Wheel collection

Last week I purchased this collection of vintage wheels. I am going to keep the gold wheel, which I bought just for the rim. If it is suitable, it will be used as a front rim rather than trying to repair the rim pictured in my previous post. I am going to sell most of the other wheels.

Rear wheel becomes the front part 4

This is the front wheel (formerly the rear wheel) prior to disassembly. I need to remove the flat spot in one area, have the crack repaired and clean and polish. This is gonna take a while!

Rear wheel becomes the front part 3

I have a spare set of forks, so I can mock it up on the bench rather than on the bike, which is outside and in the dark not long after I get home in the evenings.

Finished machining the rear hub to suit the front forks. You can see where I have taken the material off the cush drive side, removed material and re-sunk the bearing further into the hub and taken some material off the brake plate. I just need to make or get spacers to allow the 12mm axle to go thru the 17mm bearings.

Rear wheel becomes the front part 2

The rear hub is a little too wide to fit between the fork legs, so I will machine the formerly cush drive side of the hub down by the width of the wheel bearing. This involves removing the bearing (obviously), cutting off the existing protrusion and honing the inside of the hub to reaccept the bearing. This takes about 10mm off the width.

I will then machine down the central boss off the brake backing plate by around 5mm and this will then allow the hub to fit between the forks. The rim will have to be offset by another 5mm to one side to allow it to sit centrally in the forks.

Rear wheel becomes the front…

When comparing the front and rear hubs I noticed that they looked fairly similar. They both use 150 x 28 brake shoes, but the rear hub has larger bearings and is about 20mm wider, so you cannot lace the rear rim to the front hub (spoke angles are different). The front brake plate slots perfectly into the rear hub. So it looks fairly likely that I can run the rear hub and rim on the front! I will to see if I can get bearings that fit the OD of the hub and the ID of the smaller axle. According to wemoto.com the front bearings are 12x32x10 and the rear left is 17x40x12 and right rear is 17x47x14. So that means I need 12x40x12 and a 12x47x14. Will do a mock up of the whole setup sometime this week. I'm not concerned about the lack of a speedo drive as I will be using an electronic unit anyway.

The DR400 rear rim is 18x2.15 which will allow me to run up to a 110/90 front tyre according to the 2011 Michelin tyre fitment guide: http://www.michelinmotorcycle.com/pubs/fitment2011.pdf

The rim is a little beaten up and has one small flat spot, which will come out with a little heat and a shaped male and female dolly. I also bought a JOSCO metal polishing kit just to see if I really make that rim shine. I also have brand new zinc plated spokes that I got for nothing which I will also use.

I missed out on the DR400 pictured in my last post, gotta be quick!