INDIAN 741 Supercharged...See you in 2011

[octane]

Yesterday was a good day.
Got a lot done.

The weather acted up and we had a thunderstorm
with the worst downpour of rain measured in 30 years.
6" in two hours (!) ,
so this was what Copenhagen looked like yesterday



...so I stayed in and burned the midnight oil.

Had the crank end-float shims laid out




and a few INDIAN tools courtesy of Indian parts Europe



and after initially screwing things up,
and assembling and disassembling a few times
I got a perfect end float




It's a bit difficult to explain but the engine
comes together in a rather unorthodox manner
because of the way it goes into the frame



...but finally around midnight ,
in it went:



All what's left is to throw the rest of the parts in the general direction
of the above......and WrrrrOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM !


.

[Seldom Seen Slim]

Lars, are you positive that top photo isn't from Venice, Italy?

[octane]

Lars, are you positive that top photo isn't from Venice, Italy?

Yep, though it's hard to recognize it as being Copenhagen

Yesterday was a good day.

Of cause it wasn't.
What I meant to say, was that it was a good day in the workshop.

..................................

Got the valve gear in



..and measured the cam-shaft end-float



..to compare it to the last time the engine was assembled
just to make sure nothing funny had occurred.

[octane]

...assembled the nifty starter-mechanism



allowing myself time to smarten up the cover
by polishing it, masking up some go-faster stripes
and sand-blasting it



New head-bolts and hardened washers from ARP arrived:



New on the left. Old on the right.
Unfortunately there was a f-up with the number of bolts they send me
so I'm waiting for the rest to arrive


The copper gaskets arrived



They really look the part.
They're 1.7mm ( 0.066” ) thick. (!)



Of cause they had to be trimmed to size.
Used a dentist thingy with a bend sharp thingy ( lots of thingies here )
to mark the shape of the combustion chamber
scraping along the edge under the gasket



(Yes; I have grown an extra hand. One needs that when working on an INDIAN.)


Filed it into shape



and 'flattened' the edges



Made an extra set , which of cause was easier now that I had a set of templates



and punch-marked them F and R , for 'front' and 'rear'




Did the BPG test ( Bostik Poster Gum )
Gum in the heads. Assemble heads to cylinders. Turn engine.



to make sure the valves didn't interfere with the tops.
Front head looked good.

Ooops: rear head, not so good



so had to work on them a bit



So back to filing the gaskets.
DOH: maybe I should have done this in the right order


Heated up the gaskets with a propane torch to soften them.
...and I heated and I heated and I heated and I heated
but they really wouldn't turn red,
but they did go soft.
I was wondering if the torch just didn't deliver enough heat
so I tried on my BSA gaskets. No problem. Turned nicely red.
??????

Made me think if the old gaskets would take such abuse.

NOT so:
after about 15 seconds the gasket burst into flames ( huh ??? )



and the surface totally disintegrated



ever so slightly bending the gasket and taking a closer look
revealed that it had totally fallen apart and sort of evaporated
looking exactly like what happened to them last year when I ran with them on the Salt



I have no clue why this would happen.
People use these kinds of gaskets every day.
My friend Allan use them on his souped up Indian Chiefs with no problems.
Maybe this particular batch had some sort of fabrication failure (???)

Anyway: makes me feel rather confident using the copper gaskets

[grumm441]

Maybe the old gaskets were not designed for a performance application
Also, I don't see a metal fire ring on them

I was speaking to a friend of mine, who works Jim Parker Indian in Australia, and he told me he was getting thick chrome moly washers custom made for that application, and anything short of copper or copper-asbestos gaskets just didn't work
G

[charlie101]

I'm using the hardened head bolt washers from my discarded SAAB V4 engine. I suspect they are the same on the german Ford V4 and V6 engine.

[octane]

I was speaking to a friend of mine, who works Jim Parker Indian in Australia, and he told me he was getting thick chrome moly washers custom made for that application

My new washers are grade 8 hardened,
so they should do the trick.

Maybe the old gaskets were not designed for a performance application

Mmmmm, dunno: but the thing is that , as I mentioned, my friend use them on
his two highly tuned Indian Chiefs, which turns out waaaaay more power than my engine


It's weird.
The first person I told about this, had trouble believing I was telling the truth
( and frankly; so was I....ha ha ) so I re-did the test this morning
putting it on video ....can't argue with that, can ya ?

Here's the video. Watch how it bursts into flames at around 10 sec.
( Click the image ,wait a few seconds and the video starts )



and here's the result of the above exercise:




Now I do understand that this is not a exact representation
of what goes on inside the cumbustion-chamber, but still ;
all that damage just from my measly little torch !

.

[wobblywalrus]

Lars, it is not hard to make a copper head gasket.  Sheet copper is available from a commercial roofer and usually they have scraps.  First the copper is clamped between two pieces of wood.  The big piston hole is cut with a hole saw to a size a little bit smaller than the final size.  Then it is taken out from between the wood pieces and the piston hole is enlarged to the final size and the other holes made.  The last step is to anneal the gasket.  It takes an evening to make one gasket for a single cylinder.   

[Briz]

Lars, I expect you know (and did) this, but to properly anneal copper, you have to heat it and quench it. The opposite to annealing steel.
These days its fairly easy to get copper gaskets laser-cut.

[Koncretekid]

Lars, I expect you know (and did) this, but to properly anneal copper, you have to heat it and quench it. The opposite to annealing steel.
These days its fairly easy to get copper gaskets laser-cut.

I think that the jury is still out on the quenching part, but I'd like to hear what other people think (or know, if we have an export on board.)

This is copied form Gasket Works USA website:

 "After the gasket has been worked to proper size it is ready for use. It may be necessary to re-anneal the gasket if it has work hardened. Annealing is a heat treatment that softens copper. The gasket may work harden somewhat if you have worked with it but it still should be soft enough for use.

Since there is oxygen within the copper it can only be annealed (using flame heat) a few times before it becomes somewhat brittle. I don't rec. reannealing more than three times.

OXY/ACETYLENE TORCHES may give TOO MUCH HEAT. We do NOT REC. this method.

Heat the metal until it appears just dark red while in a dark location. More red or orange is not necessary. Ideally, a temperature of about 900d F is optimal. Let air cool. Once cool (in about five - ten minutes) brush with the"Scotch-Bright" pad on a flat hard surface to clean and flatten. A flaky post annealing residue is normal after annealing in air. Bright annealing in an inert gas oven is optimal and prevents this oxidation. "

I've heard of both methods.
Tom

[MattGuzzetta]

I am not an engine guy, but I have been lucky to have watched some great engine guys work.  When assembling the Yamaha road race motors Don Vesco used to heat the copper gaskets and then quench them to to the annealing.  It surprised the heck out of me at the time as it is the opposite of heat treating various steels.  They used to use the same gaskets a number of times.
It really is the details that count in engine assembly.  You are doing a great job Lars, it really takes time to do it right!   Can't wait to see your bike in person this year!
Matt Guzzetta

[octane]

Lars, it is not hard to make a copper head gasket...

Nope

It takes an evening to make one gasket for a single cylinder

..but I simply do not have the time.
I needed one set + one extra set
+ one set ( not filed to size ) for my extra set of heads.
So I bought 3 sets. They're not cheap but they're not expensive

Lars, I expect you know (and did) this, but to properly anneal copper, you have to heat it and quench it. The opposite to annealing steel.
These days its fairly easy to get copper gaskets laser-cut.

I think that the jury is still out on the quenching part

Thanks Briz
and thanks Tom for the info.
Obviously the jury is still out,
but I did do the quenching thing.
From what I've gathered it won't hurt.

It really is the details that count in engine assembly.  You are doing a great job Lars, it really takes time to do it right!  Can't wait to see your bike in person this year!
Matt Guzzetta

Thank you for your kind words Matt.


A friend pointed me to a magazine in which was featured a bike
that's supercharged and runs one of them Wal Philips 'injectors':





The builder claims it works really well
but best so at WOT

Mmmmmmmmm.


Da' Saltbisquit is starting to look like a bike again:









.

[Ellwood]

What a fantastic build, i can only give you one tip, for the head gasket - machine in a couple of  matching grooves on the barrel top and cylinder head underneath to give a better seal on the copper gasket - the copper will press into those grooves and never blow the gasket.
Good luck at Bonneville,
regards Ellwood

[wobblywalrus]

Hi Lars.  Somehow I missed the post showing the gaskets.  They look good.

Most of the fellows that taught me how to work on engines grew up in the great depression.  They were thrifty.  One guy bought his copper head gasket new in the annealed state.  He kept the gasket for the life of his engine and he did not reanneal it.  He said the gasket squished to conform to the high and low spots in the mated surfaces.  He always reinstalled it exactly the same way, up side always up, etc.  He also torqued and untorqued the head bolts in incremental intervals and he followed the manufacturer's tightening pattern.  This was important, he said.  He had no head gasket problems that I recall.

It is difficult to get a head gasket evenly heated with a propane torch before quenching.  Some spots are hotter than others.  This can make some spots more annealed than the rest and cause problems.  A gas stove burner can adequately heat a bike head gasket with sorta even heat.  A foundry has a large enough flame to evenly heat a car gasket.  When in doubt let a foundry do it.  Usually the cost is minimal and several gaskets can be done at the same time to make it economical.

One of my side acts is old style architectural sheet copper work.  The copper needs to be annealed so it can be bent and hammered around sharp corners.  See the copper around the posts.  This is a job I am doing this afternoon.  The copper is quenched after heating if it can be done.  Often it is not.  Both processes make it softer but the quenching makes it softest and the annealing is the the most uniform with quenching.

Pre-unit Triumphs needed more bolts in the cylinder head between the cylinders.  Head gasket leaks were a problem in this area.  Some silver paint applied to both gasket faces at this spot made a big difference.

The bike is looking good.  - Bo

[octane]

Thanks Ellwood !
Thanks Bo. Your sheet copper work looks just beautiful.

I mentioned earlier that my friend running the two souped up
big Indian Chiefs, used the same head gaskets that I previously used.
Not so. I had misunderstood him.
In fact he uses this type



..a triple layer of metal.
Don't know the exact kind of metal, but a magnet sticks to it.
Never seen that type before.


The right head-bolts from ARP arrived yesterday



..so with a bit of luck I can start up the beast tomorrow.