Combat Wombat Ready for Battle or Play

[bchappy]

It has been two years since I brought this little bike back from Hodaka Days 2014. Got it from Kelly McKeirnan. Took it down to the last bolt, powder coated the frame. New decals on the breather cover. Went through the engine and while I had it down I matched up the case ports that Rich Gagnon had installed in the 03 cylinder. Cylinder was one Rich had already tricked out and it was already NikaSealed. The head is a Combat Wombat. It had the Super Combat ignition system and the 34 mm Hodaka 250 ED front forks. (Still looking for 03 springs to put in the forks if anyone has a set they want to part with.) I installed a new 28 mm spigot mount carb which drove me crazy trying to get it to idle. It came with a #60 pilot jet and I ended up with a #40 (I am at 7200 ft from sea level).

I have the same cylinder work on a Super Combat and I have not raced them yet but I am thinking it will keep up. Really pulls good. Main difference is the Super has an HT3 pipe and a 32 mm carb.

Time for a little fun.

[hodakamax]

Wow Bill, It's lookin' good! Sounds like the engine is trick also. Give us a performance report soon.

Maxie

[Dale]

Simply beautiful Bill. I hope to see it at Hodaka Days 2017!

[Bill2001]

Sweet!

[Bullfrog]

Yes, SWEET! Conical hub for better front brakes the easy way too!

Ed

[bchappy]

Thanks Ed, I forgot to mention the conical hub.

[Bill2001]

Hmm, would W'Bat 94 forks be upgradeable to conical hubs?

[Bill2001]

So this is a Combat Wombat 95 with fork assy 938750A? In that case the forks are the same as W'Bat 94, and the conical hubs should fit. Maybe..

[bchappy]

Bill, I installed the fork assembly from the Hodaka 250 ED (#718754) therefore I had to use the steering shaft that Paul sells to adapt to the Combat Wombat frame. Therefore, what I have is essential the same as the Wombat 03 front end (except for the springs.) So the conical hub fits right in.

I have these forks on all 3 of my bikes so I am not sure what is needed to adapt the conical hub to the Wombat 94 or 95 forks.

Surely someone has done that???

[Bill2001]

I'll do some juggling to see what all matches up between the forks and the hubs. I'm having to do repairs in the area between the hubs (drums) and forks on my W'bat 94 so as long as I'm hunting up parts I might as well look at the later brakes. There is a lot of resource info on brakes and forks in The Resonator, but not a specific answer.

[Bullfrog]

Road Toads have the conical hubs and use the chromed steel slider (30mm) forks - so it should be a "no sweat" deal to mount a conical hub in the stock forks of the 94/95/96 models (chromed steel slider 30mm forks). That being said, I haven't done it so can't give you the exact parts list needed - but I'd go look at the Road Toad illustrated parts list for information to proceed.
Ed

[michael_perrett]

I installed the conical drums on my son's Wombat trials bike and 98 Rat, both with 30mm forks.

Mike Perrett

[Bill2001]

That is what I figured from the Forks articles and Brakes articles in Resonator. One good thing about smallish companies like Hodaka (and BMW in the '70's) is that changes tend to be evolutionary instead of revolutionary and it's easier to putter.

Let me edit this post later to include specific Resonator references-- I'm between two computers and a Smartphone and it's hard to cut&paste.

EDIT: here are the refs--
Resonator
Hodaka Brakes
Vol 1
Iss 10 Pg 6
Iss 12 Pg 7
Iss 13 Pg 7
Vol 2
Iss 1 Pg 9

Hodaka Forks
Vol 2 Iss 19 Pg 39

[bchappy]

Performance Report: Finally had a chance to test performance of this Combat Wombat against my Super Combat (same cylinder, head and piston modified by Rich. Main difference is the SC had a 32 mm carb and the HT3 pipe and the CW had a 28 mm spigot mount carb and the stock pipe.

My son was riding one and me the other with about 30 lbs difference in weight. After several runs we switched bikes. Only noticeable difference as expected was that the CW had a little more mid-range power. For woods riding I prefer the CW and for motocross the SC.

Very pleased with the performance of both. Thanks Rich!

By the way here are pictures of my Super Combat. Need to get conical hub on it.

[hodakamax]

Hey Bill---Wow! The Super Combat looks awesome too. You do good work! That HT pipe really sets it off.

Max