Brakes, wheel, forks, swingarm, wheel adjusters, axles, Gold Valves

 Old braided brake lines.

Found this lot in the back shed. There's a master cylinder and switchblocks amongst other stuff.

Has a Brembo caliper and a disc that's surely aftermarket. I recall the originals being stainless with a reputation for being weakly powered.

Front axle bent.

Front brake calipers ready to be stripped and kitted.

Brake master cylinder am planning to use. '96-on.

Cleaned the 5/8" threads with tap and dienut.

Made a caliper mounting bolt. It's a shoulder bolt with a 9mm shank.

Fork bottom clamp stud has been stretched from overtightening. It's a safety issue so will replace.

Axle cracked and badly beaten up. Repop I believe.

 Thread stripped. Shaft worn, grooved and hammered.

Crack near head...

Fixing the missing steering stops..

The steel welds nicely

One side almost done though needs cutting back for correct fork lock stop location..

Basically done. May need some minor adjustment to achieve ideal steering lock.

 Padlock bracket yet to be fabricated and welded on.

22Sep2021 Rear wheel adjuster broken. Should be an easy make. Worse though is the damage inflicted on the swingarm by PO overtightening axle.

 Rear wheel adjuster repaired with new stud then both zinc plated. New nyloc nuts.

New fork leg studs turned up today. Genuine Harley parts.

New OEM washers for the top fork tree bolts..

The old bolts were only engaged by 3 - 4 threads. Old vs new...

Another speedo drive of same ratio turned up, greaseable type..

29Sep2021 Made spacers for fork spring preload from PVC conduit. This is cheap, light and strong. It lathes perfectly. Also added a washer between spacer and spring..

5Oct2021 The repop dust shield was rubbing hard on the neck cup. Turned out it was a lower dust shield incorrectly fitted.

Groove around perimeter from dust cover rubbing.

Disc rotor bolts were a bit scary. They are 5/16" but hub has 7/16" holes. Plan is to make 4140 chromoly top-hat spacers to accommodate the adaption, otherwise buy disc rotors with 3/8" or 7/16" bolt holes.

Making the replacement top steering head bearing dust shield. A pair of dies were made from scrap mild steel offcuts. The shield was made out of an old oven tray which happened to be a good thickness to work with. Dies took a couple hours to make and stamping the shield took a mere few seconds. Pic shows shield (left) plus the die pair.

27Nov2021 Making the axles from Chromoly round bar.

Bought a meter length of 3/4" 4140 bright round bar. Also flanged nuts and Nyloc nuts.

3/4"UNF thread was cut with regular stock and die.

New axle above compared to FXR below.

 Ready to weld. Thread will do all the work, weld will stop it unscrewing..

Next is to polish off .002" so it slides into bearings easily.

More progress. 4140 is a bear to machine but anyway I learnt a bit.

Swingarm

See how out of square it is. Both sides were bent to the right.

Final check sitting on top my old saw bench using v-blocks.

Factory drawing from '78 -'80 manual

Made a hydraulic line junction that incorporates a front brake switch. Made from free-machining aluminum billet.

Kennedy brake master

Needs rekit

New brake parts arrived.

Gold Valving by RaceTech

Early style fork tubes. Sliders are reproduction. Axle bores were not true so causing stiction.

Careful measuring and truing of the axle bores and fork action is much happier.

Existing seals were not leaking but they do give quite a bit of stiction. Ordered replacements hoping for a less sticky action.

Axle bore needed grooming. They were rough. Aligning these was concentrated on the slider, as the clamp self aligns.

RaceTech Gold Valves kit with adaptors and a selection of springs.

Am going to re-use existing fork springs though they may be too light weight. Let's see, worst case I order replacements from US.