

I put the carbs back on tonight but while I have the tank off I want to make a fork stop to protect the tank. I got it about half done tonight and I hope to finish it tomorrow. I do miss having a drill press on jobs like this. If the carbs work out I want to reset the rear brake to a driveable angle with the new bars before testing this weekend. The summer has just disappeared.
 
I finished and installed the fork stop tonight, now the new bars can't hit the tank. I also set the rear brake lower to a better position. Then on with the tank and testing for leaks, so far so good. The new fuel filters with the metal element to protect against bad fuel flow well enough, I used one for each carb. Some paper elements don't flow enough for gravity feed and some, Emgo in particular, have been disintegrating and messing up carbs.
I was thinking I should charge it since its been apart a while, but what the heck, I'm trying to make an easy starter so here goes. No sense changing out of my flip flops or giving a serious kick because that would not prove to me she is starting easy. Both enrichment circuits on, ignition on, one easy half way kick to get some fuel in, and on the next half kick she fired right up. During all the trouble shooting I have screwed up the tune, so tune and test ride is on the cards for tomorrow.
 
This is what it looks like with the new higher bars. I'm waiting for a bit to tune it by ear as it's noon on Sunday and no sense disturbing the neighbors. This winter there will be rainy days that I won't mind fiddling the tune exactly but it is nice today and a quick tune will make her rid able.
Shaking down an old dog
 
Hey, today would have been a good day to 'shake her down. The weather was spectacular for the annual 49 Mile Ride through San Francisco. About 200+ bikes from a teens Sunbeam and including a few Atlases.
 
Aw rats, I forgot the 49 mile run. I went over to the coast with a little fuel leakage and now one of the enriching valves won't stay on when cold. That actually an old featherbed frame tank, maybe a Dominator.
 
I think the Interstate tanks was sort of based on those classic Norton lines. I feel like an idiot about the 49 mile ride as I even picked up the flyer from the organizer. Senility wins again.
 
You fooled me, I read the comment about it being an Interstate tank and thought, well yes, it is. Very similar in appearance, at least if not side by side (and maybe even then).
 
Cookie said:
Actually I think Laura is on an oil rig in new Zealand right now. How about Simone?

Shaking down an old dog

very cute girl. no offense.

lol I thought it was an interstate tank. What's the difference?...just the capacity?
 
Actually there is nothing the same except for the general shape. The featherbed frame has a wide pair of upper tubes to have a flat tank bottom, the Commando has the single large tube. MHO is that similar to Jaguar, Norton's stylists kept a family resemblance going where they could.
 
But now that I think of it the police bike may have used an adapted featherbed tank.
This evening I started mounting a set of Amals on this bike. Franco came over and we reinstalled his rear tire and added a Mikuni to his Commando.
 
I was surprised it didn't start right up with the Amals but after a few kicks I figured maybe I ought to charge the battery and it was time to quit for the night.
 
A hot battery and fresh plugs are always a good start when you do some other significant change...
 
Franco's bike lit right up tonight with the very easy to install single Mikuni. It has a bad petcock leak so it will need to wait for one of those. I didn't get to my bike after working late and having to prepare for train work tomorrow.
 
I had time to start it up today, it's not right yet. One carb overflowed but it stopped after I hit the tickler a few times, perhaps a bit of debris or even the tickler or float sticking? It was running on one carb like a plugged idle jet and took off on both and then stalled when the float stuck.
 
I got a few minutes to look at this bike today and found one of the needle clips in the new Amals had failed. For some reason it seems to have no spring tension. I've heard about this before but never seen it. I put a new one on and will put the bike back together after my holiday trip.
 
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