Saturday, May 10, 2014

Do Not Ever...Ever...Ever pound on the end of the crankshaft


The bits on the left are probably worth more that the larger lump on the right...particularly after   
I went to work on it with a hammer. Actually the problem was two fold. First I allowed myself to get caught up in an ill advised rush to complete a job which really did not have to be completed in the next minute or so. The second problem was more mechanical than mental. The main bearing on the magneto side was firmly attached to the crank, and it was just as firmly attached to the crankcase half. Instead of thinking about the problem (may be some heat???) I just started bashing away with a hammer.

I did manage to free it from the crankcase half, but the bearing remained firmly attached to the crankshaft. After reviewing my options with the guys on Trials Central Forums, I was informed that a tool existed which was designed to deal with this situation. It is called a large bearing separator.

Next, I had to deal with the trauma that I inflicted on the threads on the magneto side. My bashing had curled over and obliterated the first few threads and had created a mushroom effect  on the end of the crank. I used a dremel tool to eliminate the mushroom effect, and then it was back to ebay to look for a die of the correct size. I was able to figure out that the correct size was 12X1.25mm. Mainland China to the rescue, so now I have this size die as well as a fairly complete set of taps and dies from the same supplier. Using the die was pretty straight forward.

So...lesson learned. 

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