| Drive Train: page 4 |
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| Clutch & Swing Arm |
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The clutch/swing arm assembly was not difficult. Fabricating the parts
took the greatest amount of time. Drilling the swing arm bracket on the
frame was tricky as you will see below. As usual, I got so involved in
the construction process that I forgot to take as many pictures as I would
like.
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This is the clutch pulley and swing arm. I've already mounted the pulley
and prepared to drill the mounting bolt hole.
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This is the clutch spring tube. The springs slip into the cylinder beneath
the actuator piston. Two rivets will be located at the top of the cylinder
to serve as keepers for the piston. The bottom of the cylinder and the
attachment arm had to be tapped to accept the swivel rod end attachments
( not in the picture ).
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There was splatter from welding the attachment arm to the spring tube
cylinder that had to be removed. Another job for the mighty Dremmel.
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I had to slightly enlarge the bore of the
spring tube cylinder in order to install the piston. I once again resorted
to using the HDHMBSH
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| The clutch actuator casting was too thick to
fit between the mounting brackets on the frame. So, using the best tool
on hand to do the job, the belt sander is mounted upside down in the work
bench to "refine" the casting to proper size. |
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The actuator casting mounting hole had to be sleeved with a bushing cut
from tubing. Then it was drilled out for the proper bolt fit. The bushing
was slightly wider than the casting so with the mounting bolt tightened,
the casting pivots around the bushing. I forgot to take a picture of the
final assembly.
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On to the swing arm mounting. It is impossible to drill the swing arm
mounting bracket without removing the main drive sprocket. At least that's
what the RotorWay construction manual leads you to believe. I did not
want to remove the main drive sprocket because that means dismounting
the secondary unit so the drive belt can be removed. That's undoing a
lot of work that I just got finished. So I figured out an ingenious way
to drill the hole. By the time I got done with the ingenuity, I could
have just a quickly removed the main drive sprocket.
You can't tell form the picture but you can't get a drill with a drill
bit located to drill the holes in the actuator arm mounting bracket without
some mechanical gymnastics or unbolting the main drive sprocket.
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As you can see from the picture above I decided to attack from the bottom
of the bracket. There wasn't enough room to get the drill and a regular
bit into position. I used two drill bits. Both bits had to be cut short
to fit into the tight space required to drill the holes. The shortest
bit was used to drill the bottom hole. Then the longer bit was pushed
up into the hole. Then the drill chuck was attached to the drill and the
upper hole was drilled. If you look closely at the longer drill bit you
can see a chamfer on the chuck end of the bit. The space that I had to
fit the drill to the bit was so tight that the chamfer was necessary to
get the bit into the chuck.
Hind Sight: Go with the book and move the main sprocket.
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You can see I drilled out shim material to fit around the swing arm mount
weldment. I clamped the shim material to the frame so that proper alignment
was maintained while drilling the top mounting hole.
Man, I sure went to a lot of trouble to avoid a little trouble!
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| Well it all worked out in the end. This is looking
down on the clutch swing arm and actuator mechanism. You can see how the
swing arm mounting bolt is located under the main sprocket. In this picture
the clutch is engaged. |
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| This is another angle of the clutch assemble
engaged. Eventually there will be a steel tube link from the cabin to the
clutch engagement casting. It's a push-pull mechanism that will actuate
the clutch. |
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| A final check of the clutch alignment relative
to the secondary sprocket shows perfecto alignment: 0.0. It's a miracle!
Yay! |
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