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January 2013

This site will be ten years old in June !  But, as predicted, last year was a bit quiet KR-wise.  However I'm hoping to focus on them more this year.  It's about time that the red/black one is back on the road for a start.  And the green one needs new fork seals and a welding repair to a small hole on the rear exhaust.

So on New Year's Day (no point wasting time !) I fitted a brand new YB4LA Yuasa battery to the green bike and put it's older YB4LA in the red/black bike.  It had previously had a YB4LB fitted (vent at wrong end so doesn't fit the battery box properly) but it had died anyway.  Both bikes have Optimate leads fitted and I treated myself to a new trickle-charger for Christmas so they should be fine now.



March 2013

The tax-disc renewal's arrived.  Better renew the MOT too then, even though that ran out in, erm, April.  The fork seals are leaking badly (the trackday and a couple of trips strapped down in a van haven't helped) so that's the first job.  Slip the forks out and get 'em down the bike shop then.  Unfortunately, there isn't a lot of space to work in my single brick garage, probably something to do with the 8 other bikes in there.  And the weather was too horrible to push some outside.

I took off the bellypan and managed to prop an axle-stand under the frame to lift the front end clear.  The calipers, front wheel and mudguard came off easily, then I had to disconnect the brakelines from the anti-dive units.  But then I remembered the clamp that equalises the air pressure in each fork, which meant that the whole front-end needed to come out.  Bars and top-yoke off next then, then slide the front-end out.

Notice anything in the photo below left ?  Yes, seconds after I'd leant the liberated front-end against the workbench, the KR slipped off the axle-stand and crashed against the red/black one.  Arse.  With difficulty I managed to prop it back up again, no damage to either as far as I can tell.  I then took the forks complete with bottom-yoke, pressure link and AVDS units to my local bike shop for new seals to be fitted.



Two weeks later I got them back, fitted with the last set of pattern seals on their shelf.  I refitted the front-end, wheel, mudguard, yoke, bars and the brakes, which needed bleeding.  Then - instead of a proper welded repair - I gobbed up the holes in the rear exhaust with my old friend Chemical Metal and slapped some black paint on !  With the bellypan fitted and the tyres topped up, I rode it down to the same bike shop for an MOT, which it passed.  Another 12 months tax sees me set up for the summer, assuming it ever stops snowing.  Oh, and the RK passed too.



April 2013

I took the KR - by van - down to Gloucester for  SouthWest SmokeFest  organised by  Diff'rent Strokers.  There was a great turnout of cool 2-strokes and a dozen of us went for a brief rideout together until the weather turned bad.  Unfortunately there was a pool of fork-oil in the van so that needs looking at, and the exhaust 'repair' didn't really last long either.  Nice to show the bike off to some like-minded people though.



August 2013

After that it all went quiet again, mainly due to having to work away for 4 months.  But I wasn't going to miss the  Cadwell Summer Weekender  organised by   Classic Bike Trackdays  so the van (er, my van, I've finally got round to buying my own now) was filled with camping gear, beer, BBQ, KR and my RB50 for a weekend in the sun.  The KR was just on show all weekend but I took the Gag bike out for the parade laps on both days.  There was some cool machinery on track and in the paddock and I strongly recommend you join in next year.



October 2013

Another NOS radiator cover from Ebay ?  Yes, I couldn't resist it, sorry.  No KR's at  Stafford  this year, either in the show or the autojumble, but tandem-twin fans got to take a close look at this beautiful Armstrong 250 race bike.



December 2013

I spotted this battered 'S' tank on Ebay and thought it was worth saving.  And I ordered a carb repair kit from  Mitsuo-san,  the same chap that does the gasket sets.  Piston and ring kits next ?  Happy New Year !