Wrench turning tarp

The picture above is from the early days of the rebuild - taken one year ago. A lot of the work on the bike has been done in delicate environment. As oil change on vintage wooden floors or valve tuning on the kitchen table. As a designer I get in contact with a lot of interesting manufacturers, and new materials is developed every year. I just found out about a rubber tarp, made from recycled car and motorcycle tyres. The use of it today is floors in stables and decks on aluminum boats. I have a shipping on the way to my office. The plan is to start producing recycled rubber tarps for motorcycle builders. Specially cut to fit under a bike when you need to protect the floor - or if you have the habit of breaking down in nature. No more missing bolts in the lawn - no more oil in nature or on the sandwich. The tarp will be made in different sizes and models. The goal is to have a small production running before christmas.

Bar end mirror

Finaly the bar end mirror is complete. Custom made for the bike. I had a lot of trouble finding a design that did not add to the width of the bike. With triumph grips, measuring 16 centimeters, there is no need for a mirror that hangs outside the bike. It is easy to move the hand on the grip in order to get full view of the world behind you. The connection to the clipon is two metal tubes with a diagonal ends. The inner tube and the rod to the mirror is threaded. When the mirror rod is turned around the clip on the metal tubes presses together and expand.

Trying to mount my camera on the bike - but the movies gets blur. The positive thing is that the valves finaly seals perfect to the seats. Compression is now over 150 psi. And I have 200km to go before the engine is tuned in perfectly. The vibrations is there, and the roar is comming back. And the rear view mirror spinns like a propeller when I hit 90 km/h:) Need to tighten some screws even more...

On the road

The engine is running, and I still got a few weeks before the first snow will fall i Sweden. This is the scenery that made me build my motorcycle - a small paved countryside road, autum leaves and a little bit of mist in the air. Nothing else to do than breaking in a new engine...


If I add up all the tips on the internet about breaking in engines the result is useless. Some say; be extremly carefull the first 100km. Some say; beat the engine hard. Some say; never idle. I say; this is not a racer. I want the engine to respond to my wishes. I want the bike to be easy to drive. So I´m mixing the Yamaha instructions of taking it easy with the forged piston demands of beating. The formula of it all is avoiding lowest and highest revs. Use the throttle midrange. Use engine brakes a lot to distribute the oil evenly. Change oil and filter after 500km. - I will keep You informed if the engine blow up...


There is though a question mark. I got 150psi of compression but the horsepower is not there. And the bike does not sound as much as before. But it runs very steady and precise - nothing sounds wrong. I am posting on several forums to find out if this is ok. There is a small leakage of oil from the kick indicator, so I will take the engine apart again during the winter. I just want to tune in the piston in the autum breeze.

Assembly sentimental

Is there such a diagnoses? Can´t help but feeling a little sad while putting the motor together. I have got so use to the interrior of the engine that I´m allready missing the looks of the machine behind the covers. I hope the sound and the revs of the motorcycle will make me forget.


The new piston and cylinder sleeve is shining. It is not likely that the 400cc engine will reach 10:1 compression - as the 500cc will do with this piston. But I hope that it will make a little difference.

Valve mounting. The assembly is done with a custom made tool - to avoid accidents. The dismounting was made a week ago with a simple wood workshop clamp and a short metal tube.

Lapping valves

New valve guides in place, but no grinding tool in the workshop. It took me the whole night to adjust the valve seats with coarse paste. After six hours two fine, red, full circles appeared. Time to go home and rest the palms. To morrow it is time to do the final lapping with fine paste. When I decided to replace the valves and adjust the valve seats I did not know if it was necessary. Didn´t have any idea if they were worn or not. But when I push the new parts into possition I can see the difference, and the guides are much tighter - no need to measure. The old valves were broken in all possible ways. Happy to find the reason for the lack of compression.

Speed cable

My engine trimmer is driving motorcycles as well - good to know. But he drove a little bit to much with his ribs a few days ago. He broke one and cant trim my motor until next week. In the meantime I´ve been working with the speedometer cable problem. I wanted to put my only gauge in the centerline of the bike, but there is no room because of the head light. I could have made more room by moving the light a bit forward, but that gives the impression of the light driving on its own - a bit ahead of the rest of the bike. As a designer I know that good design is measured in millimeters and a good day´s work. The 5 1/2 inch head light is not big - but it is in the way at exactly the wrong spot. Two holes were the only way to solve the problem. I used two rubber bushings, left over from the top triple tree, to guide the speedometer cable through the holes. Absolutely no room left over in the headlight housing. Had to remove all the standard connectors - use simple cable lugs - bend the H4 bulb pins in different directions - in order to get all the parts together.


The textile on the gauge is a linnen cloth from the local paper mill...

A Kedo moment

The package has arrived. Finaly it is time to put things together again. The people at Kedo has a good tradition of keeping all of their products in stock = quick delivery. They also have the habit of putting candy in the packages to bring the unpacking to a true Kedo-moment.


While the top and cylinder is taken care of by the professionals at Eliasson´s racing, I´m getting low behind the front light. The tt handlebar (of my own design) has been replaced by clip on bars from kedo. To fit in with the worn surfaces of the rest of the bike I used the heat resistant paint again. It creates an iron like structure to the otherwise shining crome of the new handle bars.

The speedometer is moved to a center position, and lowered to the level of the top triple tree. The down side to the compact design is that I now have to drill two holes in my bates headlight to lead the speedometer cable to the wheel...


The tiny electrical system and the small throttle handle is good to have when the angle of the clip on is adjusted. Even with this small components I needed to restrict the steering angle with a few degrees.