From:Steve Marks e-mail:steve@microdesign.ltd.uk
Subject:Two years on Date:Mon Jun 22 06:27:05 2009
Round about a year ago, I posted a ‘One year on’ update on how my model K was going, 12 months after getting it back on the road. Basically, I said that there had been a few teething troubles but that it was now going well. I spoke too soon - a week later I had to post another report saying that the gearbox had locked up due to a cracked case allowing the main shaft to move. It was an ‘engine out and complete strip’ job starting with weld repairs to the case and re-cut threads, new main shaft bushes and so on. I got it all back together a few days before Christmas but wanted to make sure all was well before reporting in – look what happened last time.....
On Christmas Day we were expecting lots of visitors so the good lady was cooking. Now it’s only right that these offerings be tested before the guests arrive but no, I was told to ‘get out of the kitchen!’ So I went into the workshop. Had a play with the carburettor and adjusted the float level (some good info on the Zenith carb available in the 1927 Dykes Carburettor Manual available for download from www.old-carburetors.com/1927-Dykes.htm). Got everything back together and running just as the first visitors started to arrive.
The following day we had a run organised. Only 40 miles or so, but it ran well on the way there. On the way back it slowed down rapidly so I pushed the clutch in only to find that the engine was ticking over nicely but the back wheel remained locked solid with the tyre sliding up the road. ‘Oh no – here we go again’ I thought (or words to that effect!) Then just as suddenly, before I had skidded to a standstill, the wheel freed up and we were rolling again. Couldn’t see anything wrong so rode home rather gingerly. Once in the workshop I had a closer look but couldn’t see anything obvious wrong and once it had freed up, it had run the rest of the way home with no problems
The New Year’s Day Run was about a hundred miles – only drama here was when a fellow rider overtook me and waved me down. He’d noticed a footboard mat falling off so we went back and got that. A little bit of rain in the air and salt on the roads meant that a good cleanup was required but no other problems showed up.
Next run was a fine sunny day, all going well when I had the same wheel lock up problem. I’d been going along a long straight road when I suddenly slowed down very quickly. Bikes following me overtook on both sides and I heard later that there were a few near misses.... Exactly the same situation – engine ticking over, back wheel locked and then freed up before even coming to a halt. The rest of the run was fine – about 140 miles in total. Occurred to me that maybe it was wheel/brakes this time rather than gearbox. Maybe a stone or something trapped between the brake band and drum perhaps. I stripped the back wheel but the brake lining was fine so I discounted that idea. Maybe the taper roller bearings were adjusted too tight? (yeah, I know – not standard....) Checked all that but all seemed OK. Decided I hadn’t really found anything wrong – worrying really.
Next ride out, it did it again. By now I was convinced it was brakes. I had experienced just these sort of symptoms when standing on the brake pedal rather too enthusiastically and locking the wheel (Not the Henderson, I hasten to add – if only the brakes were that good!). I wondered if it was the inner brake shoe causing the problem. As most of you will probably know, this is almost a full circle. One end on a pivot pin, the other on the cam with a spring holding it all together. It occurred to me that, if the brake shoe tipped over – it was quite ‘floppy’ - it would start to rub and perhaps pull itself on with almost a servo action until it locked the wheel. Couldn’t think of anything else and as I had never used the internal brake anyway, I decided to take the wheel out again and remove the brake shoe. Next day saw a 120 mile run with no problems – yeeeeeeessssss! I thought about posting my findings on the site but decided to wait a little longer - the big test was coming up. I’d entered the Henderson for the Ballade des Vieux Clous Rally in France.....This rally is a ‘door to door’ run for us – no trailer queens here!
Before this came up though, I had one other issue I wanted to address. My work with the carburettor had improved fuel consumption to about 37 miles per gallon – still room for improvement in this area but my main concern was the fact that there was no ‘reserve’ on the fuel tap so if I ran out of petrol, I was stranded! Last year, before the engine troubles, I had started work on an auxiliary petrol tank to bolt onto the frame. I’d been carrying a plastic bottle of spare fuel in the saddlebag but the rally was to last a week and I needed the space. On the run up to the rally, I carried on working on the new tank. There’s no pipe work, it’s only storage so if needed, it’s removed from the bracket and the contents tipped into the main tank. We were due to leave on the Thursday at about 2pm which left me the morning to paint the tank and make the mounting bracket. Needles to say, time was running out, but I was only 15 minutes or so late as I jumped on the bike and kicked it over ready to leave. That’s when I found a problem – the kickstart scraped down the side of my nice new tank! I had forgotten to allow for the fact that, as the kickstart goes down, it moves in towards the engine - s**t!!!! No time to do anything about it – we were off!
Thursday afternoon saw the 70 mile run to Dover completed with no problems. Early – very early – Friday morning we were on the ferry to France. A short ride on French soil and we stopped for breakfast. As we were about to leave the breakfast stop, I looked down to turn on the petrol tap and noticed I’d lost a knurled nut from the top of one of the spark plugs. HT lead was still on the plug and it had not misfired or anything. Anyway, no problem, I had a replacement in position and running again while others in the group were still trying to get their bikes started (these old British bikes,,,,,,)
At the lunch stop we met up with the French contingent and there were then around about 100 bikes in total. The afternoon run was about 120 miles – we left about three o’clock and were expected to arrive about 6.30. But we are the East Sussex Section of the VMCC and we are not noted for our good time keeping – or map reading either come to that..... We finally arrived just after midnight with two bikes in the breakdown truck. One had a shellacked magneto, the other was running but had no lights fitted. It was this long afternoon session which brought the next problem with the Henderson. I was leading the way with about a dozen bikes in tow. Time was getting on, so we weren’t hanging about. I kept looking over my shoulder to see that everyone was still there. One time I looked and saw huge clouds of white smoke. ‘Oh dear’ I thought ‘someone’s got trouble’ and closed the throttle. Then I had another look and realised that it was me....The engine hadn’t missed a beat so I was a little confused by what might have caused the problem but we soon found out. The exhaust pipe exits mid way along the length of the saddlebag. The saddlebags were heavily loaded so were sitting pretty low. The pipe didn’t touch the bag but the hot gasses from the exhaust pipe had scorched a hole though the bottom of the bag and just inside the bag was a plastic bottle of oil – and the plastic had melted..... a whole litre of oil had come out and dropped on the hot exhaust which had produced the smoke. Boy oh boy, was I pleased it hadn’t been the plastic bottle of petrol I’d been carrying up until that run......
As I said, we didn’t arrive until very late so had several hours of night time riding – lights were great. (Splitdorf converted to two brush operation, electronic regulator fitted plus LED rear lamp). We had a day and a half riding in the rain – some quite heavy at times - which was a first for the Henderson. No problems though – despite no rubber covers on the plug tops!
The rest of the week saw plenty of dramas and roadside maintenance – but nothing we couldn’t fix – everyone made it home under their own steam – including the Henderson! I had no other problems all week. We did about 750 miles in total which, together with a couple of other runs since we got back, brings the total since original rebuild to about 1800 miles now. I say ‘about’ because I had to go by other riders’ odometer readings. My speedo works but the odometer never has – there’s always something needs doing on these old bikes!
Oh and to finish off – the auxiliary petrol tank problem was caused by fitting the ‘P’ clip mounting brackets the wrong way round. Once corrected the tank sat further into the frame opening and the kickstart now misses by a mile..... doh!