1940 chief front end

[jn1972]

I am assembling the front end on my 40 chief ,I think all the pieces that I have are correct for the the bike ,when I put everything together the center of the wheel is not in the center of the fork,it is apx 1/2 inch closer to the left side is this normal ,or did I put something together wrong ? Thanks for the help jerry

[Yellow53Chief]

I am assembling the front end on my 40 chief ,I think all the pieces that I have are correct for the the bike ,when I put everything together the center of the wheel is not in the center of the fork,it is apx 1/2 inch closer to the left side is this normal ,or did I put something together wrong ? Thanks for the help jerry

Hi,
Was everything O.K. before you took it apart? If this is the first time it has been together, check the offset of the rim relative to the hub. I don't know the specification for the 1940 Chief, but the rim is not supposed to be in the middle of the hub.

[jn1972]

40 chief

That was only one of the few things that I did not take a picture of before I disassembled it, the hub is indian but I think that the rim is not ,not sure what you mean by the offset of the rim .i have enclosed of few pictures ,we are going to oley next weekend I will try to take some pictures and see what is different,

[Yellow53Chief]

That was only one of the few things that I did not take a picture of before I disassembled it, the hub is indian but I think that the rim is not ,not sure what you mean by the offset of the rim .i have enclosed of few pictures ,we are going to oley next weekend I will try to take some pictures and see what is different,

Hi,
On the 1940 Chiefs, both the front and rear brakes were on the right. This meant that in order to make room for the drums, the wheel hubs were moved to the left. The rim that held the tire had to remain in the center of the frame/fork. The distance that the hub center is to the left of the rim center; is known as the offset. There are different ways of measuring the offset, but in general, the distance from the outside machined surface of the hub where the brake drum attaches to the center of the rim is 1 5/16" (+ or -) 1/8". The later 1946 through 1953 Chiefs had an offset of 1 5/8". If the wheels were in the center before you took everything apart, then something must have happened. If you had the wheels respoked, maybe the offset is wrong. If other parts were changed, then maybe a part is wrong or the assembly order is wrong. The offset dimensions given above are from the vendor Kiwi. Being off 1/2" is significant. When you do find out what happened, please update this thread.

[PRG]

Howdy Jerry,

If you don't know the history of this machine I'd likely study that front end closely to make sure what you have is all 1940 rather than a combination to include 41 and later. Have seen some strange assemblages with expanded fork legs to accommodate the latter. It could have had a wheel laced offset to accommodate this. Start with your brake drum, you should not be able to put your fingers between the spokes and drum face on a 40 but the 41 has the hub offset to the left on the mounting flange creating a gap. Variety of spacers on 41-later as well.

[jn1972]

When I purchased the bike ,the motor was stuck so I decided to have the motor and trans rebuilt as it was November,when I had the motor out it did not look like a difficult job to take the rest of the bike apart at that point.its turned out to be a lot more involved than I thought. The front hub is correct for a 40 chief I measured the offset and it is 1 3/4 inches to the center on the rim ,I think it is suppose to be 1 5/16 to 1 7/16 so it is 5/16 to far to the left.i am told that I can mount the wheel in the fork and then adjust the spokes to center the wheel ,would 5/16 off center effect the handling of the bike ,I do not know all the history but I think it was ridden like that for some time. Thanks jerry

[Yellow53Chief]

Hi,
Issues with handling are hard to predict. You will know what is going on handling-wise once you start putting some miles on the bike. You might not notice anything horrible if one or both wheels (rims/tires) are off-center, at least not for hands-on riding. Where you might see a problem is when you try hands-off riding. If everything is centered and balanced weight-wise left-to-right; the bike should travel straight ahead when your hands are off of the handlebars. If the bike's tires are too far to the left, the bike will pull to the right. Part of the pulling is due to the weight being too far to the right if the tires are too far to the left. A bike will typically pull the to the heavy side, if the bike is not weight balanced - even though the tires might be centered. A good example of issues with hands-off riding is my 1953 Chief. For me to travel straight ahead with my hands off the handlebars (on a flat level road); I have to shift my rear-end in the seat an inch or so towards the right. My bike has a slight tendency to pull to the left, and when I shift my weight to the right, it counteracts the left tendency and then the bike goes straight. The left pull tendency is slight and I only notice it when I'm putting on my gloves, sunglasses, or performing some other task while riding. What could I do to fix the problem? On an Indian, moving the front wheel to the left or right is not often an option because of fender skirt clearance issues. What I could do, and what I'm going to try to do this summer, is to pull the rear wheel slightly to the left using the spokes. By doing this, more of the bike's weight will be on the right, and it will have the same effect that shifting my weight in the seat had. Why does my bike really pull a little to the left? Good question. I'm not sure. Could the front fork be bent a little? Maybe. Could the frame be bent a little? Maybe. I'm not going to strip the bike down to find out. I'll simply shift my rear tire a little and that will hopefully compensate for the pulling issue. Because of fork/frame issues, predicting handling is difficult. You may find that the bike handles fine with the front/rear tires where they end up. Now if the tires don't end up visually in the middle of the fenders - well that may be a whole different problem. Putting some miles on the bike is key. Until you do that, you won't really know exactly if the problem you have is real, or if is just a ghost.
Wheel alignment is important, and the rear wheel must be adjusted to track directly behind the front tire. This is done as part of the rear chain adjustment. If you find that the bike handles horribly, with turning issues and really weird tire wear - your frame or fork may need some attention.

[Rowdy]

I'm just rebuilding the front wheel on my 44 (see latest post) and I had the same problem. What I did was put the bike on the centre stand with the wheel off, making sure that the bike was on a flat surface, I put a spirit level on the front of the rockers, one was way higher than the other, which in my case made the rim almost touch the fork leg. It was caused by one of the rods that come down from the spring having a different angled bend at the top, you could also get the same effect if one of the rods are bent.