Project Virago

Good work done Doc Cox, very good 

Thanks Crash, found an interesting article on you tube about custom tank building and thought it maybe of interest, will be making my own for the other Virago eventually and just looking for tips,

Cool looking tank

nice to see it makes it look so simple Doc! 

I will have to get my tool box out again   was good to watch all the same 

Good vid Nigel.

 Good Vid Doc   He makes it look so easy! I tried to knock one up from a Cornflake packet earlier? I failed miserably 

Very hard to get the curves without the English wheel on cornflake packets,Sim,

I tried making one out of papiermache but when I filled it up with petrol it went all soggy & fell off the bike. 

Mr Intruder wrote:

I tried making one out of papiermache but when I filled it up with petrol it went all soggy & fell off the bike. 

I know what the problem was, you should have used Exterior grade PVA glue instead of normal PVA when making the papiermache.

There you go davey, you should of done like andrew says you silly boy. 

The guy in the video used cardboard for his first tank, :shock: but I think that would also leak so will make mine out of steel sheet......

Out in the garage tonight harvesting some Led,s from some circuit boards, the easiest way is to play the flame from a blowlamp across the back and they fall out easily....





Now where,s that lighter...  I always put mine back in the same place but, to make things a bit easier came up with this simple mod, all you need is preferably a neodymium magnet as these are slim and very powerfull, the one I used came out of a computer hard drive but any types can be used




Glue the magnet to the back of the lighter






You can then put it on the side of the blowlamp, as this is a lot larger than the lighter there is less chance of dropping it and not finding it without a mass garage hunt...






Hope this simple mod, is of use to you all,


Have not put any Health and Safety warnings up as I only use common sense and all these disclaimers along with the "Legals" they have after radio adverts get right up my nose 

:ballchain:  regards to all Doc Cox

good idea doc

Many years ago, when I were a lad, we made a bonfire. We put a length of Cast Iron drain pipe in it (from memory I think it was about 5 or 6ft long) at a slight angle and then started dropping in spray cans in it, such as de-icer, paint rattle can, hairspray etc to see how far they would fly when they went off, anyway my mate had the bright ide to drop one of those in it, mistake, the cast iron pipe exploded and I nearly s**t myself . I am not going to try that again in a hurry.

Hi Andrew, on the posotive side you now know what happens   something along the same lines happened to my Dad, It was a very hot summers day and we had a large bonfire to light, I had just tipped a jam-jar of petrol into the centre of it and was walking back to the house for some matches passing my dad who unknown to me was going down with some matches to light it   having picked up the matches I was about halfway back down the garden when there was a noise like a sonic boom  The bonfire leapt about six feet into the air and there was my Dad running around the garden trying to put out the flames on what little hair he had, didn,t help as my Mum and I were laughing uncontrollably   The petrol had readily evaporated in the heat and the bonfire material was keeping the vapours in one area, so we had an invisible Vapour bomb waiting to be ignited, They say Laughter is the best medicine, but on that day we don,t think my Dad was in agreement 

 

Good idea with the lighter Doc   I'm not to sure about the rocket launchers and hidden bombs though! 

Good idea, but why was "fire bomb" the first thing that came to mind when I saw it 

I have noticed you use magnets for all sorts, clever thinking 

He is a very ingenious man Crash, I believe he gets a lot of magnets out of old hard drives from unwanted PC's.

Totally right Dave, computer hard drives are a very good source of Neodymium magnets, these are the most powerfull you can get but can be dangerous, the following video is a good example and very graphic




Only a chicken bone but could be your finger, even the small ones can give you a nasty nip.

Decided today would be a good time to get the bike running, but one flat battery, so, out with the spare but some previous owner had badly damaged one of the contacts, now it was repair time






just used a pair of pliers and took them off.



Used a sharp wood chisel to remove the excess metal



Then very carefully drilled down the post tap a thread into it, managed to drill down about 3/4" which is more than enough for a stud to be fitted, this would be stronger then tapping the hole and fitting a bolt



First a primary tap followed up by a plug tap







Dave gave me this large syringe that is usefull for all sorts of jobs, one being blowing the swarf out of the tapped hole as it wasn,t a good idea to turn the battery upside down




Found an Allen stud making it easy to screw in




One stud in place and ready for the cable, hope this is usefull to anyone in the same predicament,





Regards Doc Cox

Well thought out Doc, would not of thought about doing that myself.
By the way have you seen the questions I put on Dave's mail re 6 volt batteries etc???

Good repair job Doc 

Good repair, new batteries don't come cheap.

 For getting work done today, I have only managed to trying to get over the bad hangover from yesterday's New Years party.

Good job done Doc.  love to see your way of thinking, coming to life in a thread, money saving expert . com has nothing on you.

Thanks Guys, but, I,m just a tight fisted old git really   

Doc Cox wrote:

Thanks Guys, but, I,m just a tight fisted old git really   

Really?? I'd have never guessed? 

Would screwing a screw that penetrstes metal work?

Hi Sapper, if you mean a self tapper the answer is yes, but, I would advise drilling a pilot hole first to  avoid splitting the lead or damaging the battery when winding the self tapper in.

Ah yes, that would help. Good tip Cox cheers

Good little mod there Doc, money saver for sure. Thats one to remember 

Great way of saving a damaged battery Doc, well done.

Another excellent mod,well done Nigel.

Excellent bit of work, well done Sir.

Have finally dug a spare swinging arm out of the caravan to strip down for refurbishment and coating, the retaining pin for the shock absorber is a very unusual set up, there are no signs of any retaining bolts or pins, looks like it was just hammered in, the shock bush was totally seized on the shaft but managed to free it by drilling some holes in each side and then working it with WD 40 followed by engine oil




This is the only hole that may have had a retaining pin but the other Virago is the same with no sign of anything in the hole




Did try heat on the frame but couldn,t go too wild so as to avoid damage to the shock absorber so out with the good old hacksaw




This did the trick, will just use a couple of 1/16" stainless washers to make up the metal lost by the hacksaw

That's a strange set up Doc?, Perhaps someone else had tried removing it before hand without success and left the retaining pins/clips off?.

A good possibility Sim, could be it was an interference fit and had a washer and splitpin in there for peace of mind, will look into it a bit further.

Have just trawled the net and there was just a single split pin in there, so I assume the pin was an interference fit.

How unusual, egineering is not even my weak point so, I'm clueless anyway.

As you say, just one cotter pin. Seems a bit odd.

http://www.cmsnl.com/yamaha-xv750k-virago-1983_model8941/partslist/D-11.html#results

Good Morning 

Started the Virago up last week, was a bit cackly where I hadn,t tightened up the rear exhaust pipe flange enough, so, time for a modification, the rear pipe can be awkward to fit as you have to locate it by feel rather than by sight as it is at a funny angle, 






So, out with the hacksaw...






Bolt the pipe back on, much easier to hold and fit...





Into the box of handy exhaust bits...




A nice bit of stainless, ideal for an inner sleeve...







On with the other half, have used the pipe clamp that came with the exhaust...





Over and fully clamped...





This is where my Snap On cranked head spanners came in really handy...






The bike now sound a lot better, will be putting three videos up later for you to see and hear the difference   

Nice work, did you really use a hacksaw to cut it that straight!! if so you have amazing skills

Think Doc has a bandsaw Justin? 
But if you set your self the task out properly you can do just as good a job with a hacksaw but you need to use tape to complete the 'ring' so you cut up to that otherwise you end up with a wobbly cut which is a bitch to file/grind flat to attach to another section cleanly.

Well he should have said "band saw" Cheat

I said I think doc has a bandsaw I did'nt say he used it Justin & reading between the pictures it says Hacksaw, my wrong sorry.
But as I said it is possible by hand to cut a perfectly straight line with preperation.

The answers to your questions are on page 6  
https://www.suzuki800.com/t1849p250-project-virago

Damn this man is clever, just spent the last 10 min reading/watching the exhaust being built last year! major talent

Had to do some more crafting   , when doing the initial fire up I wanted to check the wiring loom to make sure all was OK So, decided to make a small auxillery fuel tank that can be used with other projects. Had an old Gunk tin that looked suitable and an old petrol tin that was badly corroded and not repairable so this donated its screw on petrol cap and neck...




Prised out the old plastic cap and soldered on the screw neck...




Here is a selection of brass fittings that are handy for these type of jobs and the fuel tap is one of three off Ebay...




The top of the gauze on the tap had been damaged so it was cut down and resoldered...






The idea was to use a large washer to spread the load and a nut inside sealed with PTFE (Plurotetraflouroethane... Plumbers tape ) but this leaked...







So it was back to the selection of Brass fittings...
The chain hangers are old household plug prongs soldered to the side and the chain and hook came off a hanging basket that had been thrown out... 





This inline gas fitting was ideal to donate one of its female fittings and this was bored out with a taper drill to allow the filter to go through...






This was then soldered into the base, also had to run a seam of solder round the bottom flange as this was also weeping...






This set up didn,t leak and was fine for the next fire up,