I'm still alive...

Not dead yet. These are things that have been happening:

I have too many things to talk about. So much amazing stuff going on. as you can see some crazy vespa things are happening and even more are in the works. I have a beautiful wife now, and between all the rallies and events we are planning to hit, I think that this season may be the best one ever. Ill be back soon to talk deets. ta ta for now!

Clutch braces.

So Jake Cain hooked it up with cutting these centers out of the stock clutch flywheel deal. Super simple instant lightened clutch. Not much of an update but whatever. Oh and the engine is all buttoned up and all I need to do for assembly of top end is cut an aluminum spacer for proper cylinder height.
Oh yeah and Megan and I went to nyc and had a blast. hung out with nick from mpg and he showed us an awesome time and took us to go hang out at 2nd Stroke. They got a sweet shop out there and mission23 guys are way cool. They let me ride a tallbike motron, and I proceeded to fall off it and almost hit a lady! Oh and I proposed to megan (I made the ring) we are officially engaged!

Some moar clutches

Huge thanks to sean lynch from tuscon az, shipped me a superfresh jawa 207 clutch, for free including shipping! What a rad guy. Even threw in extra starter clutches!

Some ringland porting

My good friend and fellow casseroller jimbo (moped taco) called me up and wanted to do some ringland porting aka lateral gas porting, I figured i might as well go ahead and do the parmakit piston as long as i was getting everything out for doing it tomorrow night. This is the result. If you don't know about it find the thread on ma about it. There is some great advice from local snowmobile racing legend and rollerskating master, known as bigblockfiero on the forums. Heres a pic of my shabby results. I did it freehand, so it turned out alright, but the bit walked slightly and the half round holes on a few didn't come out flawless. Whatever, it should work. Ill get some action shots tomorrow when jimbo and I do some moooooaaaaaaar. Alrighty thats all for now!

progress... and a new toy

So I test fitted the crank and piston with the kit and the cases finally today, still need to order bearings and seals. But with centering the crank just by hand and checking the piston at tdc and bdc things are looking pretty sweet. Here's some photos:

As you can see, not perfect... but very close. I have been told that the parmakit is like this on mobys as well. I have never ran one on a moby, thats just what I've heard. I will probably still be doing an aluminum spacer, as I feel pretty uneasy about just stacking base gaskets that thick.

So with my mind at ease about not having to deck this thing like crazy just to make it work, it will go quickly from here. I forgot photos but I also finished case matching the transfers, so those are all good now. I also grabbed one of those threaded exhaust nut things from my friend Nick, and I am essentially going to make a spring mount ball joint style exhaust, minus the ball joint. I think it is probably the most practical way to make a motobecane pipe from a standard style mounting pipe. So expect to see that soon as well.

Oh and I got something else that should prove to be fun:

I have been following mars in his programmable curve cdi adventures, and checking out what some other people have been up to, and I really want in on the action. It's definitely some cutting edge moped stuff... albeit way over my head. I really may just use that as an excuse to make some other cool shit with this thing. Maybe some fun music related stuff. But on sale for $15 at microcenter today, I literally could not walk out of there without one.

Well thats about it for tonight, I decided that I will try and end every blog post from now on with a random photo from my library that I really like, so here it is, my beautiful lady and fellow casseroller putting a new intake and carb on her cl70. This was a while ago, before she put the 125 on it. Enjoy:

 

This was in our first apartment together. We had no garage, so this was in our bedroom, and yes that is carpet. And yes we had two mopeds in the living room... and no we did not get our deposit back.

Got some new tots in the casserole!

Just got some new members! Congrats jed, JAKE, nicole, and brian!!! Heres a link to maizes blog post about it with some awesome photos of initiation, 2013 is gonna be amazing with these guys on board!

1977garage

I finally put a couple bikes up on the garage @ 1977mopeds.com, heres the links, hit the like button if ya like!

Blanco

Bravo

Another jawa rebuild...

Just tore another 207 almost all the way down... sportwheels really does a number on engines. Apparently sitting outside in the elements for 5+ years makes bearings pretty happy to stay where they're at.

1977garage

I finally put a couple bikes up on the garage @ 1977mopeds.com, heres the links, hit the like button if ya like!

Blanco

Bravo

Jawabecane

So going about putting my 74 parmakit was actually fairly easy. First of all the stroke is only 0.6 mm off, the motobecane being the longer of the two.

As far as actually getting the cylinder to fit, i first had to bore the cases out. I did this with a sanding drum as opposed to a flap disc simply because I was too lazy to go buy one. I then roughly matched the transfers, just to get an idea if I had to weld extra material. Luckily I did not. Repositioning the studs was also fairly simple. Just thread in studs with jb weld, mark and drill, then tap. Whamo, cylinder fits no problem.

Then there was the difference in wrist pin sizes, this was almost a huge problem, as the jawa wrist pin is very big compared to the moby. After a bit of measuring, I realized something amazing; if you press out the jawa bushing on the con rod, the mobys stock needle bearing fits like a glove!

So the only other variable now is the con rod length. I have yet to order bearings and seals, but Brian and I were out in the garage one night drinking and talking and measuring, and we figured out that the difference in con rod length is almost completely made up for in the difference in case deck height! That is to say, jawa has a shorter con rod, but lower deck height. It was meant to be.

I know some people have voiced their concerns for the vertical engine style fins being an overheating issue, but in my tribute to my first true engine love, i will be throwing a v1 fan and shroud on this thing.

Whew that was alot of words, so anyways, long story short, cylinder is on and it looks like it'll work. I am still undecided about carb and pipe, but its definitely gonna be some big boy parts.

Oops...

So i have neglected this for a verrrrry long time. Ok its time to get going again.
This is a moby 74 parmakit on a jawa 207 engine, its gonna be will be wild! Its getting a full rebuild, that kit, moby parma head no decomp, and a custom lightened clutch brace. Also I will be figuring out how to run a cdi with a curve for ignition, and putting this ratty pipe i found at sportwheels on it.

Needless to say, im really digging the jawas right now. I have some really cool ideas for them in the works, and will actually be keeping up with this as per maize and marty giving me shit. Im tired and my brain is broken, but stay tuned for tomorrow and I will put up some real info. Byyyyyye!!!!

Casserollers...

Oh hey by the way, the gangs got a new name, "The Casserollers" and a new logo! Its on the right there, and if you click the image, it magically takes you to the sight. Hop on over for upcoming rides and other minneapolis related crap. But its winter so not much going on. That is all.

"You're doing it wrong!"

Hey folks, it's been a while since I posted last, I'm new at this and occasionally forget that I started this thing. And the holidays were alot going on. But I did get a milwaukee angle grinder, and a propane torch! I love getting tools as gifts so that was cool. Anyways, big news is that I split cases, drilled intake, and drilled my carburetor to match. bad news is that my phone died in the garage and didn't get a pic of the beautiful dremel work that I did on the intake. Oh well, I still have pictures of everything else.  Believe it or not, this is the stock intake on the kinetic engine. Pretty big compared to the stock vespa I would say, but it could go bigger. I drilled 18mm in with a 1/2 inch drill bit, as per the wiki on MA, then smoothed out and widened the intake to about 2mm to the edge of the window. The cool part about the kinetic cases (maybe vespa too, I'm not sure) is that there is alot of material around the spigot mount part of the intake and the wall of the case, which meant alot of ramping from the spigot into the windows, so everything is as smooth as can be. I also got rid of the square corners to reduce eddy currents and to make the fuel move as fast as possible through the window. I did not cut my crank as of yet, but that will be the next step in the process. On to the carb:

  This is after drilling through with that same 1/2 inch drill bit to match the intake. So I borrowed a drill press for the cases, and decided to forget my carb when I went. Oops, so with my drill at home only having a 3/8 inch chuck, I had to improvise. This was the result:

I know "You're doing it wrong" ha ha. vice grips, bench vise and some downward pressure let me drill straight and true with little to no issues. I think it looks damn good myself. The best part about spaco carbs (the knockoff dellortos that come on kinetics) besides having a mixture screw, as opposed to dellorto sha NOT having one, is the atomizer.

As you can see in the picture, the atomizer tube does not go all the way up. If you have ever tried to remove this type of atomizer from a real dellorto, it is a bitch to do. Check it out in the wiki on MA if you don't know what I'm talking about. It involves heating up the carb and using a watchmakers screwdriver to push it out while its still hot and expanded. These ones are easy peasy, just a flathead on top and some force and it pops right out. Super cool design. So after reassembly and some rejetting, I'm hitting a strong 37 mph with awesome low end. This thing just keeps getting faster and faster. The next step after cutting the crank, will be to get this:

 Thats the athena 50cc kit with outrageous transfers. It should be a pretty rocking kit, and I'm pretty set on seeing how far I can take this bike with just 50cc's of raw power. I may end up getting an aftermarket crank to keep up with the rpms without exploding. I'm still not sure how much I trust those metallurgists in india. Well thats all for now, I'll leave you with a picture of my intramotor gloria blanco. V1 with 75cc polini kit, ev racing exhaust, 19mm carb. Rips hard all day with more low end power than almost everyone else I ride with.

Side gapping adventures!

So not a very exciting update, for most of you that are familiar with sidegapping, but its still something cool. Basically the standard sparkplug looks like this, with the electrode covering the tip. This causes the explosion to push out around the sides, but with a sidegapped plug, the tip isn't covered by the electrode, so that means we can create an arched shape explosion, from the two closest points to the two furthest points of the electrode. I am not sure I explained that real well, but just follow the steps, and maybe do some research as well.







 Start by getting yourself a dremel and some cutting discs. the ones I use come in a little plastic container with about 30 in there and they look like this:

Another thing about dremels, I highly recommend a flex shaft attachment for everything, as it is easier to hold, gets into small spaces, they're sweet. Anyways, sidegapping a plug is just as easy as it looks, just cut the electrode arm off so the edge that is cut off is just to the edge of the tip like this:
And thats about it. just lightly take of the burs from cutting off of the edges, but leave the edges sharp. Also with a high speed cutting tool it is very easy to go too fast, so take your time and start out too slow if you have to, avoid grind into the tip at all costs. Now that its sidegapped, we can effectively gap the plug at half the distance of the specified gap that we had before due to the arching shape doubling the explosion. This will create an easier sparking plug, with a better explosion!  Like I said, do your own research, I am no expert. But high compression ratios demand a better plug design to run cooler temperatures. Well, thats all for now! 

1st post... 1st blog..

Hello folks! I'm not quite sure if anyone is, or will be reading any of this, but hello anyways. Winter is upon us Minnesotans, and as such, I will be spending alot more time inside. So instead of buying mw3 and being a total jackass sitting inside all winter playing vids, I thought I would be a total jackass sitting inside all winter on the internet. Seems to be a healthy alternative, so I decided to start (yet another) moped blog, as if there's not enough out there already I'll be documenting the stuff I'll be building this winter, so without anymore rambling...

This is the furthest along build, so why not start with that. right? Vespa Bravo frame and subframe with welded crossbar for the tank, which is an old plastic can am dirtbike gas tank, and a handmade sheet metal cafe seat. The engine is a kinetic (i know, i know) engine, stock intake size, 12/10 carb. transfer ports are opened moderately (which will be the subject for another time) and exhaust port is opened up to match the exhaust. Other than that stock cylinder, and a high comp malossi head with no decomp.

The pipe is a NOS sito cobra circuit pipe, pretty small, but perfect for this setup. other less exciting things are kinetic rear wheel, non variated, but look at the size of that hub! And clipons. Its coming along nicely and is getting just over the 35 mph mark so far, with quite a bit more low end than it started with. Things to be done are: gas tank and seat mounted, headlight finished and wired up, paint, and some minor cosmetic things. So far I have heard nothing but trash talked about these kinetic clone engines, but with a cdi, 12v lights, and no rebuild necessary (2003 engine!) Its really growing on me. The bravo frame came with no engine and I had the kinetic just sitting in my garage as a parts bike, so why not. Well thats where I'm at with this build for now, but this'll be a mostly mopeds blog with quite a bit of motorcycle stuff thrown in for good measure. I have much more to share, but my dog is whining at the door, so thats all for now.