Project: Gyro

[Cubey]

That sounds like a weird sci-fi movie title, huh?

Hello everyone, I'm back! It's been quite some time since I sold my Spree (7-8 years!) and I went through and sold a couple other scooters since then. (sig freshly updated)

Today I got this for all of $120. Sorry for the blurry pics, I was too excited to hold the phone still.
(Plus I was using a cheap phone with a less than great camera)

It's a true project bike. None of the wheels will turn due to rust, I think. It was sitting in an overgrown, wooded rural lot that had a home on it in the past. Who knows how many years it sat there, but it could look worse. I suspect the trees shaded it and protected it to a large degree. The seat is the main thing that suffered, moss coated on the exposed foam. It has just over 400 miles on it and 99.5% complete. Only two pieces of plastic are missing, from what I can see. (top engine cover and battery/oil bottle cover). I got a good working key with it (left in ignition) so that's a huge plus. The young guy with a wife and baby bought a piece of land (presumably to build a house or place a mobile home) and he found it under some small pine trees growing over it. He didn't have time to mess with it for himself, he needed the money, and he wanted it out of his way.

It was $100+20 delivery since i have a walk in camper on my truck and I would have had to rent a uhaul. It probably cost him $4 in fuel to bring it to me, so he got a little more for his trouble. Can't beat that! It's worth wel over $120 in parts, if I find that it's beyond restoring... but I doubt that will be the case since it's untouched, aside from the muffler being removed, but present and in decent shape.

0531201449.jpg (180.52 KiB) Viewed 17593 times

0531201449b.jpg (265.49 KiB) Viewed 17593 times

[motormike]

Fine score there Cubey
I have a good seat you can have for the cost of shipping.
It's been covered, but it looks okay unless you're going for a concourse restoration.
Hope that gas tank is salvageable...don't have one of those.
Reply if you want to grab this seat. I have Paypal
Also have some misc. parts, not much, but lmk what you need......motormike...
I suggest you replace those tires with some 15.00 X 6.00 X 6 lawn tractor front tires for best results.

[Cubey]

Have a pic of it? Lemmie know how much. I'm really not going for showroom restore to resell, just restore well to be usable.

I haven't gotten to the fuel tank yet but I might do so in the next day or two. I need to get some marbles for rolling around in there to help clean it up. I've been working on getting the wheels off due to the seized up brake shoes being stuck to the drums. Had to use a puller to get the left rear off, breaking one of brake shoes. They are garbage anyway, but yeah. I did see that the fuel tank cap is totally trashed.

20200601_125207sm.jpg (139.07 KiB) Viewed 17574 times

20200601_122218sm.jpg (153.16 KiB) Viewed 17574 times

20200601_134500sm.jpg (122.96 KiB) Viewed 17574 times

[Cubey]

The carb is all crusty with white powder of some kind. I only pulled this out and sprayed in some WD40 for now to help get it soaking.

20200601_131005sm.jpg (72.01 KiB) Viewed 17574 times

[motormike]

Yeah, that tank is probably toast.
I have extra rear brake hubs.
What is your zip code?
This seat is great for a rider.

[Cubey]

Zip is 71854 but I need to wait until I done going over everything before I start having parts being sent/buying parts.

I figured out today that I need a long primary throttle cable (the one between the throttle and splitter box). It's broken off at the end in the splitter box. The carb and oil pump cables are still good, they pull and retract fine.

I figured out why the tilt parking lock wasn't working well. The lock arm was on the shaft slightly wrong. Someone trying to "fix" it? Maybe due to the following...

It looks to be missing the plastic bushings for the metal linkages for the rear parking "brake" where it goes between the tilt lock and the transmission. In addition, the parking brake arm on the transmission isn't moving. In this video, you can see how it was: https://youtu.be/ALDmQ1azhf4

I have since pulled the tilt arm off, disconnected the trans parking linkage from it, and put the tilt lock arm on the shaft properly. Now the tilt lock works perfectly.

I tried putting a wrench on the rear parking linkage nut (seen in the video) and tried to turn it counter clockwise (not a lot of force) and it didn't budge. I hope the transmission isn't a rust bucket, but it might be. The trans oil fill plug had rust on the inside tip of it... not a good sign. It was low on trans oil, so I put in some cheap 10w30 that I had lying around. I saw a video about a trans drain plug but I couldn't spot on mine. Maybe I just overlooked it. I need to refer to the video again.

My current goal is to get it cleaned up, lubed up, and inspected well enough to be able to try to start the engine. Maybe I'll get it to that point in the next few weeks. If it starts and idles half way good by feeding it premixed fuel and the drive wheel turns when given throttle, then I can worry about replacing the bad parts. If it's a rust bucket inside the trans.. and engine for that matter).. then it's probably gonna have to be parted out. Let's just hope it's not that bad.

[motormike]

Zip is 71854 but I need to wait until I done going over everything before I start having parts being sent/buying parts.

Totally agree...hope this turns out to be a runner.

[Cubey]

The main thing I need to look into next, after getting the right side wheel/drum off so that the wheel can (hopefully) turn, is that external parking arm.

Maybe some idiot put the arm back on wrong when trying to "fix" it like they did the tilt lock, and it can't move because it's oriented wrong on the shaft totally wrong. At least that's easy, I just have to pull off the left wheel again. Maybe that's what caused someone to park and leave it. They went screwing around with that and got it locked up and they were too dumb to undo what they changed.

Based on this photo, the arm on mine is totally facing wrong on the shaft Mine is crammed up against the crankcase to the right side of the arm and nut.

TG50_external_parking_arm.jpg (40.64 KiB) Viewed 17557 times

The service manual photo of the tilt ("swing") lock arm is what clued me on that being installed wrong. The yellow shows how the bolt that the photo points out was facing on mine. Any wonder it was having trouble unlocking?

TG50_swing_lock_arm_a.jpg (48.11 KiB) Viewed 17557 times

Worse case scenario, I might have to pull the right crankcase cover so i can see if it's all rusted up inside there, if I can't get it to move from the outside. Whats bad is that the right crankcase cover gasket is impossible to get now, and it needs to be able to contain an oi bath for the transmission. I'd have to use an RTV gasket maker, if it's not a lost cause inside.

[Cubey]

Oh, some more pics I took today.

The inside of the left side wheel... pretty nasty. It's gonna take a lot to smooth that out. The original Dunlop tube was in it and still has some air in it.

20200601_141141sm.jpg (85.58 KiB) Viewed 17552 times

The speedometer has some water/moisture inside. We just had a CRAPTON of rain for like a week before I got it, so it might dry up?

20200601_134943.jpg (70.82 KiB) Viewed 17552 times

[Cubey]

Yikes!!! It has clumps of mud in the bottom transmission case. What did somebody to do this thing?!

Through a mishap/misunderstanding of the "parking rod", I bent it. I mean, they are a common, easy to get part that usually doesn't get damaged, so it's replaceable. Considering how stuck everything was when trying to get the RH crankcase cover off, I think I did a pretty decent job.

The plastic oil pump gear was trashed (lost some teeth) already from getting the metal oil pump gear off against it, so it would need replacing too. As well as other parking lock parts. Might need a new starter pinion, but I will try soaking it in oil first.

All bearings and seals are probably trashed. Many can still be bought new from Honda for not much money. For what they don't sell, they are nice and list the generic bearing number, so I should be able to source them online.

I am going to continue doing a complete tear down of the engine and transmission, and see what I can do for salvaging the transmission/clutch parts. Most, if not all, look like they might be able to be saved. It's just all seized up with rust at the moment. Once it's all torn down and I know what needs, I will make a list and see how much it's all gonna cost.

I might very well do a complete rebuild of the engine and transmission. $300-400 would be worth spending to rebuild it, IMO. You can't exactly get a rebuilt engine Gyro for $500.

If I need a new stater motor, that will drive the price up quite a bit more (~$180) but let's hope that's salvageable. The gear tip is rusty looking but maybe the motor isn't ruined.

On the plus side, the RH side drum came off easily and the brakes weren't rusted up and trashed. Not sure how that happened since the transmission is a muddy rust bucket. But.. it did have a crapload of ant eggs! so many, that they came spilling out when the drum came off. Maybe the ants saved the brakes by keeping the mud out? It looks pretty squeaky clean... except for the ant eggs. I had ant spray within reach, so I soaked it down.

[Cubey]

I am fearing that the stator/magneto is gonna be ruined. The guy did say it was laying on it's side and I think it was on it's left side. Maybe it was submerged in water/mud on that side, hence why that side's drum was so bad off and the air cooling area is full of (now dry) dirt. The starter may also be ruined. The stator and starter are both expensive on ebay. Might be how mud got into the trans case? That still baffles me since everything looks sealed up. Maybe I need to look closer for a gaping hole in the crankcase.

It looks like I am going to have to buy one of these at bare minimum if I decide to continue with a rebuild. The service manual calls for using it to split the crankcase.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Motorcycle-Car ... 3782842480

At least I don't need that until after I get the left side crankcase cover off and inspect the starter and stator.

[harleyracer59]

you can get a lot of that rust cleaned off those parts by soaking them in diesel. I wouldn't soak the clutches though. soak the rusted metal parts for a day or 3. then wire brush the loose rust off. repeat if necessary.

ive split a few of these engines and haven't needed any special tools to separate the cases. scrapers putty knives and various sized and thickness screw drivers

also, on the top of engine by the carb and the oil pump, theres a breather port. its a brass nipple sticking up. if it was submerged in water. that's where the water got inside at.

[Wheelman-111]

Greetings:

Rusty parts do really well with THIS PROCESS. Sorry for the silliness, but the pictures tell the story...

[Cubey]

Well that sucks. I had the starter almost working, after getting it unseized. but then one of the magnets came unglued. Now the thing won't go back together. I spent at least 2 hours messing with it. I give up. It's trashed. That's probably the most expensive part on these things too. $100 for an as-is one, or $175+ for a "tested good" one.

I finally had a bolt break on me. It's kind of an important one but not exactly a "ruined engine" one. It's the bottom center LH crankcase cover bolt. Maybe I can work it loose with vise grips after I get the flywheel/stator bell off. The bolt sheared/split almost down the middle, leaving about half of the diameter of the bolt in the block. The remaining bolt might just break off too, but I'll cross that bridge when I get to it.

To pull off the stator bell, I need to either buy a $10 tool specifically for the task, or try using generic a puller. I don't know the stator's condition yet since I can't really see in through the 2 small holes in the bell. I should probably assume the worst. That's another $100.

On the plus side, the engine is turning pretty easily by hand via the bell, even with at least one seized crankshaft bearing. The crankshaft is spinning in the center bore of the bearing, which might be a bad thing if the crankshaft has been damaged from being spun, but I can't tell yet. I need to buy a $35 crankcase splitter tool also. I hate blowing almost $50 on specialty tools when it might be a lost cause, unless I commit to sourcing everything to make this ridable again.

I pulled the head off and had a look in the cylinder. There are some wear marks on the exhaust side only. Not scratches/gouges, just bumpy feeling with visible lines. It sounds like it has compression when turning it over by hand. I can feel it sucking in air through into the intake manifold. Makes normal "turning over by hand" noises like something with compression does. How much compression? I don't know. I can't see the bottom end yet, since I need the flywheel puller. The intake side felt smooth as can be. Maybe that's just normal heavy wear?

[Cubey]

also, on the top of engine by the carb and the oil pump, theres a breather port. its a brass nipple sticking up. if it was submerged in water. that's where the water got inside at.

Ahhh, the transmission breather. I saw that black hose it has for that. That makes sense... I guess. Weird that so many clumps of mud got in it through such a tiny hose though!