Ok so here is an update on Café ala Carte. I has been a slow summer with family things taking most of the time but now I am rolling again. Basically the big accomplishment is I now have a rolling chassis so I can really get down to business.
To fill anyone in that has not been following this (slow moving) project this is going to be a café bike built with a Savage engine at its heart. The frame is a 1968 Wards Riverside Mojave 360 now modified to hold the Savage engine. The Mojave was made by Benelli in Italy for Montgomery Wards which sold motorcycles during that era. The frame is mild steel however it is a large diameter tube with a frame design that was a knock off of a Rickman racing frame so it is extremely stiff.
So here we go. Here is a picture from late spring showing the basic look of the bike. Note at this point the swing arm pivots are in the their stock position. Later on these will be completely cut out and lowered 1-1/4”.
Now the first thing was to add mounting lugs for the Savage engine. There was a cross bar up front that I had to cut out and then another big one behind the rear of the engine. The front lugs were made by boring through the frame and inserting a drilled and tapped solid lug. These mounts will hold bolt on front mount tabs. They were welded in and then the outside welds ground smooth so they look integral to the frame.
The rear lower mount was made by again through boring the frame but this time inserting a tube to allow a full length cross bolt to go through from one side of the frame through the engine and out the other side of the frame.
The top engine mount was done similar to the lower with tubes inserted through the backbone tube.
Next the swing arm mount had to be lowered. This frame was designed for a Benelli 650 twin which had a very high counter shaft. Now it came to America with a 260cc or 360cc engine but it’s original intent was a 650cc twin. (Using the 650 was scrapped before it ever went into production. Eventually it did come wrapped in a new frame as the 650 Tornado.)
Many swing arm pivot plate designs were mocked up and this is the final choice.
Next new pivot mounts were turned up from 1 ½” solid stock and set in place in the frame jig
Next plates were cut from 3/16” steel.
These were welded in and here is what it looks like
Next it was on to moving the rear shock mounts outward 3/8” on both sides. Here is a picture of the old shock mounts. Note the 3/16” plate of the mount.
Instead of cutting out the old plate mounts the old studs were cut off and drilled out ..
and new section plates were fabricated to create a boxed section mount.
These were welded and ground smooth. Then new studs were fabricated and welded in place.
The swing arm is from a GS450 with the pivot tube narrowed to match the frame width. Now there was a slight clearance issue with back end of the swing arm with regards to the sprocket bolts so part had to be machined away for clearance.
Then a 0.080” thick plate was cut and formed to fill in the relieved area of the swing arm and welded in place and ground smooth.
Now I have converted the belt drive to sprocket an moved that in-board 1/8” which was about the max I could shove it toward the engine and still clear the cases. I am also moving the engine to the right in the frame 1/8” from center to allow for better chain clearance with the frame. Even with that I had to cut scallops out of the frame tubes and weld in formed plates. These were welded and ground smooth.
So here are more shots of the frame
The center stand is from a 1974 Suzuki GT250 with new mounts fabricated and welded to the frame.
Note this is a Savage rear hub laced into an 18” high shoulder (Akront style) rim off a mid ‘70’s Yamaha XS650. The spokes are 8-9 gage stainless steel spokes from Buckanan spoke. Interesting note was they had the spec’s on the front hub but had never made spokes for a Savage rear hub so I had to send them mine so they could measure it.
The sprocket is an aluminum for 520 chain. To accomodate all the movement of rear chain inboard I had to move the entire sprocket hub inward which meant machining down the center boss that spaces out from the bearings as well as the drive webs of the crush drive. This also meant the rubber crush blocks had to be thinned out.
Here is a shot from the right.
Note it has the Savage rear brake so the swing arm needed a tang welded on to for the brake arm to slide over. This gives the rear brake a very clean look.
The front wheel is a 19” high shoulder rim (again from a mid 70’s XS-650) laced to a Suzuki GS750 front hub. The forks are from a GS500E with Race Tech springs and Gold valves.
One other thing I got done was making the dash surround to hold my digital dash. This was machined by hand using a cross slide on a rotary table on a Bridgeport - not with a CNC!!
Here it is sitting in the headlight shell which is from a 1964 Honda. I chose it because not only was it time correct but it had the oval speedo opening that would just hold the digital dash.
So, now that I have a rolling chasis I can really get cranking on all the other components.
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