A few weeks ago I had a chance to go back to my parents house to visit and use some of my larger shop equipment that would be a real pain to move to the apartment building. One of my long time projects that has been buzzing around my head included creating a brand new brake lever pivot shaft since the original was seized, and could not be removed with heat, force, or lubrication.
I was completely clueless on what to use for steel or even where to get a new shaft, so why not make one, right? My good friend Frankie handed down boxes of old motorcycle parts to me for just such an occasion! It didn't take long to find an old engine mounting bolt to turn down and create a new brake shaft.
Above is the brake shaft that I powder coated with a cheap Harbor Freight system.
As you can see above, there was absolutely no way for me to reuse the existing shaft. It was completely destroyed just trying to get it to move.
I first brought it over to my friend Chad's house to try and get it loose. We tried brute force with hammers and hardened steel spikes. When that failed we moved onto some heat. It wasn't long after Chad pulled out the Oxy-Acetalyne torch that the shaft was glowing a cherry red. We tried force again to no effect.
Obviously I was a little frustrated, so I went over to Frankie's house the next weekend. Frankie tried heating up the shaft with a propane torch, and then spraying the shaft with a penetrant to try and free up the shaft.
Still no effect.
The final straw, which I hoped it wouldn't come to this, was to drill the shaft out. Thats what we ended up having to do, and it worked!
But now I am in this predicament.
I started first by machining the engine mounting bolt to the correct diameter.
For a lot of this work, I used the power feed on the South bend which automatically moves the carraige at a constant speed either towards or away from the headstock. It really gives you a good surface finish, much better than I could do by hand, thats for sure!
Once the shaft was machined down to the correct size, I measured from each end to create groves for the cir clips that prevent the lever from slipping loose.
All done! Ready to install on the freshly powder coated Ducati frame!
Stay tuned!
Comments
Post a Comment