Topic: Terry's POS 1969 Suzuki T350 Redneck Reincarnation.

[grcamna2]

Bench sync with wire sounds good enough Terry.What does the manual say about final synch,how do they do it ?
I've always done the 'feel method' with the slides up top on 2-stroke multis myself.

Thanks Bill. The manual says to set the idle first, then sync them with the cable adjusters, using the "feel" method, i.e., holding the palm of your hand at the back of the pipes to feel the exhaust pressure from each until they feel even. I think vac gauges would be a little more accurate.

Will you use those nice sensitive gauges  ?

[Terry in Australia]

No, it turns out I owe Trevor an apology, there's only one vacuum spigot, and that's on the left carb. (closest to the petcock) When I got the bike it didn't have a fuel tank, and the petcock I bought for a T350 isn't a vacuum style petcock, but looking at some pics on the interwebs tonight I saw that the 1969 T350 has a vacuum operated petcock.

No biggie, I prefer non-vacuum petcocks anyway, so I put a piece of vacuum hose on the spigot and blocked it with a screw. I suppose I could drill and tap the other carb's body for a screw in spigot, or replace the right hand carb with my spare left hand side carb with it's spigot and then I could use the vacuum gauges, but I'm not that fussed. I am learning more and more about Suzuki T350's every day though.........

The weather is still miserable, it's cold and wet, but I bravely braved the arctic conditions to bench sync the carbs this afternoon. Now I thought about this a lot whilst "working from home" today, and decided that I'd just sync the slides with them sitting completely closed, because all I really needed to do was to make sure that they had the same amount of slack in the cable, at the adjuster. I attached the throttle assembly to the cable to remove any additional slack, then just wound the cable adjusters on top of the slides out until there was 1mm of slack on both sides. When I've got everything else set up and it's ready to fire up for the first time I'll use the idle adjusters to lift the slides, and then sync them again.

A little bit of dicking around I suppose, but no biggie, I remember "bench syncing" some CB750K0 carbs once, using a piece of wire, but once I fired it up I realised that I'd effectively set the idle too high, so I had to do pretty much what I did tonight, drop them all the way down again, and just make sure all the cables had the same amount of slack, lock them in, fire it up, adjust the idle with the 4 idle screws, then sync them again, this time using vacuum gauges.

Anyhoo, I did finally mount the carbs and I hope I've correctly routed the throttle cables through the frame, I think I have and the slides snap back when I release the throttle, regardless of where I turn the handlebars. I had to also connect the choke linkage rod, which is a pretty basic piece of wire bent at right angles at each end with a hole for a tiny split pin. As you'd expect, I had every split pin imaginable, but nothing small enough to fit thru the hole, so I did some red necking. The split pin in the pic is 1.6mm thick, but too thick for the holes, so I modified them.

T350 Tuesday 8 Jun 2021 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

And they did the job.

T350 Tuesday 8 Jun 2021 2 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

By this time it was dark, cold, and I'd decided that 3 hours was enough time spent. I did attempt to find some pods (as I'm waiting on the rubber air box adapter) but I had no luck. The pods on my Mikuni 33mm smoothbore carbs for my Z1-B were too big, and the old K&N's for CB750 carbs were too small. Oh well, I won't be operating it in dusty conditions any time soon, so hopefully the rubber thingie will arrive before I take it for it's first shakeout ride. I'll be hooking up the oil pump cable and adjusting it, then installing the wiring harness, battery box and battery tomorrow, and with luck I'll be able to kick it over and see if I have spark, it'd be nice to fire it up this weekend, but I do have to do some more problem solving to do before I can do that, as I'm missing a key part, and don't have a replacement coming as yet. More tomorrow.

T350 Tuesday 8 Jun 2021 1 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr
   

[grcamna2]

Oh,Ok Terry I see now.I thought you had carbs with a screw/plug on each slide tower and the slides each have a special indent in the exact same place in each slide,you then match-up each slide's indent to the viewing port.
The ones you have with that brass knob on each one is actually the idle adjuster,rather than having the idle adjuster screw further down in the traditional way we're all used to.The synchronizing of the slides together needs to be done using the cable adjusters on the top of each carb and the 'feel' method:what simon#42 says.
I would personally drop each slide All the way down to the 'rock bottom' floor as far as it will go and with the carbs installed and cables hooked-up,working from the back side of the carbs with the (flexible?)rubber airbox to carbs boot pulled out of the way.This is to make sure that both slides are pulling upward at exactly the same time all the way through their travel toward the top.I hope your throttle cables are in good condition(OEM?)or good quality new.
I personally like to hold the bike open at full throttle with my right hand,then reach-back with two long left fingers to 'feel' using a finger in each carb with my left hand,then lower both slides a hair and 'feel' if they are both exactly open the same amount at the top of their pull in each carb.
I can then adjust one carb to match the 'pull' of the other by adjusting each cable to match the other,exactly.This synchronizing makes a huge difference in how smooth your engine pulls in all situations.I would adjust the idle screws(top knurled brass knobs)last by using both my hands close-up toward the ends of each muffler output to feel how much output each cylinder is breathing,you get the idea Terry.This last part is accomplished best if you just got done setting your ignition timing with the dial indicator.

Did you synch the cables with the slides up-top('feel' method)using a finger in each carb from the back as I described? it'll help to do it before you install the filter rubber boot.

[Trevor from Warragul]

No biggie, I prefer non-vacuum petcocks anyway, so I put a piece of vacuum hose on the spigot and blocked it with a screw.

Ditto.  I got sick of the vacuum petcock on my Kawasaki H1A & replaced it with a Pingel.  Blocked the spigot the same way you did.

[Terry in Australia]

No biggie, I prefer non-vacuum petcocks anyway, so I put a piece of vacuum hose on the spigot and blocked it with a screw.

Ditto.  I got sick of the vacuum petcock on my Kawasaki H1A & replaced it with a Pingel.  Blocked the spigot the same way you did.

Thanks Trevor, and the trouble is that the more I think about installing 2 x left side carbs so I can sync them with my vacuum gauges, the more I think I'm gonna do it? The only difference is that the mixture screws will both be on the left side, but on this uncomplicated little bike, it'll probably be easier to tune it anyway.

[Terry in Australia]

Well it's been 2 days since I last touched the beautiful T350, but I was sick yesterday (plus the rain was coming in sideways into my "Winter workshop" in the patio) and today I was undergoing "Death by 1000 questions" when I put in an insurance claim for the damage done to my car by a young d1ckhead who "fell asleep" between his driveway 150 feet from my driveway, and smashed into my parked car at 1am yesterday.

You'd think that it would be an "Open and shut case". The afore mentioned young d1ckhead drove into my car, continued on for another 100 feet, then pulled over when his car couldn't be driven any further, so he knocked on the door, apologised profusely, gave us his license number, name, address, mobile phone number, car registration number/model/colour, insurance company details, etc etc. Nope, the insurance company needed me to answer a thousand questions, send them pics of both my car (every panel, not just the damaged area thanks) his car, my license, my last 5 years of driving history, a diagram of the incident (I won't call it an accident, I'm pretty sure he was practising his drifting when he lost control and hit my car) and in my own words, an explanation of what actually happened. What a PITA!

Anyway, I've jumped thru all the hoops, and as it's looking pretty sure that my car will be written off, I've been looking at alternatives. I still have my big Ford Territory SUV that I've had since new, so I'm thinking that I wouldn't mind a "Ute" (sedan based pickup truck, or "Utility Vehicle") for collecting/delivering bikes and parts? I've been looking at "Utes" around my price point (around $7K AUD, or $5400 USD) and disappointingly, most of the cars offered look like they've been lived in by homeless people. That's a bit miserable, as my Mitsubishi Outlander has had only 2 owners including me, and has been serviced from new until now. Maybe I'm asking too much, but something along the same lines in a ute would be nice? Oh well.

T350 wise, the headlight rim arrived today, and doesn't fit the T350 shell. Close, but no banana. Fcuk it, I bought a chrome 7 inch headlight assembly that I'll install and worry about the weird "D" shaped Suzuki OEM item later, the one I bought looks the goods, and it's local, so I won't have to wait for weeks for it to turn up.

The good news is that I've found a cache of 1950's BSA C11G parts on FB, being sold by a human. I bought Spotty's C11G a couple of years ago, but haven't done anything with it as it's missing all the tins, the front forks and wheel, etc etc. I spotted an advert in FB last night with around 75% of the parts I need, for cheap. The seller is a semi-retired cop, and didn't want me to pay him up front (we're still in lockdown for another week) and said that if I like, he'll jump in a cop car and deliver them to me next week? What a nice guy! I won't be starting a C11G build thread any time soon, but I'll slowly collect the remaining missing parts, and once I've got them all, I'll do a quick build thread like this one, rather than drag one out for months. More tomorrow.

BSA C11G parts 1 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

BSA C11G parts by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

[grcamna2]

Hi Terry,sorry to hear about the insurance company you're dealing with causing you to go swimming in a sea of red-tape forms.That  odd-shape(Vintage Factory Suzuki  )headlight rim.. I think you might be able to look on Ebay,etc. under 'used headlight' and possibly the rim might come with it?
That's a cool Antique BSA.

[david 750f]

Terry, I rented one of those XR6 Falcons when I was in Australia about ten years ago. They upgraded me to the turbo model and I totally agree that the "gentleman" that hit your car was drifting sideways in the wet. We never got those cars in North America, if I recall the turbo model was around 350hp and rear wheel drive. Excellent for drifting

[Terry in Australia]

Ha ha, yeah mate, I had the base model Ford “Ute” (sedan based pickup) and it went like a rocket, but the XR6 Turbo and the twin turbo “Typhoon” version with more BHP and torque than the 5.4litre V8 GT was an absolute weapon!

It looks like the Mitsubishi will be written off so I was thinking about a ute for my daily driver as they’re super handy for picking up bikes and parts, but all the cool Ford and GM (Holden) utes in my price range have been flogged to death by young hoons like the knob who hit my car, only days after he got it back from the shop.

Then I saw that the “un cool” utes like Mazda’s Toyota’s and Mitsubishi’s are going for reasonable prices, and to be honest, a small turbo diesel truck with a manual gearbox is more useful to me, the big gasoline powered utes are gas guzzlers, and even a high mileage diesel thats been regularly serviced will last way longer than a poorly maintained gasoline powered ute that some young would be drift racer has flogged mercilessly.

 I better find one soon as I’m sure that eventually my boss will want me to come back to work, and I don’t want to drive my “Good” car to work and back every day, as nice as it is for long trips, it’s not a good city commuter.

[grcamna2]

Sounds like a good,used Ute is in your plans Terry;you see any likely candidates yet ?

[Terry in Australia]

Thanks Bill, yep, I’ve been looking at a couple of Mazda BT50 turbo diesel utes on FB going cheap, I contacted one seller who has a high mileage but clean one going cheap, but he doesn’t want to provide a roadworthy certificate so I might pass on that one.

There’s no rush though, if the weather wasn’t so bad I’d consider just banking the insurance money and riding my bikes to work, but we’ve had storms, flooding rain and icy conditions all week, so riding in and out of the city at 5am in these conditions don’t really appeal either.

[grcamna2]

Thanks Bill, yep, I’ve been looking at a couple of Mazda BT50 turbo diesel utes on FB going cheap, I contacted one seller who has a high mileage but clean one going cheap, but he doesn’t want to provide a roadworthy certificate so I might pass on that one.

There’s no rush though, if the weather wasn’t so bad I’d consider just banking the insurance money and riding my bikes to work, but we’ve had storms, flooding rain and icy conditions all week, so riding in and out of the city at 5am in these conditions don’t really appeal either.

Do they do a road-worthy inspection as a mandatory thing every year in Australia Terry ?

[Terry in Australia]

Thanks Bill, yep, I’ve been looking at a couple of Mazda BT50 turbo diesel utes on FB going cheap, I contacted one seller who has a high mileage but clean one going cheap, but he doesn’t want to provide a roadworthy certificate so I might pass on that one.

There’s no rush though, if the weather wasn’t so bad I’d consider just banking the insurance money and riding my bikes to work, but we’ve had storms, flooding rain and icy conditions all week, so riding in and out of the city at 5am in these conditions don’t really appeal either.

Do they do a road-worthy inspection as a mandatory thing every year in Australia Terry ?

Each state has it's own rules Bill, here in Victoria you need to have one when you buy a car or bike, and when you sell it, but that's it. In a couple of other states they need to have annual inspections done, which would be a PITA, and from what I've heard is rife with fraud anyway. Money talks, and bullsh1t regulations walk......

[grcamna2]

I got it Terry.The seller of that prospective Mazda BT50 turbo diesel which doesn't have a 'road worthy certificate',could that be because he has something to hide(damage)or because he wouldn't want to pay for it ?

[Terry in Australia]

It's a common problem nowadays Bill, sellers say, "Registered until December" or whenever, but "I'm too busy to get a Roadworthy Certificate, (RWC) but it shouldn't need much" so you have to assume that it needs work. There's a nice one going for a bit more than I wanted to spend, but has way less miles on the odometer, and comes with a RWC so I'd rather spend the extra money, because I can't transfer the registration into my name until I have the certificate. It's actually illegal to sell a registered car here without providing a RWC, but people don't seem to care nowadays.

[grcamna2]

Another Mazda BT50 turbo diesel;2-door or 4-door ? Will your job give you allowance to purchase it as a work/transportation vehicle Terry ?  I hope you're able to part-out the vehicle you own now after the insurance company totals it,to possibly sell the salvageable parts for some recompense.I imagine the rear cargo bed isn't large enough to carry a full motorcycle(possibly the T350 sideways  )but you can tow a trailer.

[Terry in Australia]

Another Mazda BT50 turbo diesel;2-door or 4-door ? Will your job give you allowance to purchase it as a work/transportation vehicle Terry ?  I hope you're able to part-out the vehicle you own now after the insurance company totals it,to possibly sell the salvageable parts for some recompense.I imagine the rear cargo bed isn't large enough to carry a full motorcycle(possibly the T350 sideways  )but you can tow a trailer.

No, once the Mitsubishi is written off it belongs to the insurance company Bill, and to be honest, it's been a great car, but I don't want to have it here. My $58000 ($45000 USD) Ford was leased thru the company I work for, but the lease expired last year and I bought it, but don't want to lease another car, it was great when I was doing big miles, but not so much now that I'm mostly working from home. I'll just buy a cheap(ish) ute that I don't care if it gets bumped in the car park etc.  

[MauiK3]

here it used to be Kia suv's that were undervalued, that seems to be changing. My daughter had an old body on frame 4 door Sportage that was a great little vehicle.

[Terry in Australia]

Well my mum reminded me that I had a car parked outside her place that, at almost 93 she no longer needs, so I'll be going back to my old Subaru that I gave Ma 6 years ago. Back in 2014 I bought a rough 1994 Subaru Liberty (Legacy in the US) for 400 bucks. The bogans (rednecks) who owned it had paid a mobile mechanic to give it a service and replace the cam belts, but the "mechanic" had fcuked it up and couldn't get it to run afterwards, and told them that the cam position sensor was faulty, and left.

I paid them the 400 and asked if I could use their driveway for a little while? I then took the belts off, re-timed it (no issue with incorrect valve timing hurting the old engines, they were "non interference" engines) put it back together, fired it up (which really pissed off the bogan lady) and drove it home. The following year I saw another one that had been a one owner car, a little old lady had bought it new in 1995 and driven it right up to the end of 2014, when she decided to move into a nursing home. She didn't need the car, so she gave it to one of the nurses at the home, a male nurse, who was also a PT (Personal Trainer) and wanted a car to cart all his PT stuff around, but decided that the sedan was too small, so bought a Forester, and sold me the old lady's car, for $500. My older sister who'd just moved back after living in the US for nearly 30 years needed a car, so I gave her my old one.

The "new" Subaru was a great car, I loved driving it, and did a bit of work on it, installed some headers, put new Pirelli tyres on it, new windscreen, brake rotors and pads etc. Then I got the 6 figure salary job in Canberra. I drove it back and forth and it was fine, until one time when I took a detour down "Brown Mountain" on one of my trips home, and cooked the new brakes, and almost wiped the car and myself out. OK, I leased the new Ford Territory, and gave Ma the Subaru to drive around town, as the 1975 Triumph TC2500 that she and Dad had owned since 1977 was becoming a bit unreliable. Coincidentally, we gave Ma's old Triumph to Rob in 2017, who is now in the process of giving me his minty Kawasaki KZ750 twin.

Anyway, the Subaru is still going well, but as Ma is 93 now she's not driving much, so when I told her the Mitsubishi has been written off by the insurance company, she suggested that I should come get the Subaru. Not a bad thing, as much as she's still got her marbles I do worry about her driving, and even though I've never made an "At Fault" insurance claim, in the last 4 or 5 years I've had 4 or 5 "Not at fault" claims due to other folks running into my cars, and every time that happens, my insurance company increases my annual premium. Not fair, but just typical of car insurance companies....

While the latest Covid-19 lockdown has been lifted, I can't travel into Regional Victoria until our dopey state premier says it's safe, so not sure when I'll get down home to collect the Subaru, but I'm actually looking forward to picking it up and driving it back to Melbourne. I'd still like to get a ute, but the Subaru will be an easier car to commute with, so I'll drive the Subaru and keep an eye out for a ute.

Back to bikes. It's sunny outside, so time to get back into the little Suzuki. More later.  

[grcamna2]

How close are you to firing-up your T350 Terry ?

[PeWe]

"My little Sizuki" sounds as a girl!
Lets hear some girl power or a sexy chic!?
A Japanese manga bike?

[Terry in Australia]

Thanks Bill, not long now at all. But of course, before I can kick it in the guts and ride it around the block there are a few things that need done first. The tank mounting rubbers I ordered a month ago haven't arrived yet, so I decided that I needed to redneck something to make them work. Suzuki front mount rubbers are like CB750 items in that they fit on the 10mm(?) pegs, but instead of being 32mm OD, they're 28mm. I didn't want to chop up new Honda mounts, so I pulled the ones off my tank painting stand, and pushed an 8mm bolt thru it, tightened a washer and couple of nuts on the back, fitted it into my cordless drill which I ran backwards as I ground it down on my belt sander.

T350 Saturday 12 Jun 2021 1 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

T350 Saturday 12 Jun 2021 2 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

I wasn't sure whether I'd need to shorten them too, but as it turned out, they are perfect, there was no sideways play when I mounted the tank. The next issue was the rear mount.

T350 Saturday 12 Jun 2021 3 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

It needed to be rubber mounted also, and I remembered that I had a roll of flat rubber strap somewhere, so I ratted thru my tubs and found it.

T350 Saturday 12 Jun 2021 4 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

Only 3mm (1/8") thick, but superglue loves rubber, so I glued two pieces together and used my gasket punch to punch a hole for the bolt.

T350 Saturday 12 Jun 2021 5 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

Another piece for the top:

T350 Saturday 12 Jun 2021 6 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

A washer and shiny bolt, and it was done.

T350 Saturday 12 Jun 2021 7 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

While I had the tank bolted on, I cut new fuel hoses, and added a couple of inline filters, even though there are filters on both petcock tubes.

T350 Saturday 12 Jun 2021 8 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

OK, so next job was the one I was always hate, wiring. As it was, it was pretty painless, even running the wires thru the handlebars for the left switchblock wasn't too bad. I installed the battery box, and dragged out my rusted rotten battery box to rescue the lid, which was missing from the one that I bought from Keith. Once again the rubber came in handy to pad the new Motobatt battery.

T350 Saturday 12 Jun 2021 9 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

And that was about it. I couldn't help but turn the ignition on and give it a couple of kicks, and was rewarded with nice fat sparks from each spark plug. Tomorrow I need to go find some new spark plugs at my local Supercheap Auto (big box car parts store) and buy some fuel and maybe a bottle of 2 stroke oil, and see if I can't make it go. I still need to McGyver one of the oil hoses to make it work, but I'll worry about that tomorrow. So far, so good.




     .

 

[simon#42]

when you first start it run it on pre mixed fuel , just a couple of ltrs . once the pump has bled through and it starts to smoke excessively just add more straight fuel to dilute it .

[Terry in Australia]

Thanks Simon, that's my plan, I don't even know if the oil pump works, so I'll run it on 25:1 and keep watching those little oil lines to (hopefully) see oil moving thru them.

[RAFster122s]

Looking good Terry. You gonna hit the rear of the tank
's rusty area with a bit of paint or just leave it?

The 2.5L Subaru motors with a lot of age sometimes develop head gasket issues,worth keeping an eye on your fluids andtemps as you get it going again.