Frame Restoration

[Robert Luland]

Grease nipples are inboard on early and out board on later. There are other differances but at a fast need to know glance, etc. Bob L

[DANPATCH]

Steve how do you tell the differance between the 1936-1940 springer

[Steve Little]

Hi Eric.
I appreciate your praise.
It felt like, it took as long to enter the thread posts as it did to restore the frame.

I originally had a Deckel FP1 for this job. Deckel is a world renowned (German made) toolroom mill, and they are very sought after.
If you use a Deckel, a new (shorter) quill has to be manufactured to get into the deck area. This means sacrificing the manual drill operation of the head.

It was a great machine but a little light for the work, so I traded it in when I bought our CNC mill and then bought this current machine which was manufactured in 1957.
I knew this machine would fit in with out alteration. This machine is solid and handles this job, and other jobs with ease.
Thanks again.
Regards Steve

[exeric]

It's amazing how you found a milling machine that is purpose made to deck Harley Davidson motor mounts In all my years in machine shops, I've never seen a mill with such a low profile head and I can think of many jobs where that would have been a life saver. Steve, thank you so much for taking the time, and making the effort to document the remarkable work you do for so many people. You are a true craftsman.

[Steve Little]

Cutting the decks.

When a frame has been welded or brazed there will always be contraction at play.
Contraction is the pulling force of a weld as it cools.
A 6mm or 1/4” fillet weld in a corner has a contraction rate measured in Tons.
During the welding of a frame, contraction can be managed to a certain point, by balancing the welds across a frame.
This means, don’t weld everything down one side of the frame and then weld everything down the other side.

During the welding of the engine mounts, the contraction pulls at the decks.
The rear decks usually (but not always) pulls up which decreases the important angle to the seat post and also increases the gap from the front engine mount.
The relationship of the seat post to the rear deck is important because it dictates how close the rear head will be to the seat post. Harley Davidson designed this angle to be 74 degrees and 4 minutes.
The measurement from the rear deck, down to the front engine mount is 1.625” for frames 1936-1947 and 2” for 1948 through all Pans etc.
When we have checked a frame and determined that the decks need cutting, we bolt it into the jig on one of our mill and then take a very light witness cut across the rear deck. The witness cut shows any distortion. We then evaluate the next cut on what we read from this.
Enjoy the pictures of young Steve weaving some magic.
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28 hours and Job is complete.
Hope it was informative.

[Steve Little]

Run out of time today. Will post pictures of deck cutting tomorrow.

[Steve Little]

Small ball hone with some Kerosene to take the high spots off the machining.
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The shafts fits beautifully.
The way to tell a well fitted shaft, is to grab the end of the shaft between thumb and forefinger and spin it.
It should spin freely, and if you flick it between your thumb and forefinger it should spin a revolution by itself.
We cut the brake crossover bushes in our frames at 0.730” +0.001 -0.0005.
If your brake cross over shaft is bent, or if you have a aftermarket shaft, best to check the run out of the shaft between centres.
Harley Davidson made their brake shafts by putting a centre drill in each end and then rough machining them to size.
Then they were heat treated and then ground to final size.

Usually original shafts are good, but if your at a swap meet and the owner has his parts on a table, get down at eye level and slowly roll the shaft along the table.

I have seen a brand new aftermarket shaft, that had 0.015 run out which would mean they do not follow the same procedure as Harley Davidson.

If the brake crossover shaft does not operate freely, it will cause the back brake drag.
If the back brake drags, it will wear out the brake drum, brake shoes, and heat up the rear hub, to the point that the grease will run out and eventually destroy the hub.

[Steve Little]

Reaming the brake crossover bush.

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Pictured is our reamer for line reaming the two bushes in the brake crossover.
The shaft has tapered pilot bushing on both ends too ensure perfect alignment through each bush.
The drill has plenty of horsepower to cut through the brass bush.

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Set up and ready to line ream.

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Fit tapered pilot to end of reamer to align to centre of bush.

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One cut and line ream is finished

[Steve Little]

Brake crossover support

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Fitment of the brake cross over support has more importance than some frame restores and frame manufacturers give it.
If the brake crossover “support set” is placed too far in, it will pull the exhaust S bend in too close to the engine and it will also be to close to the supply oil line.

The exhaust S bend is already close to the crankcase, and most people have seen the lines worn into the right crankcase from the butted seam weld of the exhaust S bend
If the brake crossover support set is placed too far out, it will force out the exhaust S bend. This will make it too close to the brake lever pin.

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The tool shown here ensures that the brake cross over support is set at the correct measurement.
No point looking for this tool on our web site. We have them, but they are not listed.
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Ready for welding


Thats it for this week.
On monday I will be posting the pictures for line boring the brake cross over bushes.
When the restoration of this frame was complete, the engine decks needed cutting to bring them into factory specification. This is what Harley Davidson did with every frame that was completed off the assembly line.

I took some pictures of young Steve doing this proceedure on one of our mills. They will also be put up for your veiwing pleasure.

[Steve Little]

Rear trans mount fitted and aligned to the frame centre line. When its all tightened up, time for welding

[Steve Little]

1945-46 frame restoration 011.JPGSidecar lugs.
The circumferential welds and plugs weld are done and also the front engine mount.

Here we have fitted the rear engine mount, seat post, seat post cross brace, etc
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When all the parts are fitted to the frame and then tightened to the jig, it is time to weld the seat post to the cluster.
Arc welded seat posts are welded around the top. The seat post sits about a 1/16” above the cluster.
The extra metal is then fused down to the seat post cluster.
This is called a fusion weld. No filler material is used during the weld
1945-46 frame restoration 012.JPG.

[Steve Little]

OK kiddies, today were going to Adventure land!!
Turn the lights off, and here we go.
Little Bobby, if you dont stop making finger shadows on the screen there's gunnu be big trouble.

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Plug welds and root run finished.
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Welds linnished off1945-46 frame restoration 008.JPG
Left side looks good aside from the shiney linnish marks. A light blast will make the frame look uniform and untouched.

[Robert Luland]

Steve, this is a great thread but your giving them too much , too fast. Ya got to handle this like Disney did when we were kids. Leave ya frosting at the jaw until next Sunday at 7pm to find out if BoBo the Chihuahua makes it home, lol. Fantastic thread. Bob L

[Steve Little]

Welding

All fitted up ready for welding.
The white lines drawn on the tube, define the length of the sleeve inside the tube.
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The tubes all fitted to the frame and are ready for welding.
The gap between the tubes is called the “penetration gap”.
The idea is that when the first weld is laid down, the weld will penetrate half way through the thickness of the sleeve and penetrate into each edge of the frame tube. This is called the root run.
Then the root run is wire brushed to clean any smoke fumes, slag, or impurities. Then a fillet weld is laid over the top. The fillet weld will penetrate into the root run and ensure a solid, full strength, X-ray quality weld.
The hollow sleeves will ensure that this join will happily move with the rest of the tube.

[Steve Little]

Sleeve detail.

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The sleeve that we turned for the right side of the frame is the straight looking unit.
It has a slight difference turned to the centre. One end is turned 0.833” and the other end is turned to 0.840”
This was done to accommodate the different inside diameters of the two tubes.
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The second sleeve took a bit more work to fabricate. Not only did the two tubes have different size diameters but there was also a internal stiffener to accommodate.
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After turning it down, we then had to press the flat section that is in the tube for the inner primary relief.
To do this we slit a piece of 1” inch tube down each side, and placed it over the section of the sleeve that was going to fit into that end of the join.
Then we set up the die set that we use to press in this section of our replacement tubes.
Cross fingers, and press.
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The sleeve fitted perfectly. You would think we do this for a living.