Sneak Peak

Progress on the scooter has been made, but not on the blog.  I will post everything once I am complete. I have almost given up twice now on this soft engine rebuild.  I have learned along the way.  There's only thing I would re-do, soldering of stator, but that can be accessed easily in the future if ever need be.  80% of my time has gone to cleaning and only then on sealing the cases.  Almost done with this side.  Rear hub and clutch next.

Down for the count - injured

I am healing from a severe herniated disc at C6. My right arm was in a pain I can not describe. I was out of work for almost 2 weeks and could not get out of bed. This happened about 1.5 months ago. It's serious. It has the possibility of ending my riding career permanently.

Today was my second round of cortisone. The Sunday before last I reached for Piper, who ducked, and I over extended myself. My neck hurt through Wednesday. but seemed to heal. I could not lay any way other than on my back, but have been back to normal since last Wednesday. Doctor said that is a promising sign, but he also said if this cortisone shot does not bring me to 100% recovery we need to discuss surgery. It should be noted he suspect this will work and I will recover without surgery. The last shot brought me back to 65-70% and peaked out. So I just need another push for the last 30%. Being vigilantly careful.

What I believe happened is . . . around December 20th I bought a new helmet. The shop guy fitted it for me. He grabbed the helmet from the front and told me to keep my head straight. He then applied pressure to turn it. I used a lot of neck strength to keep my head straight. For a solid week I ate Ibprofin like candy because my neck hurt a lot. I could not look over my shoulder. Then I healed, I thought. For about two weeks at night my right arm hurt a lot. Then the bomb dropped and the disc popped. I cried as my wife helped me get dress for work and left work early and reported to urgent care. The pain is unreal. The pain meds suck - clouded my existence - very very strong stuff.

Keep me in your prayers. I have two scooters to restore and one wanting to be ridden now.

Seals went bad on my back plate

Wow! I am frustrated. After cleaning my engine case gasket with a razor blade and brake cleaner (thx Tom G.) I found that my seals on my backplate had hardened and broken. I was shocked!
The seals I need are 93990 (qty: 2) and 93977 (qty: 1).
I spoke with Gene M. and it is difficult to find these seals he has told me. An alternative is to run P-Series seals, but the hole sizes are different and don't seal as well. It's been many months since I took the backplate off, but the seals were new when the engine was rebuilt years ago by Christopher M. I don't know if the seals he used were VSC or VSE. Bummed. So bummed. Going to hunt them down now if I can.

I spoke with Tom G. about options:

" They are just brake backing plate dust seals.

They are extremely hard to find, and for a while were completely out of production. I'd say there is a good chance that Chris M. did not replace them, because he probably could not get them at the time.

If you can get them from 25 bucks, thats probably the best deal you're going to find.

Not replacing them will have no effect on the way your motor runs, and will not cause oil leaks. The cracks and deterioration will just let water and dust into your brake area, and may cause the brakes to slip a bit, or may cause premature deterioration of the pads. Which means you may have to perform brake maintenance more often (cleaning mostly). So replace them if you can, but don't let it hand you up. They won't affect running, and you can always try to find them cheaper if you want (I would just pay the 25 bucks). and go back in and install them later, which is not difficult to do. It aint original, but you can also cut some custom rings out of sheet neoprene and use them in place of the P-type O-rings. But frankly, I think P-type O rings will seal fine on the two small holes, and may just not seal so good on the one larger hole."

I have ordered a set of dust seals that are repops for the GS/SS.

Layshaft Rebuild

No normal restoration takes this long. I have made many major changes throughout the process and therefore, well you know . . .

Before I can move forward I need to rebuild the layshaft. Thanks to Derek, who helped me with his mill and expertise. I rebuilt it with him and used nut/bolts to hold it together, per Tom G.'s recommendation. Tom recommended creating a small whole in the punch nut to catch the head of the rivet. Thanks Derek for helping with that.

Today, I riveted it shut using a palm nail gun (I highly recommend buying the MINI palm nailer for additional control and better view of the area you are working on) again per Tom G.'s recommendation. It went well.

Next step is to put the engine back together, which I hope to do in spurts in early mornings and late nights after my kids are asleep.