Hifi & Tuning Show Oulu September 2016 - American cars

American cars were also a minority this year. Here's few photos of the ones exhibited at the event.

1930 Chevrolet Hot Rod

Hifi & Tuning Show Oulu September 2016 - Motorcycles

Here's couple of photos of motorcycles displayed at the event.

1998 Honda CB1300 X4 Turbo

Hifi & Tuning Show Oulu September 2016 - Japanese import cars

Today I attended one of our local trade fairs called Hifi & Tuning Show held in Ouluhalli, Oulu. It is an annual event meant mainly for modified cars. First time the event was held in early 2000s. You can find more info of the event from their facebook page.

I wanted to test out a new camera, Sony DSC-HX90V, so I took quite a lot of photos during my stay. I will make separate posts of the event which will cover cars from different regions.

Honda Civic Type-R

Yamaha RD 350 F2 '88 - Part 5 - Rear suspension linkage maintenance

I did some small maintenance jobs while I had my bike dismantled and taken to pieces when I was modifying the rear frame. One of those jobs was to replace worn bushings, collars and seals from the rear suspension linkage with new ones. After cleaning and dismantling the linkage I found one corroded collar (part #: 90387-144H4), one worn bushing (90386-20134) and punch of broken oil seals (93109-20076 & 93109-18020).

Since my RD is quite old I had to purchase replacement collar and bushing from eBay where you can find a nice collection of NOS (New Old Stock) parts for sale. Common parts like oil seals I try to buy from my local store which sells industrial products. Most of the common sized bearings and oil seal are usually in stock so you don't have wait for them. This time I wasn't able to find the right sized oil seals for the linkage arm so I ordered them from my local Yamaha parts dealer. Dimensions for linkage arm oil seals (93109-20076) are 20 x 27 x 5 mm and drop link oil seals (93109-18020) 18 x 24 x 3 mm.

After getting all the right parts it was just a matter of greasing them with multipurpose grease and putting back together.

Parted rear suspension linkage.

NOS collar (90387-144H4) and bushing (90386-20134).

New oil seals for linkage arm (93109-20076)...

... and drop links (93109-18020).

Old versus New (Old Stock).

Yamaha RD 350 F2 '88 - Part 4 - Simple bolt-on mods

One thing that needed changing in my RD was the narrow handlebar it came with. The old handlebar I had on the bike was only 740 mm wide. Fortunately my local motorcycle parts store had a nice low and significantly wider tapered handlebar made by Emgo for sale with a discount. Emgo's are quite a bit cheaper than let's say handlebars made by Renthal or Magura but with a 50 percent discount this one was bargain not to miss.

I had a problem with fitting stock control switches on the new handlebar since they were too wide. Fatbar handlebars tend to have quite narrow control length since they are mostly used on motocross and enduro bikes. I had to buy a pair of slim bar ends and choose a narrow set of grips to make most of the narrow control length and widen it a bit. Fortunately it helped and everything fitted at the end. Luckily stock cables were also long enough and I didn't have to do any mods to them. You can find those slim bar ends from eBay if you have a similar problem. 

I also wanted to replace those old mirrors I had on the bike. Agila makes a nice looking and cheap pair of mirrors which fitted nicely without any adapters.

New fatbar made by Emgo (7075 CR low bend).

Pair of Slim Bar Ends made by Bike It.

Pair of Agila mirrors.

Left side mirror unboxed.

Pair of Domino grips.

New parts installed. Total width 860 mm with slim bar ends.

Closeup.

GoPro Hero with a handlebar mount?

Yamaha RD 350 F2 '88 - Part 3 - New battery Exide EB5L-B 12V 5Ah

When I bought the bike previous owner of it said that current battery in the it doesn't want keep its charge. While driving you definitely noticed it since headlight on it shined quite dim and indicators kept flashing slowly since they didn't get enough current. After going through one of our local parts dealers web site I found a suitable battery to replace the old one. 

I chose Exide EB5L-B (12V 5Ah) which is 120 mm long, 60 mm wide and 130 mm high. It has only 5 Ah but it is still plenty enough for a bike like my RD 350. In a bike like this battery is mainly used to run lights. Since it doesn't have a electric starter it doesn't really need that beefy battery ether. Since it is a conventional battery you need to fill it with acid before installing it.

DISCLAIMER: If you're not 100 % sure of what you're doing don't attempt anything you're not trained to do. Battery acid is a extremely dangerous substance and should not be handled without care. Remember to use proper safety equipment and get acquainted with all the info and instructions provided by the battery manufacturer before attempting anything.

Here's everything what package contains:
battery, acid bottle, overflow hose, bolts and nuts for terminals,
funnels for acid filling and instructions.

Instructions for acid filling on the side of the acid bottle.

First step was to remove red vent caps.

Next step was to install funnels. I also removed red exhaust cap
and added overflow hose.

I removed plastic film around the acid bottle and
pushed it upside down against the funnels.
Remember to leave seals to the acid bottle before filling.
Funnels will puncture them when you push the acid bottle against them.

Lastly I installed back the red vent caps and
added bolts and nuts to positive and negative terminals.
Battery is now ready to be installed.

But before installing it I wanted to test
what kind of voltage I get from it after filling. 

Voltage kept rising quite high.

New battery in place and ready to be tested.

Yamaha RD 350 F2 '88 - Part 2 - Back to stock seat and side panels

After driving a bit over 300 kilometers with my 88' RD 350 F2 I felt I needed to do something to the seating position of the bike. Rear frame of the bike had been modded a bit by the previous owner to get the seating position as low as possible. Fuel tank and seat had also been moved a bit forward. He had changed the angle of the rear frame, upper frame tubes, seat and fuel tank mounts. 

After thinking about it for a while I decided go with the OEM look and buy some stock second hand parts to replace the old and modded parts. List of parts included an air box, inner rear fender, left and right side panels and a seat. Fortunately I managed find some decent/good conditioned parts which matched the color scheme of my bike. Unfortunately I didn't take as much pictures as usual when I fitted all of the parts and unmodified the rear frame but here's few of the end result.

American Car Show Oulu May 2016

Went to see some show cars with my friends last weekend. Here's a small collage of pictures from the show. I used a loaned pocket camera so image quality isn't the greatest. American Car Show is an annual event in Oulu and put together by American Car Club Oulu which was established in September 17 1979.

You can find out more of the show from their Facebook page and website (in Finnish):

https://www.facebook.com/americancarshowoulu/

http://accoulu.fi/

Yamaha RD 350 F2 '88 - Part 1 - New daily driver for summer

It has been a while since my last post but last week I picked up a new bike for a daily driver as my other bikes are still in pieces. Rear frame of it was modified to fit a shorter person so I'm planning on  changing it back to the original look. I'll also try to make it look a bit better for my taste so stay tuned.

Some specifications of my new ride:

Make and model:     Yamaha RD 350 F2
Year:                            1988
Engine:                       Parallel twin cylinder, liquid cooled, 2-stroke
Capacity:                   347 cc
Bore x stroke:            64 mm x 54 mm
Compression ratio:   6,0 : 1
Max power:               56 hp at 9000 rpm
Max torque:               41,2 Nm at 8800 rpm
Transmission:            6 speed
Drive:                         Chain
Fuel system:              2 x 26 mm Mikuni carburetors
Fuel capacity:           18 litres
Front suspension:     Air assisted 35 mm telescopic forks with variable damping and 140 mm
                                     wheel travel
Rear suspension:      Rising-rate Monocross suspension with 5-way preload and 100 mm
                                     wheel travel
Front brakes:             2 x 260 mm brake disc with 2 piston calipers
Rear brake:                260 mm brake disc with 1 piston caliper
Front tire:                   90/90-18
Rear tire:                    110/90-18
Dry/wet weight:      142 kg / 156 kg

Some pictures I took today:

Bates style headlight and custom stainless steel brackets - Suzuki T250J

I wanted a small side mounted headlight for my T250J. It had to be E-marked. I found a suitable one from ebay and ended up buying some rubber inserts with it. The headlight is approximately 155 mm wide with spacers and 110 mm deep without glass. I found some relatively small indicators from my local motorcycle parts store.

I made some custom brackets out of stainless steel sheet. I started by creating few prototypes with a modeling software. After a few models I ended up with a simple one seen in the pictures below. 

Rubber inserts were a bit too big so I shortened them with a knife. I also switch the stock headlight screws to stainless steel cylinder head cap screws which I had to order from ebay since I couldn't find them from my local shops nearby.

5 3/4" Bates style side mount headlight

41 mm rubber inserts for headlight brackets/mounts

Dice Winker Mini Arrow black indicators

Assembly and parts list

Dimensions for clamps

Dimensions for brackets

Cut and drilled blanks

Bend parts with shortened rubber inserts

5/16" UNF A2 stainless steel cylinder head cap screws with

stock headlight screws

Closeup