251LC

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JonW
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Re: 251LC

#16 Post by JonW » Thu Nov 09, 2017 9:14 pm

Yesterday I powdercoated this after a good blast and clean up but... I got a nasty reaction where the alloy oxidisation was on the top part. deciding now whether to strip it all off or just sand and recoat. Might try the latter first as its the simplest... powdercoat is great when it takes, a nightmare when it doesnt... worse on a large part lol.
80 XT500 Supermoto!
81 RD350LC Resto
82 RD421LC Hybrid
82 RD350LC decapitation project
82 RD250LC JDM '251LC' YPVS
83 RZ350 Resto
84 RZ500 Resto
85 RZ350 F1 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Hybrid

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JonW
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Re: 251LC

#17 Post by JonW » Fri Feb 09, 2018 4:24 am

Ok, the bad news is that the work on the clutch side cover got shelved late last year due to my health issues, but I did remove all the powder and make up some Alumibrite at my mate’s workshop to dip this and other stuff in. When dipped the acid (its only about 2%) eats the oxidsation, the reaction is so vicious that you can't see whats happening and to make matters worse you can't leave anything in too long or it turns the alloy black... and you cant get it on yourself of course... nasty, but good, stuff! Anyway, the cover will get re-coated when I get back into the workshop, after another dip in case any oxidisation has come back.

FWIW I also spent a bit more time sanding down the edges of the cover to ensure none of the more serious sanding marks remain that would show through, powder is forgiving but things like that will still show through and this is a part that needs to be nice and flat as marks stand out and ruin the look of the engine, disappointing after so much work to build a motor. I'll do an initial powder and sand that area all back first as well to give it a kind of 'pre-coat', that will ensure that the final coat is nice and flat with no tell tales. Powder is amazing like that, you can powder over scratches and scrapes as a 'filler' if you know what you're doing. Ok, no business would bother to do it for you, but when doing it yourself you can save quite a few parts this way, eg. my F2's dented and scratched grab rail was saved with some welding, grinding and then extensive use of that technique.

So onto something I have actually done... A few weeks ago I did the ‘brass ball clean up’ on the resto LCs 4L0-01 carbs and this week it was the turn of the carbs for this project. The correct carbs for the ‘85 51L motor in Aus are 1GA. In Japan there was a 51L version, but those were the single pull type like the USA carbs on the RZ350, we didn't get those instead we got the 1GA which was the first of the PJ type that and the 1GAs continued with the Aussie 250s thereafter. Ive no idea why they did that, why not just ship us the whole 51L bikes as our RZ250R, hmm... Maybe we had an aversion to those single pull throttle linkages for some reason lol. Ok, its more likely that dealers knew how to service the bikes with the twin pulls and many parts are common, this would have saved training and spares holding costs. Anyway, ours make the same power as the Jap spec bikes, so its no bother, tho really you'd think being a PJ there must be some improvement while running as Yamaha moved to all PJs on the 350s as well in ‘86.

The carbs were pretty horrible that Im using. Obviously been left to stew with fuel and water in them for some time :(

Image

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And how on earth do you do this to an air screw? I had to heat the carb body up and spend a while on this to get it out. sigh.
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I bought a kit from Cruzin Image on ebay which is for the RZ250R and actually contains needles and jets etc. The needles do look very much like the OEM 4N10s and the nozzles do look like the 345Pn units as well. The pilots were the correct 25s, but the mains were 180, OEM was 155. To be fair n the ebay listing he says that these are 180s. The rest of the kit is very nice, using a rubber gasket instead of the usual cardboard, but including the smaller carb top flat rubber washer as well as the larger one. The inclusion of the smaller one is bizarre, you cant change it on any RZ, only the LCs and then these washers are a special 3 piece bonded design, not straight rubber like the kit. I guess the kit is the same as the one for the LC ;) The brass washer for the nozzle/main jet and the aircsrew were a nice touch as were new screws for the fuel shut off valve. sadly no idle adjuster screw, but no one else even supplies the airscrew so that’s a moot point lol. All in all a good kit for low dollars. Previously Ive used TourMax kits which are fine, but have less stuff and cost a little bit more.

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After a full dismantle, balls out and an ultrasonic clean and then the new kit fitted, this is what they look like. I should add that vinegar is amazing stuff, it even eats carb poo and gives brass a good shine. I left the brass in for about 2 days and that worked very well indeed on those parts. I didnt leave the carb bodies in neat vinegar, that would ruin them, only the brass.

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Of course I also rezinc'd the screws and the fuel hose T piece and the fuel hose clamps (not in shot of course) and no i didnt zinc the needles LOL!

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Earlier I've spoken a bit about the 250 51L engine and why its special, but this pic (from LB’s N1 build) shows the extra port nicely.

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Remember no other RZ has this technology, I know that the licence would have been costly from my work on KX and KDX motors back in the day and this makes me wonder why we had it at all. Perhaps one of Yam Aus’ execs rode the ‘84 51L in Japan and said ‘that’s the 250 we need to beat the RGs!’ or something. LOL!
80 XT500 Supermoto!
81 RD350LC Resto
82 RD421LC Hybrid
82 RD350LC decapitation project
82 RD250LC JDM '251LC' YPVS
83 RZ350 Resto
84 RZ500 Resto
85 RZ350 F1 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Hybrid

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JonW
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Re: 251LC

#18 Post by JonW » Sun Feb 11, 2018 8:05 am

Image

Its very quiet on here these days :/
80 XT500 Supermoto!
81 RD350LC Resto
82 RD421LC Hybrid
82 RD350LC decapitation project
82 RD250LC JDM '251LC' YPVS
83 RZ350 Resto
84 RZ500 Resto
85 RZ350 F1 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Hybrid

Like Watches? www.PloProf.com & www.DeskDivers.com

hablair
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Re: 251LC

#19 Post by hablair » Sun Feb 11, 2018 11:01 am

I'm reading !!

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Re: 251LC

#20 Post by hablair » Sun Feb 11, 2018 11:01 am

you are a talented man, Jon

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JonW
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Re: 251LC

#21 Post by JonW » Sun Feb 11, 2018 5:24 pm

haha thanks Howard, very kind of you mate.

Dunno why my pic of the tumbleweed suddenly became a thumbnail when it was full size before :/
80 XT500 Supermoto!
81 RD350LC Resto
82 RD421LC Hybrid
82 RD350LC decapitation project
82 RD250LC JDM '251LC' YPVS
83 RZ350 Resto
84 RZ500 Resto
85 RZ350 F1 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Hybrid

Like Watches? www.PloProf.com & www.DeskDivers.com

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Re: 251LC

#22 Post by JonW » Tue Feb 13, 2018 4:19 am

The cylinders for this bike were dropped off at the reborers this week. I wanted to drop them before Christmas with the 350s for the f2, but the pistons one of the larger online yamaha parts suppliers sent me were wrong, not just being from Taiwan and not Japan, but being 66mm and not 55.5mm... hmm. They did remedy this very quickly and FedEx'd the correct pistons to me, but I'd missed my deadline... So they only got dropped in this week.

One thing I would say is that Mitaka make some great pistons.... but only in Japan. The guys there seem to have and use great machinery, the staff have expertise and care about what they produce. From what Ive seen i deduce that in Taiwan they employ distracted 5yr olds who appear to sand cast pistons in the playground and don't give a toss about what they send out - mould flashing and dents are all just 'gifts with purchase' it would seem. Shocking. Ive had plenty of great parts from Taiwan so please don't think i'm down on the people or country at all, but Mitaka need to do some quality control at their factory there.
So...... I say: Avoid Mitaka's made in Taiwan like the plague; the Japanese ones are the only ones to buy.


In other more exciting news I bought some mirrors for this bike. Not excited about mirrors? hmm, you should be... The problem with LC mirrors is that theyre NLA now and the aftermarket versions are not great. Ive got them on my resto bike as I couldnt justify almost $1k for two mirrors when some came up on ebay, who pays that?! But I did want to find some OEM mirrors that I could use on this bike and being a bit modified I felt I could get away with chrome mirrors and the the version closest to the LC are the ones worn by the RD400. Ok, those are also not easy to find but with a bit of web sleuthing I did manage to pick up a set for sensible money (about double what a set of LC Repros cost!), although one was from a UK seller and one was from Aus. The Aus one has landed and its chalk and cheese with the repros on the LC im sad to say, OEMs are much much nicer. Interestingly older mirrors were made for Yamaha by Toyo, I wasnt aware of that.

Image

(notice the cunning antipodean upside downess of this...)
Last edited by JonW on Sun Feb 25, 2018 8:24 pm, edited 2 times in total.
80 XT500 Supermoto!
81 RD350LC Resto
82 RD421LC Hybrid
82 RD350LC decapitation project
82 RD250LC JDM '251LC' YPVS
83 RZ350 Resto
84 RZ500 Resto
85 RZ350 F1 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Hybrid

Like Watches? www.PloProf.com & www.DeskDivers.com

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two-stroke-brit
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Re: 251LC

#23 Post by two-stroke-brit » Tue Feb 13, 2018 2:46 pm

Nice mirror buddy
350LC,Athena 392 big bore,stock porting,swiss cheese air box,stock reeds,spec11 pipes.(now TSA big bore pipes)
She might not be pretty but she will always be a fun ride


1982 YAMA RD350LC
98KDX 220R
1967 TRIUMPH TIGER
2001 TRIUMPH TT600

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JonW
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Re: 251LC

#24 Post by JonW » Tue Feb 13, 2018 6:39 pm

Thanks Mark! See... I knew someone would be as excited about mirrors as I am :)
80 XT500 Supermoto!
81 RD350LC Resto
82 RD421LC Hybrid
82 RD350LC decapitation project
82 RD250LC JDM '251LC' YPVS
83 RZ350 Resto
84 RZ500 Resto
85 RZ350 F1 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Hybrid

Like Watches? www.PloProf.com & www.DeskDivers.com

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Re: 251LC

#25 Post by JonW » Tue Feb 13, 2018 9:17 pm

Its been silly hot here again but Ive been out in the shed working my ass off on the NLA (except aftermarket from yambits, and maybe others tho ive not seen them) LC passenger peg mounts.

With a bit of juggling I worked out a way to utilise 4 sockets and a washer in my vice to return the twisted knackered bits of rusty bent junk into usable brackets again. With the metal back in shape I’ve just got to tidy them up and have them greened then fit all the other silver rezinc’d parts and I should have a working set of pegs for cheap, which makes a change LOL!

This plan to use up the old stuff I had lying around is part of the ethos of this build. You may recall that for my resto LC I bought all new peg parts and only reused the brackets as they were straight. In fact they’re off to be green’d now actually with this lot as back then I hadn’t found my plater. With this bike I will reuse the best of 7 rubber and 6 sets of steel parts that I had in my spares, I keep all sorts of rusted junk LOL! While this does represent a significant saving in parts it also removes the knackered spares that you couldn’t give away to other folk from my boxes and I do love turning what most people would bin into usable parts again as you know. :)

This also follows on from my plan to rebuild a set of front pegs as well. I actually have all the new (rubbers, pins, spring etc etc) and NOS (a spring) parts and had cleaned up the brackets and powdercoated them, but of course I now have the ability to do green, so I stripped off the powdercoat last week from those for my next plating run.

All I need to do now is sort out the rearset brackets... they need to be cleaned, blasted, polished and I'll powder them again like I did previously.

No pics, but I’ll do some when they're all done and built up. :)
80 XT500 Supermoto!
81 RD350LC Resto
82 RD421LC Hybrid
82 RD350LC decapitation project
82 RD250LC JDM '251LC' YPVS
83 RZ350 Resto
84 RZ500 Resto
85 RZ350 F1 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Hybrid

Like Watches? www.PloProf.com & www.DeskDivers.com

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Re: 251LC

#26 Post by two-stroke-brit » Tue Feb 13, 2018 10:12 pm

nothing like rescuing a part to have a second life :smt023
350LC,Athena 392 big bore,stock porting,swiss cheese air box,stock reeds,spec11 pipes.(now TSA big bore pipes)
She might not be pretty but she will always be a fun ride


1982 YAMA RD350LC
98KDX 220R
1967 TRIUMPH TIGER
2001 TRIUMPH TT600

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JonW
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Re: 251LC

#27 Post by JonW » Sun Feb 25, 2018 7:51 pm

I’ve been building up a set of 31k calipers for this bike. Its not so much that I think they will offer a massive step up from the LCs OEM brake calipers as I really don’t think they will noticeably different, but more that finding a set of 350 calipers in Aus is nigh on impossible now, plenty of single 250s, but not the other caliper to make up the set. These 31k calipers actually came from LB many years back when I couldn’t find LC calipers for my resto LC (in the end I got a set from Rob in Canada of course) and as a head start for this project they had already been blasted and painted with Caliper paint. A quick wire wheel of the seal lands and the slider tube muck removed, then a clean up in my mates parts washer and finally a blast with an airline to get the rinse water out and they were ready for building. New seals and pistons slipped in and all was going well until I struggled with one of the new slider rubber dust covers. I sourced these from Yambits and really both the small ones needed a trim as the edge that locates in the caliper was a little too large and had some flashing on it. When fitting the sliders it was tough going to get the slider past the rubber and that ‘one last push’ we all do to get something to click in place simply was too much material in the groove and it popped the ring that acts as a holder for the seal out!

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To be honest I’d never considered that these were removable. I assumed they were a machined grove in the caliper as they are on the larger of these slider holes, but on the smaller one I guess getting the tool into the space wasn’t an option so they simply hammered in a steel ‘L’ shaped ring, edge out of course, to form the groove. Tapping it back in was no longer an option as it had lost its tension as while it would stay in place it would not hold the seal when pulled, so I glued it back in with high temp silicone as the slider doesn’t move very much and hence wont pull too hard on the seal. With the seal trimmed back to match the grove it all went back together with no hassle, leaving me to advise that everyone trim those dust covers if you buy them, a few mins careful work with some nail scissors pays dividends lol

In other news I’d been looking for one of the pad anti-rattle shims as one of mine was malformed and when bending back it started to crack.

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A UK forumer (Thanks Lee!) came to my rescue. I know Rory mentioned that he ran without these, but I wanted to build this bike as close to OEM as possible and I can do that now, thanks to the help from the forums. :) Ive said it before and i'll say it again, but it not only makes it possible, but also so much more pleasurable, to build these bikes with the help of the forums. We really are lucky to have mates all over the world for advice and parts, weve never had it so good :)

So that’s the front brakes done. More cleaned and ready to use goodness in the box for this bike :)
80 XT500 Supermoto!
81 RD350LC Resto
82 RD421LC Hybrid
82 RD350LC decapitation project
82 RD250LC JDM '251LC' YPVS
83 RZ350 Resto
84 RZ500 Resto
85 RZ350 F1 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Hybrid

Like Watches? www.PloProf.com & www.DeskDivers.com

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Smoker
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Re: 251LC

#28 Post by Smoker » Mon Feb 26, 2018 3:07 am

Nice resto work going on here.

Looks good.

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JonW
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Re: 251LC

#29 Post by JonW » Mon Feb 26, 2018 3:12 am

Thanks Smoker.
80 XT500 Supermoto!
81 RD350LC Resto
82 RD421LC Hybrid
82 RD350LC decapitation project
82 RD250LC JDM '251LC' YPVS
83 RZ350 Resto
84 RZ500 Resto
85 RZ350 F1 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Resto
86 RZ350 F2 Hybrid

Like Watches? www.PloProf.com & www.DeskDivers.com

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L.B
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Re: 251LC

#30 Post by L.B » Mon Feb 26, 2018 8:55 pm

I remember looking at those calipers & thinking those rubbers are in good nick lol.
Nice work btw.....

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