This photo is an old one, the bike has progressed since then, I'll try and post a better one when I have time.

This time welding was a real pain, the rods were damp and popping molten steel all over the place, the Triumph pipes were rusty inside and holed real easy, and fizzled burning rust across the bench. Oh joy just what you need.

As the German diesel bike rally is in a week I went back to the old pipes to see if I could rectify the problem with them. No I buggered them up in the pipe bender, so that's that, no turning back now.  I'd like to say that it's all fixed now, but it aint, I'm still at it.

And of course the answer is to avoid over filling.

I'm well chuffed with the linkage that I've made, it's a bit Heath Robinson, and looks a bit over the top maybe, but it works damn good. Now I know it goes all the way over to the throttle stop and its sweet and easy getting there. Basically its a bar that's horizontal at the front of the engine, the end of the bar is attached to the top of the engines throttle lever, at the middle of the bar is the cable anchor, and at the other end of the bar is a pivot. The pivot is needed as the bar will rise and fall due to the engines throttle lever turning in a circular movement. Anyhow the pivot needed to be anchored somewhere so passed the linkage through an unused gear lever pivot point in the forward foot controls. The upshot of that was to get a foot throttle in to the bargain. Well not so much a foot as an ankle, if I move my left ankle in to the bike and push a little bit I can ride and rest my throttle hand, great on long journeys.        

I put this down to the exhaust pipes being restrictive, as the down pipe diameter is the same as a 125 or 250cc Honda. With each engine cylinder being  477cc's I think she is having a hard time of getting rid of the exhaust gasses. So I have decided to change the exhaust pipes for a bigger bore. If I can't buy the raw pipe and bend it to shape, then I'll cut and weld Enfield and Harley pipes paint them up black and wrap them with heat bandage.      

The gearbox is working the best that it ever has, no false neutrals, straight in and out of all gears. Oil was again a problem as I forgot to change the o ring on the kick start shaft, and the breather pipe that I made was far too short and it let oil out all over the place. Lesson learned.

The NEB clutch with it's ceramic plates works like an absolute charm,  the lever operation is a dream, sweet, as apposed to the sour old clutch (that I'm not going to mention) that I used before. Before I set off for the Big Knock rally I repaired a faulty indicator switch, and unfortunately this shorted out and took out the flasher relay and the regulator / rectifier, and in turn that took out the battery. Anyhow, the new regulator is off a KTM Duke and looks impressive, well chunky.  

The new clutch is on, and the primary cover is looking good, just a few more finishing touches and the bike's back on the road.

So where does this leave the bike? Well I have rebuilt the old four speed gearbox, well and truly sorted out the oil leaks, added some new gears, output shaft and the gear change ratchet mechanisms and that seems to have sorted all the problems that dogged the four speed gearbox. On the bench anyway.   

I'm going to throw the bike together in the next few days with the new clutch and new gearbox fixing plates which are so much better than the old ones. 

In fact this time the 33 tooth back wheel sprocket was a heck of a lot easier to modify than the last one that I done last year.

I fitted the 20 tooth sprocket to the gearbox, and oh joy the bolts that hold the gearbox in place just touches the chain. So I have decided to say goodbye to the nuts, washers and spring washers on the left side of the box and replace those parts with a single plate with two threaded holes, and use two bolts from the right side of the bike.  

If your going to covert a five speed box you'll need to block off the old shaft hole with a blanking disc from Hitchcock's or use a blank oil seal (seal without the hole). Your also going to need a small nut and bolt with a shoulder half the way down it, this is for the shaft linkage.   

To make sure the clutch centre doesn't wear unduly, I have replaced the aluminium Norton centre that I was going to use, with a steel BSA centre. I know that being steel it will rust, so I'll spray paint it and then oil it. It should be ok as the only moving parts that has contact with the centre is the four slipper plates, and so a very small area open to rust. Bearings are one sealed unit of course. Nickel or chrome plaiting would be the best option for the centre as it's hard smooth and slippery (like parabellum), but for now I'll go with what I've got.

I now have to drill a hole in the outer cover to match the new shaft bush and oil seal.  

Well I'm happy to say that the gearbox is finally in and absolutely accurate thanks to my laser. That little red dot really does the job, I recommend it to all bike builders.    

Sprocket size change yet again, 23 gearbox and 38 at the back wheel, this is due to the lack of off the shelf sprockets. 38 tooth being the smallest available for the back wheel and my original plans for a 33 tooth would mean modifying a Yamaha sprocket again. This would mean a lot of work, and I have more than enough of that. Amended: Well it's back to the 20 tooth gearbox sprocket as the 23 cost way too much. The 33 tooth Yamaha back wheel sprocket was a damn sight easier to modify than the last one that I made 

As the gearbox is further back I now have a longer primary belt, the very one that a local bearing stockiest said didn't exist. I researched on the net and printed out the information from the manufactures website, then produced this to the bearing stockist. It turns out he was being lazy and couldn't be bothered to put one on order.

I have had some good luck, as I was convinced the the gearbox would need an off set sprocket (23 tooth) for the box to fit, this would mean a special sprocket being made up. This did make me wonder if I was going the right route using the five speed gearbox, as every time the sprocket wore out it would be a major hassle. But as luck would have it a little re design here and there, a bit of jiggery pokery and the gearbox and back wheel sprockets are in perfect line. I have a laser that takes all the guess work out of alignment.     

Who would have thought that changing a gearbox of the same make would cause so much work.

Amended: What I didn't tell you was that I modified the clutch centre from a taper designed for a BSA and press fitted a Enfield centre in to it (noting more than a tube with 5 splines in it). I then welded the two ends up to the steel NEB centre. I have done this as NEB do not and will not make a clutch for Enfield bikes. I have used the ceramic slipper plates with kevlar friction plates and I have to say this is the best clutch that I have known on any bike.

I would like to say thank you to the staff of Tesco's Horsham store, who were very helpful and friendly.

The heavy camping gear really slowed down the bike, and she could only achieve 70mph when faced with a hill. I must say the weight of the kit and my 18 stone, combined with the camping table acting like a parachute would have been the equivalent to riding two up. If the bike is to go faster fully laden then it must be down geared as she didn't reach 3000 rpm in top gear. The bike does rev to 3600rpm, but I still have to see if she can achieve this in top gear without the camping gear.  I did gear the bike up to get the fuel curve (2300rpm @ 58mph) as close to top speed as I could, but doing this was detrimental to the power output with a heavy load. So I now have a decision to make, keep it as it is and eek every bit of economy out of an already very economic bike, or down gear and gain power at the top end which will make the bike more responsive, and be a bit safer.  Amended:The bike using the 4 speed gearbox will reach 3400rpm in top gear fully loaded on a motorway, which is 87mph. The bike is getting a 5 speed box and down gearing so the hills and twist and turns of country roads should be a lot easier.      

 The gear box is a temperamental cow, and will not go into gear at times, and it seems to have a mind of it's own. Third gear was always hard to get in and out of, and fourth gear is now being a pain to find, and then all is sweet as pie and working well until next time it has a hissy fit..... I am now thinking of ways to fit the five speed Enfield box.

 January 2004 I saw a concrete mixer in a ditch and thought of the diesel bike idea. August 2004 I saw a diesel bike and found out that I wasn't the only person that had this idea (great minds think alike), and the end of 2004 I started buying parts for my project.