The Hodaka Club Forum

Progress report. I uncovered the workbench in the Hodaka/storage/ junk shed. No minor job in itself. It's where I start really greasy and grim projects. There's a bench grinder/wire brush, Hammers and such to bring to a point of bringing it into the garage attached to the house and, yes, air-conditioning. Kansas Summer has arrived with heat indices predicted of over 100 today.

I've got the engine soaking in applications of penetrating oil to see if that decades old crud mixture coating can be softened before scraping and solvent. First I need to work toward a basic sound frame and swing arm. It's mostly just grinding off weld and crap but I do see where one of the swing arm axle plates is warped from the welding/bracing attempt from the past. I do have most all the grease and paint off to start the process. One step at a time.

One of many reports,

Maxie

That motor looks like it spent a lot of time sitting outside uncovered. Now you have me curious to see how you refinish it! It's a good thing motorcycles don't have memories of all the abuse they've been put through. And the frame looks ready for some lifesaving as well! Air conditioned garage?!?! Man I wish I had that!!! Victor

Hey Victor, I'm in the AC garage trying to see where the swing arm plate is bent. It's the left plate where the PO welded a plate on the outside for strength which only warped it. I've got the plate already cut off. Now to see if I can straighten this thing with what I have. Onward!

Max

My shop is a carport that I enclosed years ago. I'm getting ready to update the old 5000 BTU window A/C for a new 11000 BTU unit. Not too ritzy, but ir beats sweating.

Off to the metal fab guy. I don't have enough torch and flat metal table. This would be fairly simple if I had the right stuff. Grrr. Better to do it right but I always try to give it a shot. LOL!

Max

Update: Having the right tools and a good eye for those things, my clever metal fab guy took about five minutes to fix the problem. Yay!

I have two new messes, enough for a W.I.P. I wouldn't anyone to miss out on the fun of restoration. Shifter case removed and it appears we were running battery ignition. Back shifter case stud on crankcase, always good. Plenty greasy but the shifter case appears rebuildable, also good. Reporting.

Max

Funny, I thought that I had a really nice inside shifter case plate until I cleaned the grease off of it. The smoothest cut I've ever seen on one. Repairable.

Beautifully cut by an oversize chain, Maxie? Kind of a cool surprise under the mag cover. Did you run a total loss ignition on your flat tracker? I thought that was the order of the day for go-fast bikes. No flywheel to contend with and quite a bit of weight loss without resorting to donut restrictions. Are you going to keep the total loss ignition on your go-fast build or is it back to the magneto or otherwise? Cool options, yes?

Hey Matt. We used the battery ignition on the flat tracker for a while. While it did seem to have more power and was definitely quicker reving but it lacked the momentum of a flywheel for a consistent good start. Fiddling with batteries was also a pain and yet another weak point. Most flat track races were won at the start or at least it was a really big advantage to be in the lead right off. The advantage was to the flywheel for consistent starts. Nobody had any more power than our engines so the flywheel was the way to go. For a speed attempt (still dreamin' LOL!) a battery ignition system is not out of the question.

Max

Same as MX. Quite often the winner of the hole shot was the winner of the moto - or so I've been told Soldier on, brother. This is going to be cool! I just split the cases of an ACE 100 motor I'm hoping to bring back from the brink. It was full of sand and chunks of what looks like piston rings. How the heck did those make their way into the crank case?!?! Inauspicious beginning.

Hey Matt. Now you've got me thinking about battery ignition for the project. I can see updating this set-up with light Li-Ion batteries and some hot coil. It all would all be much lighter than flywheels and ancient lead-acid batteries. I still have and original 913007R point cam from the day. Without measuring yet I wonder if the cam duration is any different than the magneto version. Just plotting!

Max

For a dedicated go-fast machine built for for speed runs, the considerable weight savings would be a factor. It would be a period-correct, legit mod, and the lithium batteries deliver more consistent power and at a much lighter weight than the lead/acid batteries of yore. I've never operated a total loss ignition. Can you compare the racing cam to the flywheel dimensions through simple micrometer measurements?

They are the same I do believe.---------clarence

Cool! Maybe that's a sign.

Wow, I just wrote a many paragraph story talking about getting my in-between motorcycle project model done and the new Hodaka project future plans. Then, when making an addition, poof, an hour's work was launched into the ethernet with a key stroke never to be seen again. Maybe next time. I did save the pictures of the shifter case and the finished model. Grrrr. Human error, that would be me.

Rule 1 (or close to it) on computers is:
Save documents often. Make sure that Autosave is enabled in the program.
Don't ask me how I know.

A quick peek on the clutch side reveals a couple of surprises. No clutch. It's remarkably clean inside and does have a nice set of straight cut drive gears. No kick starter shaft which was common in the day for Hodaka short trackers to get rid of weight and spinning gear in oil. It will be interesting to see what's inside! Now to post this before I stupidly delete it, lol.

Maxie

But wait! There's more! I was going to quit for the night but I wasn't far from seeing inside and had to push on. Tranny looks good. The crank assembly looks to be unhappy due to standing in water. Again the inside was shiny clean but with loose crud in the bottom. Whatever the lubricant was it didn't allow any deposits to form. Ok, I really am done for the day with some good and not so good news. All part of a $65 bike!

Max

Max,
An unsolicited tip on editing. When you realize that an undesired keystroke has occurred you can go back one step at a time with the command [ctrl]+z. Try it, it works.
Dale

Hey thanks Dale! Also good to hear from you. My wife is also clever on the computer and helped me get through the digital photography phase of life. It wasn't a big deal but I should have asked her before I pushed even more wrong buttons, lol. Hey, nobody was killed or wounded in my ineptness and no losses but time. I can redo it but I can't remember what all I said. I really do back up important things, but I got caught up in my story. All is well.

Max

There's a time limit for what you type. So sometimes, I type a bit, save the post, then go back and edit to add more.

If you're doing a longer post with pics, you might try doing it in Word or some other writing software & then copy and paste. You can also add your pictures after you've put in the text and posted by using the full editor. Just have the pics ready to upload so you don't have to hunt for them when you select add attachments! Victor

Wow! I'm still amazed by my inexpensive battery powered Craftsman impact driver. In the old days it was the old blue hammer driver and special tools to keep things from turning. Last night I disassembled the engine in minutes while hand holding primary gears and the flywheel cam as I just spun them off. Case screws, no resistance. Of course you do need the proper # phillips bit or equivalent. What a device!

Maxie

Agreed. I broke down and got a Harbor Freight 12v electric impact driver and I am impressed. First use was on the thin and snug LH nut on the clutch.

Good to know about the impact drivers. Didn't know if one of them was worthwhile getting or not. Now I know. I've been using the Craftsman hand-held, hit-with-hammer type for years. I've worried a lot of stubborn bolts out with that thing, and even broken some of the bits. (Sears won't replace them for free). The one drawback that I found was that Sears doesn't carry longer bits for places where you need to use them.

I just split the cases on a really stuck and crusty Ace 100 motor, where EVERY case screw has Philips head was hopelessly stripped, using an 18V Dewalt impact drill/driver and one of those cheapo #3 stripped screw extractors. Worked like a charm. Does anyone know if longer impact bits are available for the Craftsman hammer impact driver? That would be helpful.