Blogs

Outriggers

I have just bought a Honda CH250 and am planning to convert it to a FF machine. It was great to discover this site, and I was astonished to see so many versions of the concept have already been produced by individuals without access to fully equipped workshops. Such a body of experience should perhaps be brought together to produce a fully marketable product.
Now a question: When it comes to designing an enclosed PTW necessitating the use of outriggers, has thought been given to the possibility of utilising aerodynamic lift to raise these? With lightweight, strong modern materials I'd have thought this possible, although I acknowledge it goes no way to solving the locking/unlocking requirement.

K75/Boxer FF

Not sure if this is the right way to do this (perhaps its a FF entrance exam, that I have failed)
I rather fancied a FF motorcycle with either a K75 or Boxer engine.
Any idea how I would start such a project. I have access to engineers/machine shops at work but only have mechanical skills myself.
I guess it may be easier to buy something and covert or at least ride around to get some ideas.
Where may I find auch a thing ?
I presently own an R1150GS, a K75s, an R65, 2 velo 350's a Suzuki 600, a Moto Guzzi Stornello 125 and 2 Yamaha RS125's.
I also have an ex Police R100RT that is for sale ('83 £1200) but may do a p/x on this or any of the others.

Eric of Barnsley

I passed my motorbike test, at the first attempt, aged 16 on a BSA 250 C11G a VERY long time ago. My next bike, and my favourite so far, was an AJS 350 Model 8. It was 'traded-in' for an MG sports car (TD). This I sold to help with the deposit for a house. There followed a donated Messerschmitt KR200 bubble-car then, with the arrival of a daughter, another MG (YB). There was an interlude of a few years before I came back to 2 wheels as a 'second vehicle' so that my wife could use the car. I started with a cheap BSA Bantam (175) which was followed by a Ducati 250, a Jawa 350 and a Honda CX500. This I have had for over 20 years but I have hardly used in recent years.

Fitting a Malossi CVT kit to an AN400K3

I've just been fitting a Malossi kit to my Suzuki AN400 Megascoot. The first stage is to remove the lower left body panel. This has an astonishing number of little plastic nubbins that hold it on. The foot rest rubbers also have a very large number of bits that plug into the bodywork and you have to get under them to reach some of the fixings. Eventually you get the bodywork off, and the next piece is the CVT air filter cover, and then the plastic CVT cover. That gets you to here.

The next piece to remove is the inner cover. This is ally and has two dowels that eventually get stuck, bottom right and top left. The cover has an outrigger bearing for the clutch mechanism. Sometimes the shaft spins in the bearing making a nasty screech at very low speeds. You can safely ignore this as I'm not sure how to fix it if it happens to your bike. With the ally cover taken off, we have this.

Malcolm Newell's FFs

Here below is a fairly definitive list of machines built by Malcolm Newell. (words mostly by Paul Blezard) This was not easy to compile bearing in mind that most of the machines had the same trade number plate on them when being used by Malcolm, probably no chassis plate and certainly no "official" Malcolm-applied serial number. This list is quite old now. Can anyone fill in more detail?

Blez's FF History (Updated January 2019)

Paul Blezard's potted FF history
I've been riding scooters and motorcycles for over 40 years and writing about FFs for more than 30. I was 'turned on' to FFs by reading Royce Creasey's HighTech articles in Bike magazine in 1979-80 and by meeting Malcolm Newell with the Cibie Z13 Phasar at the first NEC motorcycle show in 1981. I have ridden a very high percentage of the FFs to be seen on this site, (something like 50 in all), and had articles published about most of them.

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