What a drag

 

Link

With Tiger2 now a fast fading memory and funds in the bank, I can definitely see a time when Tabitha will be back on the road. Before that, Murphy’s Law struck again. 

I spent the first part of the weekend removing the original rear shock and to my disappointment, found the drag link was broken. A little research on line, first to see how much one would cost and then how easy it would be to remove, revealed many posts on many forums across multiple Hinkley models, all suffering the same fate. One particular post was interesting as it described the battle to have it replaced under warranty. 

The claim failed with Triumph stating the likely cause was the pinch bolt being tightened up too much. The interesting point was the local Triumph dealer agreeing to complete the work as a gesture of good will. Are Triumph trying to hide something? I don’t know but it doesn’t help me with a 27-year-old bike, even if it has been standing for many years.

While I found a few replacements on that well known auction site, all 2^nd hand, and for reasonable money, I also found that Fowlers of Bristol have them for less than £100 and as I’m replacing the shock, I thought it best to buy new, especially as there’s no guarantee a 2^nd hand part will last, given the number of failures I’ve read about. Add in needle bearings and seals and it came to just shy of £120.

I have a YSS rear shock on order from Brook Suspension and a quick look at my account shows it’s on back order, as is the Drag link. I’ve sent off my fork legs to Dynasurf who have a 4-5 week turnaround, so there’s not that much to do in the garage.

What I did do was cut the chain off as it needs replacing anyway and that gave me a little more access to remove the broken drag link. Not an easy task as the exhaust gets in the way and the bolt, tightened to 100nm was a PITA to undo. Once off, there was more cleaning to do. I also removed the rear brake and brake lines ready for when I’ve got more funds to buy them.

Yes, I know I’ve got the cash from the sale of Tiger2, but all the suspension work that needs doing ate into those funds and more.

Product review

I may have mentioned that I used brake cleaner to clean up the fork internals once I’d stripped them down and I’d used a rather expensive product from Halfords. There’s a discount warehouse not far from me and last time I was there (pre-lockdown) I noticed they had aerosol brake cleaner for £1 a can. While I probably wpouldn’t use cheap stuff on brakes, it is quite an effective cleaner for other manky parts, such as suspension parts. This is not a review of the brake cleaner, rather the engine cleaner I found on their shelves, also £1. I figured for that price, it’s worth a punt.

The instructions are clear, shake the can, spray it on and rinse off with a pressure washer or hose (make sure none of it goes into any drain) I’m not sure where they think it will drain if you use a pressure washer or hose but there you go.

Now underneath and behind the drag link, it was pretty manky, cobwebs, mud, road grime and discarded chain oil. This is an ideal place to test this engine cleaner, so having given it a good shake, I sprayed liberal amounts of said spray all over the manky bits. I left it for a couple of minutes then armed with a n old toothbrush, gave everything a good scrum. I have a spray container in the garage, the type you use for flowers in the garden, you know the type that has a pump on the top so you can pressurise it and an adjustable nozzle so it either mists everything or applies a single, high pressure jet. I usually have parts washer fluid in it. I used this in place of a hose to rinse off the engine cleaner then stood back to reveal… nothing. It hadn’t even removed the cobwebs, let alone the oil. In fact the cheap brake cleaner & a cloth did a far better job. I shouldn’t have expected much for the price of it. Yer pays yer money, yer takes yer choice.

Wheels

I've been thinking about the wheels over the last few weeks. They're in a bit of a state and while they're still round and I'm sure would work well, they loom like s**t. The question is what do I do about them, do I have them resprayed, powder coated or do I have have a go at them myself. I've wathced a few videos on Youtube, specifically from Delboy's Garage and while I think I could do a good job with good preparation, when I add in my time, materials and the likelyhood of not getting the finish I'd like, I think I'll have them refurbished professionally. There's a place in Peterborough, not too far from me that can do them for around £80 per wheel.

I need to remove the discs, bearings and sprocket to prepare them before I take them in, and as funds are tight at the moment, I'm not planning on getting them done for a while, so I've left the bearings in for now.

There's not much else I can do for the moment, at least until I get all the parts I've recently ordered. then, hopefully I can start rebuilding instead of the seemingly endless round fo stripping, cleaning and cobweb removal.