50cc Pushbike Motor Kit. Part 2.

Below are some photos of my second afternoon installing the 50cc motor kit to my spare bicycle. Day 1 and more pics are here.
Day 3 (pedals only) can be found here:



Rear sprocket installed and back on the bike.



The chain needed to be shortened. This was really close to the correct size. I had to take out one link. :(



Multi speed bikes have no position adjustment on the rear wheel to take up chain slack as that function is performed by the rear derailer. My new power-chain will need this issue dealt with.



The kit comes with a chain tensioner. I'm not keen on these things when they're not spring loaded but I have no choice in this situation.



It's on a proper bearing, not just a bushing, so it spins really nicely.



I did need to make a small hammer-adjustment to the mount bracket though...



The trailing arms to the rear wheel on the bike aren't parallel to the chain, so this little twist in the chain tensioner bracket should compensate for that.



The hammer-adjustment seems to have worked out ok.



Cool little exhaust.



I was curious if the exhaust was just a simple expansion chamber, or if it had real baffles in there. Turns out it was the real deal.



Totally SWEET idea for the exhaust bolts from the dude who made the installation video. The slightly-longer-than-needed bolts are threaded in by finger ALL the way, so you get a complete thread-engagement. Then you crank down the nuts to pull the exhaust in tight. I've stripped numerous bolts and studs in the past when tightening down into cast-iron components. This solution was brilliant and very easy. I'll be doing this for all future bolts where over tightening or stripping is common. (cast iron...always...)



The bike is starting to look like a 1930's motorbike. Exhaust bracket added to support the baffle end against the bike frame.



Tank and fuel valve with screen-filter built into it. Later I found I should have washed out the tank first...there is black powder residue running through the clear fuel tube to the motor. I'm just gonna run it through 'cus I'm a barbarian.



Tank on the bike. Geez if I painted this thing khaki you'd just think it was a WW1 motorcycle.



Bits left over after completion. Couldn't be bothered with the 2nd handgrip, as I prefer the rubber grip to the aluminium feel anyhow. Also don't think I'll put the chain guard on. The gearbox does a good job of keeping your leg clear of the chain.

edit: Oh I forgot to take shots of the throttle installation. It's a cool aluminium twist-grip throttle like you'd expect on a motorcycle.



Everyone knows that American Mustard makes engines run better. Oil in the motor makes them last longer too. ;-)


Some shots of the beast.







You can see the aluminium twist throttle on the right handle grip. (left in the photo) I didn't put the matching grip on the other side as I prefer the original rubber grips.





I kid you not, I pulled the pull-cord ONCE to start it the first time. Didn't make any effort to bleed the lines or any other kind of stuffing around. This thing starts more easily than my mower which has some sales-pitch "ezy-start" gimmick going on with it. I've had a bit of a hoon around this evening up and down our side street. It's completely awesome and made me smile like a little kid. Heaps of power. Good speed.

I'll need to buy some pedal extensions to get them about an inch further from the crank arms. I can pedal, but it's awkward and a little tedious. I may just hit Bunnings and make something up.

I'm already considering putting a larger pinion gear on to give a higher top speed. It has plenty of power, and the centrifugal clutch should give some leeway here.

Other thoughts are that I would like this kit on a full on Mountain Bike, not my hybrid. My body weight is fully on my butt on the seat, instead of offset by pedaling, and I want a more comfortable ride. Thick mountain bike tyres and some suspension would be perfect. I may drop into KMart at some point and just grab whatever $80 bike they've got going on the day...we'll see.

But I digress. This kit is awesome. Get one. Thumbs up. Very happy. :-)

50cc Pushbike Motor Kit. Part 1.

A friend from my study group mentioned he was thinking about grabbing a pushbike motor kit for a bit of fun. He had a few questions for me that I had no information on. I started looking around during the week...and decided to get one myself. ;-)

edit: there are rules regarding motorised pushbikes in Vic that you need to familiarise yourself with before pouncing on an ebay purchase. In summary, the 70cc two stroke engines that are everywhere online are TOO POWERFUL to match our local requirements. Also: two stroke engines are rubbish. Do the homework yourself first.



My old bike. It's the one I got very cheaply when paying for the 2006 Great Victorian Bike Ride. It's actually a pretty good bike. (cheap) Shimano derailers, a reasonably light weight steel frame. Nice hybrid setup. No rubbish bike. So anyway...it's getting a motor. The bike ready for its operation, mounted in the car-bike-rack which is clamped up against the work bench.





My "new" bike. A mate went overseas so I got it from him on the cheap before he left. It's actually a pretty sweet machine.



A 50cc 4 stroke pushbike motor kit.



Seems pretty nicely packed.



Quite nicely packed in fact. The engine mount bracket is seen in the bottom right corner of this image. The entire kit was designed around standard 26inch frames. The bracket is fully adjustable, however I have a 27 inch frame, and I had to modify this bracket somewhat later.

edit: I didn't actually "have" to, but I wanted to for a variety of reasons I can't be bothered justifying here :-D



It's like Christmas in here :)



Normally surgery on the engine bracket isn't needed, but I'm a compulsive Gizmologist. :-P



Again I couldn't help myself. As a result of the change to the engine bracket, I had to make my own frame strap with a wider reach between the holes. Used some standard builders strapping for this. Can't believe how many uses I've gotten out of this junk.



Engine mount plate is nice n snug.



My home made strap should be fine. (this is hardly high end engineering...)



A schwoit little 50cc four stroke engine with gearbox already fitted.








You can see a little carbon on the exhaust heatshield plate. These engines are supposed to have been pre tested, with the carburetor idle and throttle settings already done. I'm really glad 'cus I hate setting that stuff up.




So I modified the engine plate, and forgot to add new mount holes for the engine itself. Doh gotta pull this off and fix that.




I fixed the engine hole problem, but realised I'd intersected too closely to the previous holes I'd drilled to make the plate fit the bike. THIS IS SO TYPICAL !! New hole...














Engine sitting in the frame. Looks quite beastly in a pushbike to be honest.



Fitting the new rear sprocket to the rear hub. An interesting little press fitting design with rubber gaskets directly against the spokes right up against the hub. Very tidy.






I'll put some more pics up tomorrow when I finish the job. :)

Day 2 and more pics can be found here.
Day 3 (pedals only) can be found here:

FoldIt claims another success

Looks like FoldIt managed another minor breakthrough.




http://www.theage.com.au/digital-life/games/online-gamers-crack-aids-enzyme-puzzle-20110919-1kgq2.html

Journal Link here: http://fold.it/portal/node/990358

Keep at it gamers :)

Just some great music

Bumbled into these today. Well worth sharing.

Jon Schmidt - Michael Meets Mozart - 1 Piano, 2 Guys, 100 Cello Tracks- feat. Steven Sharp Nelson. These guys can be found here: http://www.youtube.com/user/ThePianoGuys





Steven Sharp Nelson - The Cello Song - Bach is back (with 7 more cellos)




Game of Thrones Violin Cover



And if you need something a little heavier; Game of Thrones - Opening Credits Cover (Heavy Version)



Really looking forward to the Game of Thrones series coming out to Australia.

Deck Timber DVD Rack

Our TV bench was overflowing with DVD's, so figured it was time to get a dedicated rack happening. Purchased stuff is generally pretty expensive, and I wanted "das uber rack", so whipped up something in SketchUp so I could flesh out some ideas a little. This was a rough draft to scale of something 6 ft tall, x1 DVD wide. Of course the bottom DVD's would probably suffer a fair bit of weight.


The deck out back was rebuilt last summer, and I ended up with a load of the unused timber from the original tear-down. So I went and had a look at my scrap timber to see what I could do.


A few shelves cut up, and some MONSTER slabs of timber for feet.


I shaved the feet down into gigantic "ducks feet". They should support 6 feet of DVD's no problemo.


Decided to be lazy and screw everything together instead of getting fancy with inset joints etc. At this point I decided I might have gone overboard with the size of the feet.


Original single-stack prototype finished. Seems ok.


I used this in the house for a week before deciding to rework it. 1) It only held half of our DVD's. 2) Wasn't quite happy with the over sized feet.


I switched out the huge duck feet for a lesser gauge timber. I shaved these down in a similar fashion to the originals.


Decided to go double-width, so created some wider shelves. I'm hogging out slots for the center spar here.


Double width shelf. Pre-drilling.


Routed edges vs. hand chiseled slots. Think I'll go with the routed edges. A router makes completely amateur work look pro.


Just getting a feel for what it'll look like with the new width and feet.


Center spar goes in.


I only had a few pieces of 6ft length which I used on the original single-width test rack. So I had to butt-joint a few pieces end to end for the two new uprights.


End-to-End joints are generally pretty weak. But I think after the glue dries this will be as good as it gets. These came out looking pretty good after a sanding. I kinda like big heavy dowel joints which are visible right through. edit: yeah I know their orientation is wrong. The other length I did was fine...not sure how I screwed this one up...oops.


Took a photo thinking I was done. Oops forgot the back rests.


As always I've over-engineered again. You could park a truck on this. There's 50 x 60mm screws in this thing. (There is actually fifty)


OK finished now. Eh it came out ok. I'll stain the pine with dark mahogany later, and probably give it a matt/satin varnish. Possibly even oil it. Maybe next week ;-)

What's really cool in this pic is the red of the rack decking timber vs. the actual deck in the background. The deck re-used all the timber from the tear-down, and I kept the stuff that was too short for the new orientation. It is actually the same stuff, same age, and both weathered the same. Only difference is sanding.

Magnet Phone

I wanted to attach my phone/GPS to the bike without the headache of a proper bracket. I'd tried a few magnetic gizmos in the past that I'd made with those flexible flat fridge magnets, but wasn't happy with their strength, or scratching, or they were just too poxy to use. But today I remembered I had a pile of very slim rare earth magnets from a series of Hard Drives that I'd pulled apart in the past.


So whack a pair of these inside the gel-case of my phone...and you can see where this is going. No adhesive necessary.


So easy. Can't believe I didn't think of this before.





Went to a mates house the other day with this setup and it worked fine. The phone didn't bounce, shift, move, anything. GPS worked fine.

I had small concerns about magnetic interference but the more I thought about it the more I realised that a static field wont effect the functionality this phone uses, both for 3G nor satellite location. If there were a pulsing electromagnetic field going on in very close proximity, then it would certainly have troubles. Even then, it may only be at certain harmonic frequencies that could cause problems, or of a strength high enough to actually cause current flow problems in the phone circuitry itself. Not something these magnets are going to achieve.

As it is, I'm very happy with it. Super simple, super easy to use, completely non invasive. Pure win!!