Monday: A red letter day I had a three hour round trip this morning to go and collect the parts back from being polished or re-plated. The quality of the polishers work is exceptional and I am really pleased with what he did. They cost a bit more than estimate due to the state of the wheels and the need to de-mount the tyres. After lunch with a little help from my wife I mounted the forks the front mudguard, the fork deflectors and the brake hose brackets. I got some of the wiring in to the headlight shell and re-connected and fitted the rear brake clevis pin. I found whilst fitting the front mudguard that two of the bolts had been replaced with longer ones to cater for the chrome front trim, as this was beyond repair and not being refitted I had to go and buy a couple more allen headed bolts. Whilst there I bought a set of replacement wheel bearings as the existing ones are full of crud following the polishing of the rims.
This weeks photos are here
Tuesday: Fitted the new bolts in the front mudguard and then had to remove the radiator to fit the timing belt cover. Torqued up the top new triple tree nut and then mounted the handlebars. Refitted the brake and clutch master cylinders and the control switches. Reconnected all the wiring inside the headlamp. Fitted the new mirrors and made a bracket to support the rear shocker air line connector. Took the wheels off to the local bike shop for him to press the old bearings out for me and I found that the rear wheel had about half a cup of water in it and so the spacer tube and the bearings were quite rusty. So more cleaning to do before I can refit the bearings.
Thursday: Cleaned the bearing pockets and installed the new bearings in both wheels and greased the seals and fitted the brake discs. Mounted the front wheel, front callipers and the brake hoses. I fitted the lower triple tree cover that I got from Andy in Germany. It looks great.
Friday: Found the copper washers so I can fit the front brake and clutch lines properly. I stripped and cleaned the rear brake calliper and the mounting plate. Then I went and worked on the Valk and fitted the copper washers on the lines, adjusted the new throttle cables and fitted the throttle runner covers. I then bled both the clutch and the front brakes. Had a go at fitting the final drive and was struggling to get it lined up and so gave it best. Went home for lunch. After lunch tried again to fit the final drive after I read up on how to do it on the main VRCC forum. I still couldn’t get it lined up and in and so after about an hour of trying I gave up and rang a friend Ken. He came round to give me a hand and after about 15 minutes we finally managed to get it all lined up and in. Then fitted the rear wheel and torqued everything up. Fitted the rear foot rests and their mounting plates and decided to call it quits for the day. In fact I am going to have a weekend off and so it will be next week before I get finished. So that’s it for this week
