Powerplus or Bust, Eh?

[Shaky Jake]

Last of the Wheels Thru Time pictures

One of the great things about the Wheels Through Time museum is that everything runs. The whole time I was there, Dale the owner was running around starting up old bikes and cars. He was having a blast starting bikes and talking to the crowd, and I was having fun watching him.










A pair of Hendersons. The second one had been set up for a cross country ride some years ago:










A Thor with a chair:










They had a large hillclimber display:








That was only a fraction of what they had at the Wheels Through Time Museum. If you're ever in the area, I definitely recommend it. Like I said, it's near the south end of the BRP, so it would be a great place to visit when you're on a Parkway ride. They had a push-pin map for all the guests, mines the black one:




Kevin

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[Shaky Jake]

moving on

'nuffa that. On to this:








When the previous owner began disassembly, he discovered that one lifter (front cylinder intake) and the timing gear on the crankshaft were both frozen in place:








With something this old, any persuasion you use has to lean towards the gentle side. I soaked the lifter with Kroil and tapped on it with a piece of brass and my smallest hammer.








I got lucky on that one, but I think the timing gear is going to be a little more difficult:







Kevin

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[Shaky Jake]

Pistons and Gears

I figured it'd be best to take the pistons off of the ends of the connecting rods before they rattle around and get damaged while I'm working on the rest of the engine. The wrist pins are held in place by a cotter pin, as well as having a light press fit into the piston. As you can see, one of the cotter pins is a nicely machined piece, while the other was a typical old cotter pin like you get at the tractor supply store. I assume the nice one is original, and the other is a replacement. The parts book calls it a "piston cross head pin dowel pin."








In this picture you can see the hole in the piston boss that the cotter goes through:








The small end of the rods has a bronze bushing:








I haven't taken measurements yet, but you can see that at least one of the wrist pins is oversized:








Now that that's out of the way, back to getting that timing gear off of the crankshaft. For the last few days I've been designing a custom puller in my head, while soaking the gear in Kroil. The problem is, any way you do it, the only thing you can grip with a puller is the teeth of the gear, and you can only get behind about half of them at that. I was afraid of breaking the gear, and I don't have a spare. So, I decided to go with some judicious application of heat, and firm raps with a hammer on a piece of brass. In the end, it paid off and the gear remained intact:









Kevin

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[exeric]

I'm loving your thread Kevin. Coincidently, I'm building the motor for my 1916 H-D J at this very time. It's funny how similar the motors are, but then why re-invent the wheel. I'm sure all manufacturers of the day did a lot of pathological work on their competitors products.



You can see H-D used the same wrist pin retaining method. I made new pins with a tighter fit.



I made this fixture to get the pinion gear off.

[Shaky Jake]

Thanks Eric. You're right, it looks like HD and Indian used similar piston designs. Maybe they even subcontracted the same company to cast and machine them.

As you can see in this picture, a puller like yours wouldn't work on my timing gear, because most of the gear is shrouded by the case. You only have access maybe 100 degrees around the outside of the gear, so the puller has to be narrow enough to slide in from one side. I've seen pullers like that made, but they have a tendency to want to bend.






Nice job on the J, by the way. Are you posting a build thread? I'd love to see more.



Kevin

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[exeric]

Thanks Kevin, I might do a build thread on the '16J, but I've only given myself till the end of November to work on the J. I interrupted work on my '17 Henderson to play with the Harley because I needed a break. I hope to get back to it soon, but there is a long list of neglected projects in front of it. Meanwhile, I'll be enjoying the work you are doing. I have to say that I have a great deal of respect for you because you are doing so much of your own work, and documenting it so well. That is what makes our great hobby such a journey of discovery for both motorcycle history, and self discovery.

[Shaky Jake]

Automatic Oiler

The 1916 Indian, having a total loss oil system, doesn't have a recirculating oil pump like a modern motorcycle. It does have what the parts catalog calls an "automatic oiler." As the few ounces of oil in the crankcase are lost through the vent, past the rings, past the seals, or through leakage, the automatic oiler pumps oil from the oil tank to the crankcase to maintain the proper level. It has an adjustment so that it can be tuned to accommodate the oil usage of the particular engine, which can vary with age, power level, duty cycle, etc. If the engine is being used at a higher than normal power level, for example if a passenger is being carried, or if a sidecar is attached, or for sustained high speeds, the quantity of oil supplied by the automatic oiler might not be sufficient, so a manual oiler is mounted to the side of the oil tank so that the rider can occasionally provide an additional squirt of oil to the crankcase when needed. The automatic oiler is located on the right hand side of the engine under the timing cover, and is driven by a worm gear on the inboard end of the timing gear, which is pressed onto the crankshaft:








In the previous picture you can see that I had removed three threaded caps, one on each end of the oiler assembly, and one on the bottom. The small screw, I assume, is for bleeding the air out to prime the oiler. Behind the forward cap there is a slotted adjustment, which is used to adjust how much oil is delivered with each stroke:








Here you can see the automatic oiler piston and cross-head removed from the unit. The lock screw for the adjustment is out. Mine was set at 3 1/2 turns in from when the threads started engaging the cross-head. I suppose I'll use that as my starting point when I reassemble the engine.








Here you can see the fittings removed from the outlet of the automatic oiler, and the inlet fitting is still in place:








It's hard to see, but the outlet fitting was nearly plugged with crud:








Here you can see the worm gear that drives the automatic oiler, as well as the timing gear, once I finally got it off of the crankshaft:








Here you can see the bronze auto-oiler cylinder, and it's lock-nut, removed from the engine case:








You can see the little slots in the cylinder that act as the inlet ports:








There was also a bit of sludge n the cavity where the auto-oiler cylinder threads in:








More about the automatic oiler in a minute.....



Kevin

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[Shaky Jake]

Automatic Oiler, Part 2

In order to remove the automatic oiler drive gear from the engine case, you have to un-thread its lower bushing. Theis required a special tool to be made. I started with a clutch tool for old Japanese dirt bikes that looked like this:








And I filed on it until it looked like this:








It fits into the lower bushing like so:








And the lower bushing and drive gear come out like so:








In these two pictures you can see how the cylinder, piston, cross-head, and drive gear all work together:










Here's a picture of the components of the sight glass assembly. There's a backing plate, the glass itself with gaskets on each side, and a retaining nut:








That's all for now, I hope you found it interesting. Enjoy the day.


Kevin

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[fciron]

Hi Kevin,

I've been following along with interest. Thanks again for documenting this.

In the final picture the drive pin is much smaller than the slot it fits in. I believe it should have a bushing/block similiar to this one on my shaper. (The shaper also uses a crank-pin moving in a slot to achieve reciprocating motion, but the length of the stroke is adjustable.)

The use of the bronze block give a better bearing surface against both the pin and the slot. Yours will be bathed in oil so I didn't try to show the lubrication holes and slots on mine. :-)

20141125_193919.jpg

[Tom Lovejoy]

Great thread, really enjoying this - keep it coming, great shot's. Mike Madden had a Power Plus 1918 or so at Borrego Springs road run a few years ago. He had modified it and it had a working recIrculating oil system - it was very cool.

[Shaky Jake]

Hi Kevin,

I've been following along with interest. Thanks again for documenting this.

In the final picture the drive pin is much smaller than the slot it fits in. I believe it should have a bushing/block similiar to this one on my shaper. (The shaper also uses a crank-pin moving in a slot to achieve reciprocating motion, but the length of the stroke is adjustable.)

The use of the bronze block give a better bearing surface against both the pin and the slot. Yours will be bathed in oil so I didn't try to show the lubrication holes and slots on mine. :-)

Good eye fciron. That pin is very loose in the slot. I'm glad you brought that up; your post prompted me to go and look at the parts book. Here is a picture of the applicable pages:





If you look at the list on the right hand page, sixth item from the top, it lists "H2620 automatic oiler worm gear pin roller." So, rather than a bronze block like the one on your shaper, it looks like there should be a roller that fits over that pin and rolls inside the slot. Mine is apparently long gone. Unfortunately the parts book doesn't have a picture of every component, and the roller is one of the parts that isn't shown. I wonder if it should be made of hardened steel or bronze?



Glad you guys are enjoying the thread, I appreciate the responses.


Kevin

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[Shaky Jake]

Great thread, really enjoying this - keep it coming, great shot's. Mike Madden had a Power Plus 1918 or so at Borrego Springs road run a few years ago. He had modified it and it had a working recIrculating oil system - it was very cool.

That would probably be the smart thing to do.

If I was smart...



Kevin

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[fciron]

My first inclination is to go with bronze, better to wear out the roller than pin or slot. Bearing bronze is quite hard and i think it should do 4,000 miles no problem.

Roller makes more sense in the oil pump application since there is relatively little force being applied. The shaper needs the extra bearing surface of the block because it is pushing against a metal cutting tool.

(Yay, I helped. )

[exeric]

My '16 Excelsior, and Henderson oil pumps use the same roller method. I made new rollers and I agree with fciron that bearing bronze would work fine. The important thing is that it rolls freely. Needless to say, there's plenty of oil there.

[Shaky Jake]

Bearing bronze makes sense to me too.

Thanks for the help - it's things like that that make the time spent posting worth while.



Kevin

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