Post by rpr851r on Oct 5, 2012 20:53:54 GMT -5
Hello to everyone,
Like many others I have had my eye on a rotary since I got my hands on a spirograph as a kid and finally came across a 76 near my place. It’s another story of “it ran when parked”. It came with a title and it turned over with nice enough compression that I decided to take a chance on it. Overall it’s not in too terrible of shape. The chrome is lightly pitted and the tank needs a repaint but cosmetically it will clean up well enough for its age. I brought it home and sprayed a half a can of PB Blaster in the engine and worked it around for a week. After that I started it on 50:1 premix from a clean tank and it seem to run well for a bike that had been parked for 20+ years. It will idle and rev up with a little coaxing without an obnoxious amount of smoke so it seems the proper unit is in reasonable shape but a hot compression test is next.
While I had it running I topped off the cooling system with water and ran it long enough to get the radiator fan to come on. During the run the coolant system pushed quite a bit of water out of the system and after it cooled down I could not see any coolant in the fill tube when I removed the radiator cap. Also, after cleaning the bike up it is clear to me by tell-tale corrosion on the right side pipe, rear wheel spacer and brake hardware that the bike must have been pushing water (I don’t believe it is from battery acid) out of the system for a good portion of its life.
So here are my first questions for the experts; should I be able to see coolant when I open up the cap when the bike has cooled down from a hot run? I know what the manual says but I am hoping for different a different answer. What do you make of the fact that it appears to have been pushing water out the overflow during its life? I initially thought that an o-ring failed and combustion gases were pressurizing the cooling system but when I got the bike there were no signs of water being in the proper unit which I would expect if the bike sat so long with a bad o-ring. Is there a definitive pressure test I can do on the cooling system? I would like to confirm if the proper unit needs to come apart rather than just tearing into it only to find out it is ok.
Here is a link to a video of it running.
I have taken quite a bit of time to work my way through most of the posts on the board and have read through the manual to come up to speed the best I can. I have learned quite a bit and look forward to getting this thing back on the road.
Thanks,
Rich
Like many others I have had my eye on a rotary since I got my hands on a spirograph as a kid and finally came across a 76 near my place. It’s another story of “it ran when parked”. It came with a title and it turned over with nice enough compression that I decided to take a chance on it. Overall it’s not in too terrible of shape. The chrome is lightly pitted and the tank needs a repaint but cosmetically it will clean up well enough for its age. I brought it home and sprayed a half a can of PB Blaster in the engine and worked it around for a week. After that I started it on 50:1 premix from a clean tank and it seem to run well for a bike that had been parked for 20+ years. It will idle and rev up with a little coaxing without an obnoxious amount of smoke so it seems the proper unit is in reasonable shape but a hot compression test is next.
While I had it running I topped off the cooling system with water and ran it long enough to get the radiator fan to come on. During the run the coolant system pushed quite a bit of water out of the system and after it cooled down I could not see any coolant in the fill tube when I removed the radiator cap. Also, after cleaning the bike up it is clear to me by tell-tale corrosion on the right side pipe, rear wheel spacer and brake hardware that the bike must have been pushing water (I don’t believe it is from battery acid) out of the system for a good portion of its life.
So here are my first questions for the experts; should I be able to see coolant when I open up the cap when the bike has cooled down from a hot run? I know what the manual says but I am hoping for different a different answer. What do you make of the fact that it appears to have been pushing water out the overflow during its life? I initially thought that an o-ring failed and combustion gases were pressurizing the cooling system but when I got the bike there were no signs of water being in the proper unit which I would expect if the bike sat so long with a bad o-ring. Is there a definitive pressure test I can do on the cooling system? I would like to confirm if the proper unit needs to come apart rather than just tearing into it only to find out it is ok.
Here is a link to a video of it running.
I have taken quite a bit of time to work my way through most of the posts on the board and have read through the manual to come up to speed the best I can. I have learned quite a bit and look forward to getting this thing back on the road.
Thanks,
Rich