Oldfeller!

Just got done sticking a 165R15 in my Savage and a few things to add.

EDIT>>I forgot to mention, mounting the tire is not for those with strong survival instincts. I don't know what pressure will rupture a beetle tire, but my 150psi compressor was about maxed out getting the tire to seat on the bead, and when it did seat, it slammed to rim so hard it sounded like a gun shot and blew dishsoap bubbles  a good twenty feet away. I thought I burst the tube at first, because the air between the tube and tire was being pushed out of the bead and making bubbles in the dish soap "slickum" as you call it. End Edit.

After using a scissor jack to spread the swing arm open, and then using ratchet straps to close it back together a little since I went overboard with the spreading, I didn't need any spacers on either side of the wheel. Also, the belt will not track correctly.

After widgetting the adjusters until the belt tracked the center of the pully and not rubbing either side, I stepped back, good and proud of what a good job I'd done and saw my rear tire was so caddy-wompus that if I'd taken it out on a ride it'd look like I was riding sidways.

I readjusted the tire so it's back in line with the bike, and adjusted the belt tension to a 90* bend with three fingers and took another look at the pulley. The belt rubs the inside of the pully when in engages, and rubs the outside of the pulley at the back, and then rubs the inside again where it leaves to go back to the drive pulley. Not to an extreme, I'm still gonna ride it like that, but it doesn't give me a warm fuzzy. I'm sure I'll get away with this for a few hundred miles, but without shimming out the front pulley or milling in the rear pulley, I don't think the 165 really legitimately fits without doing the chain drive conversion.

On a side note, all you guys suck because I'd have been just dandy with my perfectly stock Savage until you guys got me! It started with the innocent little "My butt hurts after 2 hours so I raised the front of the seat like this..." so I did it too, and then "My hands get tired so I turned my handlebars like this" and then I got mini 'apes. Then it was "My Savage sounds like the farting room at a gerbil convention" so got a Triumph Dunstall megaphone. Then it was cut the white space and drill out the plug and order a dial-a-jet and now a beetle tire is greased up and shoe-horned into my tiny little scooters fender. I sure hope  I never decide to sell this bike, only an idiot would want it now! Guess that says what I am

Here's some pics. My editing program died in a recent battle of wits between me and this stupid flickering thinkin' box, so if someone wants to lighten or sharpen the pics, it won't hurt my feelings:

Here's an ugly dark picture of the 165 in there:



Here's the only tight spot after all the bending and rebending, about 1/8" between tire and swingarm:


Here's a pic showing the complete lack of washers, even though I bought a whole box of the things:


And here's on just to show how nice my scoot is sitting in front of a Sportster I fixed for one of my riding buddies who crashed, well, because he's a stereotypical "got the money, bought a harley" guy. Whatyagonnado:


Sorry I haven't posted a lot in the last, oh, say year. But I'm still really really mad at all you freeks for not taking resposnibility for my actions.

Yeah, I'm blaming you guys for that too!

The only baffle is really more of a spark arrester. It's about a foot long, 2" diameter with gratuitous perferrations 3/16" big. The megaphone cones back down to 2" before evacuating the exhaust gases, it's not just a plate stuck on the end with a 2" hole in it. The sound is awesome! Another Harley friend of mine has leaf-blower shorty pipes that always sounded great, up until I pull along side and get on it! Makes his bike sound like a lawn mower, and makes mine sound like someone's about to fire a pi$$ed off gremlin out of a cannon! Although my favorite thing about this pipe, is that when I let off the throttle at speed and the bike starts backfiring while it winds down, my exhaust looks like the afterburner on an F-16, even in daylight! of course, all that backfiring has already started to blue the pipe, right about where the spark arrester is, so I've started fiddling with the carb to cut back on it some. All in all, I'm super happy with the $60 Dunstall type pipe, I'd recommend it to anyone willing to fiddle with there carb afterwards!

Oh, for my own butt-coverage, I'm not recommending anyone bend their swing arm! But it's just mild steel, You can bend it with slow steady pressure all day long and not cause any kind of measurable damage. It's not heat treated or tempered in any way, and you only have to bend it about 1/2" so that you gain a little over 1/8" after it springs back.

I must stress, just like Oldfeller, don't do anything you're not comfortable with! I know I'm not paying anyone else's hospital bills just because they hurt themselves doing what I did! Use your own common sense!

Great stuff b'ys! i really enjoy reading about the wild mods you fellows are doing to the good 'ol LS! Wicked! Would love to see a few more pics of those "Darkside" tires mounted on your Savages! 8)

ThumpinSquid wrote on 12/31/69 at 16:00:09:


But 2 questions....  

How do you know that the swingarm welding didn't involve some kind of designed pre-stressing.  Just because it is mild steel doesn't mean that you can't crack a weld.

When you spread it apart with a scissors jack, only the weaker side will move...or only one side will move until both sides are stressed the same.  How do you know which side gave you the 1/8" clearance that you were seeking, or do you just assume that you got 1/16" on each side equally?

Opinion -- my left side is what moved, mostly.  But since I was only looking for an eight of an inch of increase I didn't move anything very much so I really can't say for sure.

Squid moved his a lot, way more than me, enough to shift his centering all by itself.  This means he moved his left side out and then moved his right back pretty much to where it started from.  

I ain't that bold, I cut my left spacer and used washers to move my centering around and only needed a tiny bit of extra space to clear my stock belt guard to the tire.

The swingarm pipe is mild steel that is gusseted and welded up at the bend area to a fair-thee-well, so the weld area isn't what is moving.  It is the pipe itself, most likely where it exits the gusset area.

Bending mild steel ain't that hard.  I am planning to put my sporty muffler in a big vise at work and clamp her up tight on a piece of sturdy pipe and bend my offset angle right into the muffler itself.

Muffler steel is well annealed stuff, all them hot and cold cycles have drawn it totally and totally destressed it.  It will bend pretty easy I am guessing.  

Supporting the can without denting it will be the hard part so I will have to cast me a cloth-coated quikcrete gripper block to hold the muffler can with.

Something to do this winter when it finally gets too cold to ride.

Oldfeller

I've been re-reading some of this thread about automotive tires on bikes.
If you rememberback to last early summer, I put a michlin 135X15 on my machine. My original tire was down to bald spots at less than 3,000 miles. Sidecar wears a tire faster than solo, especially the rear tire.
My rig now has just less than 12,000 miles on it. Thats 9,000 miles on the rear tire. It still handles very well and brakes better and shows very little signs of wear. The 135 width is physically about one RCH narrower than the original but because of the flatter profile of the tread, puts a larger footprint on the ground. Hence the better braking.
Since it is a true radial, the rolling friction is less thus my milage is better. I tape measured both tires with air in them and found that there was only a tiny bit less than 3/4 inch difference in circumference.
That is circumference, not diameter.
Since the tire is about the same outside width as the original, measured at the sidewall it is actually a smidgeon less, no swingarm modification was needed.
Wider tires generally need more power to carry you at the same speed. This is one of the reason I chose the 135 instead of wider. The other is that no problems in fender clearance were detected either.
At the rate of inspected wear, I expect to get at least 10,000 more miles from this tire on this sidecar rig.
BTW, front tire problems were eliminated by mounting an Avon sidecar special tire up there. It too is a flatter profile at the tread and so I get much the same benifits.
Just a bit more info for you to use when choosing an automotive tire.

Phelonius

What is the full size of that VW tire. 145 is the hight, 15 is the rim size, but what is the width size according to the tire? A car tire has three numbers that indicate its size such as 165\65\15 What is the middle number on the VW tire?