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BusyLittleShop

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Posts posted by BusyLittleShop

  1. Hiya Johnnie...

    Even though Freddie Spencer had an RC45 during his High-Performance
    Riding School days he would instead dice with the students on his
    VFR... I think that the 5th gen VFR (98 to 01) has more sport and less
    tour than the other generations...

     

    Freddie Spencer's RC45 serial number 6...
     

    FreddieSpencerRC45.JPG

    • Like 1
  2. 1 hour ago, fabio222 said:

     

    Now, to the heart of the bike, the engine. I've read that Honda used the RC45 tooling to make the engine for the 5th gen VFR 800 (and this meant there would be no more RC45s as the tooling had to be modified to such an extent that it couldn't be easily changed back). That 5th gen had gear driven cams mounted on the side of the engine. 

     

     

    You're correct... Honda did used the RC45 tooling to make the engine for the 5th gen VFR 800... specifically adding bearing support structure to carry a swingarm pivot...

     

    My friend Makota San previous job was Chief Engineer Honda R&D who
    invented Honda's VTEC... he calls VTEC "his baby" and recalls his boss
    being super skeptical of the idea working at all...
    gallery_3131_5511_17541.jpg

    Makota San down on cannery row...
    gallery_3131_5511_48694.jpg

     

    • Like 1
  3. On 2/21/2024 at 7:27 AM, RLoibl said:

    Looking to buy a K&N air filter,

     

    Hiya Ron... the orange BMC will pass more air than a K&N... but you might need to remap the ECU... K&N are designed to pass just as much air as the stock paper and thus no remapping... 

     

     

    800VFRBMC.JPG

    800VFRKandN.JPG

  4. Understanding how an air box works and the reasons why a stock box is a safer bet...

     

    If you have ever had the gas tank off your late-model sportbike, you
    will notice that the front of the fuel tank doesn’t hold fuel; it
    holds an airbox. In the old days, when you bought a new bike, it had
    an air-filter case attached to feed the carburetors or the
    fuel-injection intakes. All the sharp, young guys would immediately
    rip off the filter case and replace it with four sock filters. Reduced
    airflow resistance. Much better performance.

    One day in the late 1980s, they began to rip off the airboxes of their
    new bikes and their engines fell on their faces. They lost a bunch of
    performance. “This can’t be happening! Putting on sock filters always
    worked before.” But it turns out the industry found a way to boost
    performance by making what is known as a resonant airbox.

    We have all in an idle moment blown across the mouth of a beer bottle
    and heard the "whoooo" of the bottle resonance. As air goes across the
    mouth of the bottle, it creates a low pressure, which causes air to
    flow up. That deflects the air away from the mouth of the bottle. Then
    the air goes back in, the airflow from your mouth goes back across,
    and the cycle repeats, rapidly fluttering and producing that deep
    tone. The compressible air in the bottle is acting as a spring, and
    the slug of air in the neck of the bottle is the mass that vibrates
    against that spring.

    This intake airbox from a fuel injected Honda is just a glorified beer
    bottle. Instead of the engine blowing across the mouth of it, its four
    throttle bodies are sucking from the box, pulling its pressure down.
    Air rushes in through the ducts in the fairing to fill up that low
    pressure. The next cylinder sucks the bottle pressure down and more
    air rushes in and restores the pressure. If the volume of the box and
    the mass of the air in the intake pipes are correctly chosen, the box
    will hum like the beer bottle.

    The trick is to get your engine to draw air from the box when the
    pressure is up and then the box refills when the pressure is down. And
    that is why ripping the airboxes off and putting on old-time sock
    filters resulted in a reduction in performance. In a specific zone of
    rpm, a resonant airbox can boost your engine’s torque by 10 percent.
    That’s worth having!


    My friend Stephen called long distance from England because he just
    installed a $900.00 HRC air box on his RC45 and saw 120HP on the
    dyno... mmmmm... together we wondered if the stock box be modified???

    gallery_3131_51_178065.jpg


    We found that stock RC45 throttle bodies are 46mm but the air box was
    restricted to 40mm... no problem... I'll bore the air box out to 47mm
    on the milling machine...
    gallery_3131_51_12643.jpg


    I drew up plans for 47mm bell mouth based on the stock 40mm bell
    mouths and purchased a block of black Delrin...
    gallery_3131_51_61101.jpg


    I'm not happy doing repetitious work but I labored long hours to
    machine 4 each bell mouths with my best accuracy...
    gallery_3131_51_60103.jpg


    Don't you love when a plan comes together especially if it turns out
    perfect???
    gallery_3131_51_73307.jpg


    Now I had an unrestricted air box with my own 47mm bell mouths... it
    was the best I could do to replicate HRC $900.00 air box... not to
    mention I wanted to keep  my home made K&N filter...
    gallery_3131_51_44329.jpg


    Time to put the Mod to the test on the dyno... this is Dave at Chandelle
    Motorsports...
    gallery_3131_51_181600.jpg


    No joy... I lost 1.8HP on the dyno... so bigger is not better in this
    case... a whole week worth of work shot down in flames... it seems
    Honda got the intake velocity right for a stock  pipe after all... air
    boxes are like tuned instruments... alter the holes and the tune
    just makes sour notes and power suffers...
    gallery_3131_51_28985.jpg

    Mr.RC45 fueling is not the problem... my air box will remain stock
    because our air box works like a finely tuned instrument... any wild
    ass guess mod disrupts this highly engineered resonant to where to
    you're producing nothing but sour notes... The airbox inlet tubes, or
    “horns”, are specifically designed to provide a resonance that can
    increase the total airflow by up to 10-15%. Second guessing these can
    cause the engine to loose power and increase the intake noise as in my
    case...
    3MfK43U.jpg

    RC45's stock intake horns are there for homologation purposes only and
    do not directly feed into the airbox only the HRC intakes feed ram air
    into the airbox...
    IMG_0372.JPG
    #18Crated007.JPG

     

    • Like 2
    • Thanks 2

  5. Mileage is a loose standard because wear depends on so many variables...

    A more accurate standard of chain wear is after the 3rd adjustment because that
    is undeniable evidence that the factory installed grease is beginning to
    fail to lube the critical pin roller junction hidden behind the X ring... the
    length of the chain is growing because of this metal to metal wear... I can
    not call a chain serviceable that is grinding metal... it's like saying that a
    dry bearing that runs ruff is acceptable... the net result is another 2 to
    3% drop in RWHP as more energy is lost grinding metal behind the X
    ring...

    This is what we don't see behind the X rings... metal to metal wear
    every time we adjust the chain that eats into our engine's available
    HP... a new pin measures 206.5 and wears down to 205.5 at the 8K mile
    mark... looks good to the naked eye but multiply that 1 thousand of an
    inch times 108 links and you have 108 thousands of an inch wear or
    about the range of the  green marks provided by Honda's wear gauge...
    202.8 show the very visible wear at the 12K mile mark... the pins are
    turning red from extreme heat of grinding dry metal... a chain in this
    condition may consume up to 6 to 8% of our RWHP... not to mention it
    may snap into and cause case damage...

    gallery_3131_51_50064.jpg

    Some manufactures provided a handy guide to monitor chain wear... stay with
    in the green and you'll be looking for a new chain and sprockets at the 8 to
    10K mile mark...

    gallery_3131_51_39609.jpg

    What we are lubing are external roller and between the roller and the
    sprockets (red area in my drawing)... we are not lubing the X rings
    nor behind the X rings so any oil applied in that effort is a waste
    and will only fling off...

    14746956046_fb75bdf189.jpg


    We are lubing the external roller and between the roller and the
    sprockets (red area in my drawing)... we are not lubing the X rings
    nor behind the X rings so any oil applied in that effort is wasted
    fling off...

    14746956046_fb75bdf189.jpg

    • Like 2
    • Thanks 1
  6. General info...

     

    Trouble shooting Chris's RC45 continuous high idle the culprit proved
    to be air leaks... you see that on a fuel injection engine *any* air that
    bleeds past the throttle bodies the map just increases the correct
    amount of fuel... the result is high continuous idle... make sure all
    the rubber hoses are connected and in good shape... make sure all the
    intake boots are tight and in good flexible shape... if the rubbers
    are hard and cracked its time for replacement...

     

    gallery_3131_51_651212.jpg

    • Like 1
    • Thanks 1
  7. Welcome Charles...
    Before Mr.RC45 I had a love affair with my 86 VF500F Interceptor
    bought new from Golden Gate Cycles... I modified it extensively...
    Dymags... Billet Clutch basket... Exhaust and even converted the chain
    to belt... This became famous Belt-0-Ceptor... I racked up 98,000
    trouble free miles... I sold it to my Air Force buddy up in White City
    Oregon...

    ce5BVi3.jpg

    gallery_3131_51_14630.jpg

    Home made Billet Clutch Basket
    gallery_3131_51_1687.jpg

    My custom dash with Oh Shit warning...
    gallery_3131_51_36605.jpg


    Sometimes being the littlest bike among the Big-Bad-Motors of Death
    can be a recipe for bruised egos...
    qBUdODI.jpg

     

    • Like 1
    • Haha 1
  8. The BLS method of removing grips without destroying them...

    1)slip a rat tail comb under the grip...

    2)trickle alcohol down the length of the gap created by the comb...

    3)remove comb and twist the grip to work the alcohol in between grip
    and throttle barrel...

     

    gallery_3131_51_940.jpg

     

    Best grip I found is Spider Grips...

    Spider Grips feature durable variable density elastomers, patent
    pending shaped boundary layers with isolated secondary layers, energy
    dispersing flanges, and a multi-faceted geometric surface area. Spider
    Grips are manufactured in Taiwan and distributed by Pit Bull.

    Ride with Spider Grips and you'll feel less vibration, which in turn
    means less fatigue. You can give up the death grip hold, so you won't
    get arm pump and you'll be able to ride longer. Special grip material
    works great, even when wet.

     

    RC45SpiderGrip02.JPG.523788c8a40984a20e34ec9c8aeb13d9.JPG

     

     

    SpiderGrip2.JPG

    SpiderGrip3.JPG

    • Like 1
  9. STEERING HEAD BEARINGS

    If your steering head bearings are too tight the bike will weave and
    not seek its own center... if your steering head bearings are loose
    you'll notice a pronounce clunk during braking... I don't use torque
    figures rather I raise the front wheel off the ground and tighten the
    steering head bearings until the bars lock then I back off the nut
    until the bars free wheel with a slight drag... with this method you
    find that sweat spot and avoid over tightening and under tightening
    even if you upgrade to taper roller bearings...

     

    • Like 1
  10. Lower cost by skipping the replacement of worn sprockets are for owners who close their wallets with
    a Chinese Torque wrench...

     

    We don't have to guess about wear because Honda provided a handy
    guide to monitor chain wear... stay with in the green and you'll be looking
    for a new chain and sprockets at the 8 to 12K mile mark...

    gallery_3131_51_39609.jpg

    • Haha 1
  11. On 8/17/2023 at 6:52 PM, Escobar said:

     So is my oil pump failing? Will oil change fix it?
     

     

     

    No and no but here is how to check your Red oil light...

     

    1) Key on and Red Light on...

    2)Crank the engine and note how many revolutions it takes for the oil
    pump to extinguish the Red light... have you noticed that after an oil
    change it takes many revolutions before enough oil fills the empty
    filter???

    3)Establish a warm and steady idle...

    4)Stop engine by activating the kill switch and note the time it takes
    for the red light (0 psi) to illuminate...

    5)If the red light illuminates before engine reaches full stop suspect
    a faulty pressure relief valve... If the Red light extinguishes
    immediately at full stop or it takes noticeable more time for the oil
    to bleed from the rod and crank bearings... system is normal and you
    may ride as is...

     

    Mobil 1 30 grade auto oil at 203F and flowing at 10 psi on my digital oil gauge mod which is just about perfect...

    jXs89Gs.jpg

  12. 4 hours ago, twistednoble said:

    I'm actually curious what @Lorne can enlighten me with about worn clutch baskets. 

     

     

     

    What you may have is normal clutch knock at idle... you see over time
    slop develops allowing the gear teeth to knock about and thus the
    noise... grab the clutch lever and the inner basket helps align the
    outer basket and the noise deadens... the only cure is to eliminate
    the slop with new clutch parts...

    • Like 1
  13. On 8/12/2023 at 3:23 PM, Fastdruid said:

     

    1) The slave cylinder (and the master cylinder etc). 

    2) The oil. 

     

     

    Manufactures warn owners that our gears can't shift smoothly if our clutch is part
    way engaged... check for unwanted clutch drag...


    Here are the steps how to check and eliminate unwanted clutch drag...


    1 Place your bike on the center stand...

    2 Start engine and establish a steady idle at 212ºF (operating temp)...

    3 Squeeze in the clutch lever and shift into first gear...

    4 Continue holding in the clutch lever and note if the rear wheel coast to stop or not...
    if it continues spinning that's unwanted drag... adjust...


    To adjust a cable equipped bike turn the small knob clock wise (out)
    1/4 turn and test for clutch drag... if your bike is equipped with
    hydraulics bleed system for bubbles...


    Ultimately you want the rear wheel to coast to a stop when the engine
    is idling and first gear selected with the clutch lever is squeezed in...

     

     

  14. On 8/10/2023 at 11:24 AM, Fastdruid said:

     

    Suspect maybe oil so I'm going to change to another brand and see if that helps. If not then its new clutch time. 

     

    The holy trinity of science is 1)Reason 2)Observation 3)Experience...
    employing those tools we observe that the primary cause clutch slip
    are high mileage... mileage is the constant among all of the clutches
    that begin to slip... oil type is not a constant... 

     

    If you wish 100,000 mile clutch life then you have to invest is some
    good old sweat equity... first Mic them to determine if they are serviceable
    within the factory specifications...

     

    It's a fact that all motorcycle wet clutches will reach a point in
    their life and begin slipping... the first signs happen during WFO
    throttle (Wide Fooking Open)... Don't be surprised if you tear a part
    the clutch pack and note that the plate thickness is well within
    specifications listed in the shop manual... What you will notice is
    the glazed appearance on the surface on the friction plates...

     

     

    Inspect the friction plates for glazing... make sure you have plenty
    of material to work with... your shop manual states clutch thickness
    in thousands of an inch or mm...

     

    First removed the contaminants with Acetone... pick a hard surface to lay
    over a 600 grit black dry emery paper... rotate the clutch plate in a
    circle... you're just busting the glaze... don't get carried away
    remove too much material... You should end up with a friction plate
    looks dull like a new one as opposed to a shinny glazed one... recheck
    thickness...

    gallery_3131_51_129667.jpg


    Next check the pressure plates for bluing caused by localized heat...
    make sure they are not warped... consult the manual for a thickness
    range... now removed the contaminants with Acetone and wire wheeled
    them to erased the blue and also to generally scuff up the surface...
    you should end up with a dull surface free of Blue marks...

    gallery_3131_51_40098.jpg

  15. Thanks to you Miguel VFRD is unquestionable an outstanding site... The
    membership you have attracted is of the highest expertise... they know
    how to multiply V4 pleasure and divided V4 grief... It is indeed a joy
    to express an appreciation on behalf of that membership as well as my
    personal gratitude for your passion and participation... you will be
    missed my friend...

     

     

    HispanicSlammerLarryBubbas.JPG

    HispanicSlammerBeltSprocket .jpg

    MrRC45HispanicSlammer.JPG

    Picture251.jpg

    • Like 3
    • Thanks 1
  16. I learned the hard way that bigger is not always better when it comes to our air boxes...

     

    My friend Stephen called long distance from England because he just
    installed a $900.00 HRC air box on his RC45 and saw 120HP on the
    dyno... mmmmm... together we wondered if the stock box be modified???

    gallery_3131_51_178065.jpg


    We found that stock RC45 throttle bodies are 46mm but the air box was
    restricted to 40mm... no problem... I'll bore the air box out to 47mm
    on the milling machine...
    gallery_3131_51_12643.jpg


    I drew up plans for 47mm bell mouth based on the stock 40mm bell
    mouths and purchased a block of black Delrin...
    gallery_3131_51_61101.jpg


    I'm not happy doing repetitious work but I labored long hours to
    machine 4 each bell mouths with my best accuracy...
    gallery_3131_51_60103.jpg


    Don't you love when a plan comes together especially if it turns out
    perfect???
    gallery_3131_51_73307.jpg


    Now I had an unrestricted air box with my own 47mm bell mouths... it
    was the best I could do to replicate HRC $900.00 air box... not to
    mention I wanted to keep  my home made K&N filter...
    gallery_3131_51_44329.jpg


    Time to put the Mod to the test... this is Dave at Chandelle
    Motorsports...
    gallery_3131_51_181600.jpg


    No joy... I lost 1.8HP on the dyno... so bigger is not better in this
    case... a whole week worth of work shot down in flames... it seems
    Honda got the intake velocity right for a stock  pipe after all... air
    boxes are like tuned instruments... alter the holes and the tune
    suffers...
    gallery_3131_51_28985.jpg

    • Like 2
  17. On 11/10/2022 at 8:23 PM, squirrelman said:

    the #1 thing to avoid in oils is "energy saving" oil

     

     

    Negative...

     

    Our understanding of oil is not growing if we still warn against EC
    oil... because Energy Conserving is not additive... its an API test
    that this "oil MAY result is an overall saving of fuel in the vehicle
    fleet as a whole"... there is nothing in the oil to defeat a wet
    clutch in good working order...

     

    My RC45 has over 57K miles and those are miles not in moderation
    either... its a homologated race bike with a first gear good for 90mph...

    since 98 I've been running Mobil 1 5w30 Energy Conserving oil 365 days

    a year... with no clutch slippage due to oil...

     

     

    RC45Grade30.JPG

  18. 19 hours ago, Stray said:

    Otherwise distilled water is a better coolant than “coolant”. The only reason we mix water with other stuff is to stop internal corrosion. 

     

    True...

     

    Another way to prop up your prize for maintenance is a stool of correct height...

     

     

    ClutchFix3.JPG

    ClutchFix2.JPG

  19. When it comes to choosing a coolant just pick the color dye you prefer as they are all about the same amount of glycol and de-ionzed water...

     

    Pro Honda HP Coolant 50/50 Premix 49% Propylene Glycol 50% demineralized water Green dye

     

    Engine Ice Hi-Performance Coolant is pre-mixed Propylene Glycol with de-ionized water with blue dye

     

    Belray MotoChill  pre-mixed Propylene Glycol with de-ionized water with blue dye

     

    Prestone Xtreme Sport Prediluted Motorcycle Coolant Propylene Glycol 50% demineralized water with red dye

     

    Dexcool 50% Propylene Glycol and demineralized water with orange dye...

     

    I don't recommend Water Wetter for the street because in 6 months the steel
    impeller on the Honda water pump begins to show rust... I only recommend it
    for track use and when you return to street drain the Wetter and go back to
    normal coolant with rust inhibitors...

     

    Troubleshooting High Temps
    If you see *continuous* temps higher than 220ºF or below 180ºF then
    trouble shooting is in order:

    Continuous engine temps above 220ºF or 104ºC is also a problem and the proper
    order of items to trouble shoot are:

     

    1)Faulty radiator cap... system should hold 1.1 pressure ratio...
    2)Insufficient coolant...
    3)Passages blocked in the radiator, hose or water jacket...
    4)Air in the system...
    5)Thermostat stuck closed...
    6)Faulty temp meter or thermo sensor...
    7)Faulty fan...
    8)Faulty fan switch...

     

     

    • Thanks 1
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