EFE in the cave

[Chocksaway]

Duckndive; Thanks mate, good info and pics. I notice on your bottom link though, that the distance from shock to links is way longer than mine. So surely yours runs a higher rate than mine.... ?  ie. per mm of movement on the swing arm, your shock will compress more than mine. I'll check tomorrow, but I don't think the links foul the spring at all. I had thought about remodelling the top shock mount to an adjustable one, just to be able to play around with ride heights, and if necessary, different shock or link lengths. Start simple as they say...

Captain Chaos; Thanks for the dimension, I'll check against mine tomorrow. Any dimension for an 1100 arm?

On a different subject for a moment. Was looking back at old pics on the PC and found a scan of an old pic.

Me on my GSX 600F at Long Marston early 1989.  12.33 secs @ 111mph consistent. Not bad for bog stock, although I was a tad lighter back then !

[Captain Chaos]

8 minutes ago, Chocksaway said:

Any dimension for an 1100 arm?

I think 40mm longer, but I'm not sure.

[Chocksaway]

Captain Chaos; Thanks, at least I know I'm looking for longer rather than shorter. I'll check and post results.

Rog

[Duckndive]

2 hours ago, Chocksaway said:

Duckndive; Thanks mate, good info and pics. I notice on your bottom link though, that the distance from shock to links is way longer than mine. So surely yours runs a higher rate than mine.... ?  ie. per mm of movement on the swing arm, your shock will compress more than mine. I'll check tomorrow, but I don't think the links foul the spring at all. I had thought about remodelling the top shock mount to an adjustable one, just to be able to play around with ride heights, and if necessary, different shock or link lengths. Start simple as they say...

 

 

My bike runs 1100 suspension geometry and parts "Ok its a modified bandit arm"  .. but the linkage is 1100 K , L ....your bottom link is bandit "which is making the geometry wrong" hence the stiff suspension.....

pics are 2 years old but I now run adjustable links "dog bones" so I can adjust the ride height between street and strip

I did not mean your links foul the spring ..but the bottom of the spring carrier on your shock looks like it may foul the bottom suspension link "the bandit bit"

a different shock or link lengths will not fix the problem IMHO..................

for suspension to work properly the basic geometry has to be right ...............

 

[arnout]

On 14/09/2017 at 9:03 PM, Chocksaway said:

The back end is too high, the front end too low, the geometry is all wrong..

 Sorry to butt in at this stage, but no the geometry looks fine to me.

22 hours ago, Chocksaway said:

Fork angle (no load) 64 degrees

How does that compare with anyone elses?

Mine is at around 64 deg. too, but you might think the fork angle would be even steeper looking at the picture:

With swapping the stock front end for another one the rake of the frame needs to be altered to match the spec of the fork in the donor bike in order to also adopt the steering characteristics. If not, you will end up with a very slow handling bike.

Stock EFE rake (or caster, or steering head angle) is 62 deg., but on a B12 it's 64.3 (and on a GSX-R1100L/M/N around 65 deg. I think). So.. to achieve this steeper angle the rear end needs to be raised as has been done on your EFE too. Using a B12 front end without any further geometry mods (and keeping the lower frame rails level) would result in the trail increasing by 15mm...! (that is, if I did my sums right..)

Of course instead of altering the steering head angle / raising the rear one could also use a triple tree/yokes with a larger offset to compensate and arrive at the same trail distance. But as (more) modern forks are shorter, the raising of the rear end is also a way to regain ground clearance.

Looking at pics of your EFE though it seems the B12 forks (which -as such- are of usable length) have sagged quite a bit. An EFE is a heavier bike than a Bandit, but still the springs might have weakened over the years and/or the preload might be wrong. So check the sag (20-30mm no rider load).

Another thing influencing the handling and feel of a bike is of course tyres. Maybe the front tyre is very old,  has worn square, and has perhaps developped a ridge you'd need to overcome when leaning the bike into a turn. When this the point of contact with the tarmac moves to the outside of the turn, it feels like the front is suddenly loosing grip. So I'd recommend having a close look at the roundnees of the front tyre before writing off the basic geometry..!

One last thing.. Those handlebar levers seem to be set uncomfortably low..

[nlovien]

your on the right track ref: - step back and go look this thing over as a project start versus a few issues to fix, you've already picked up enough to get the alarm bells ringing - a few bodges

example - you've noted the rear wheel alignment being out - mind and also check the wheel spindle is parallel to the swing arm spindle - i've seen swing arms out by 8mm - i.e. one leg higher than the other, this causes a biased handling where it will drop into one side versus demanding additional effort to turn the other way - makes aligning the wheels accurately impossible

  - end result is a bike you'll be able to trust and apply common sense to feed back on how it performs once you rule out as many as the variables as you can

enjoy it as a project build 

Edited September 17, 2017 by nlovien

[Chocksaway]

Arnout; Lots there to reply to. I'll do that this evening. Had an accidental knee in the bollocks from my lad this morning and can't think straight !

nloien; Yeah, by the tip I hit the pit last night it had become clear I'd have to go right back and re-cover all previous ground. To be honest, with it laid up for six years I'd forgotten just how bad it was. I was hoping just to get it good enough to go back on the road and start refining it in stages, but the last 48 hours of investigation dictate that will not happen, there's too much to get right before I can venture back out, but at least then the majority of the bigger issues will be sorted.

This morning I started to remove wiring loom and battery box, airbox and carbs next. Carbs need a clean and check over anyway as I always suspected a duff diaphragm or something anyway. It was a bit three cylinderish, but if the fourth joined in it came in with a "jump to light speed" wallop !

More to do this afternoon and will report later.

Thanks all

Rog