Boxerworks.com

I understand your confusion, for I am (and have been) totally confused as well. After going over and over the two pictures on your site a number of times and just as importantly re-reading it, I think I "get" how the replacement part (72 and up upgrade) might work. (I might add, the initial double clamping parts seem rather odd to me as well - surely nothing I would have dreamed up.)

I also see now how (I presume) why the second picture(s) I posted confused you as I guess it should have, for from seeing your picture over head, I thought the gap above the top head bearing (in the last pictures I provided) was hiding the new type one piece clamp; obviously now you're telling me it is not.

I find it very likely I have the original system, while I cannot recall with 100% conviction, I can tell you I do not recall thinking twice about touching/messing with anything to do with the head bearings at that time, regardless what it was or how it was fashioned for even if I had the better replacement, at least at that time, on this bike, the original bearings could not be set any more "properly." When the M/C is completely torn down, I'll have to reset whatever is there - so going with the better part seems logical.

I don't know, either I need glasses or a spacial relations test these last couple days, weeks...

Am I even scratching the surface of what in the World and how in the World the newer system works, and where/hoe it is located?

Hi Doug,

It looks like that is the part you need. The lock ring (not shown in the picture), goes on before the top nut. The lock ring has (I think) four notches about an eighth of an inch wide, spaced evenly around it. The lock ring and top nut are jamb nutted against each other to lock your adjustment into place...so it doesn't change.

That is how headset bearing adjustment is achieved on older bicycles. In fact, they used something like the outdated part that started this thread in the really olden days...that is, before I started my interest in bikes....as in, BC. After that, and within my timeline, they started the type that is on your last picture, which uses two pieces that jamb against each other for locking in the adjustment. Nowadays, we have a different type of adjustment that does not use threads on the steering tube.

This is for Duane: It sounds like he said he will use his outdated parts to make tools to check his fork alignment. I think he was asking if the parts shown in the pictures are what he needs to supersede his old style parts.

Chuey

I should know this crap - thanks for your post Chuey; I am headed out the door; can comment later.

Douglas

Chuey, really glad your mention of bicycles and such. Since I grew up in a hardware, and this will date me some, YES - I recall dealing with something rather similar - I want to say especially on Schwin's and a few other of the hot brands of that era from the main distributor in my region, Columbus Cycle. They had a split ring and knurled retaining nut, but I do not recall the clamp - maybe it was there, but I thought I recalled that the retaining nut merely due to its conical shape inside was what "squished" together and allowed one to set the head bearing tolerance - the split ring in those cases were really sort of a lock washer - or I mean that is the role they took, even though inside the knurled nut, they were what kept the actual nut from changing its "tightness" and therefore kept the head bearing adjustment from changing. I was also upset to see that if you look at Duane's site, I think someone finally sent him some pictures of the OEM spoke boxes - we have the Clover Leaf made (can't recall company now; they are German though...) sitting right there in plain view load of them in the back room - and I thought, "You don't suppose there are any spokes that will replace mine do you? "Take a wild guess... (NOPE)

Anyway, I could be remembering that wrong to some degree too as that was a VERY long time ago and even though we carried head bearings and crank bearings, head bearings were one of the least likely things to get screwed up on a bicycle and become "notchy." Now the crank assembly - another story entire; between people not being able to figure out one pedal was reverse thread, to deciding their crank needed "maintenance" and over tightening it. I think this was most likely due to the notion the head bearings were harder to get to and mess with than the crank bearings were and we had/have special tools...

Round of apologies to all, for your patience. I guess the part shown in my second post with pictures, I was making the assumption the locking "nut" or piece you, Duane describe was residing in the gap between the top conical head bearing and the top triple-tree clamp and then finally nut. I guess if I confused everyone, that would mean it should be easily visible and since it is not, you experienced folks see that right off - I could not tell - sorry about that. From your writings Duane, sounds like the newer part is just as it looks, one piece, but I should be able to see it in the two pics of that triple-tree.

This is all I can see in the ETK for a /7 - ITEM THREE (3) is the part I think you are directing myself and others to retrofit; is that correct Duane? and if so, is there any other parts that would need changing entirely (not just totally readjusted) as well when/if I find one? I am still betting the more I think I have the odd double clamp arrangement that would be stock for that clamp now seems to ring a bell, just can't get over to the bike right now.



So we are talking about item #3 in the above breakdown; nothing else would need changed for the step up? Again I thank you all for your patience and I did end up with revision after revision of fork alignment tools a very good tool (thanks Duane for your efforts at that time on that project) but also realized that Duane's measurements were based on something still some different than what I had or have, so when Duane quotes a go/no-go for the alignments, how do I know if I am not accurate enough, or obsessing over being truly too accurate?

Yes, I'll likely cut up the extra triple tree I have regardless and make some tools out of the bottom ends, but my first agenda actually was not to hack the thing apart at all, it was to study it outside the bike while comparing it to the installed one as during both of my fork alignment projects, the hardest thing I found (and most aggravating) was not getting everything set perfectly - it was getting everything tightened properly without it pushing things out of alignment. No, I was not hitting the stops and was using the same technique Duane uses or used and still found that challenging. On both I think in the end, I had to essentially "unalign" them the wrong way to some degree, so that even with torque relief bar properly placed, what in the end would happen is the small amount of "slippage or side-loading I simply could not avoid from friction on the nuts, would pull it INTO alignment rather than out. So I was hoping to rack my brains on if there could possible be ANY WAY AT ALL to make up a custom tool so that once all the geometry is correct, the act of tightening things up with a torque relief bar or any sort of "doo-dad" would not throw things back out of alignment. I've not read through Duane's part of the alignment business in maybe 5-6 years, but never recall this being mentioned as a major problem - I had MAJOR PROBLEMS with it. That was really why I initially bought the triple-tree for 10 or 20 bucks. But, if I am so stupid I am eluded by the simple change in head bearing lock-down design, maybe that is beyond my league right now too.

dwire wrote:
Anyway, I could be remembering that wrong to some degree too as that was a VERY long time ago and even though we carried head bearings and crank bearings, head bearings were one of the least likely things to get screwed up on a bicycle and become "notchy."

Hmmm, not my experience. Rigid fork bikes ridden and abused in the dirt (jumping, etc.) can really beat the crap out of the steering head bearings. Perhaps your customers were kinder to their bikes than my friends and I were.

Don't know - BMX stuff had not really been mainstream then yet; skateboards were just going from metal wheels to neoprene and such, so that's likely why. Traditionally, this town was not upper crust other than the college and those that worked in the few factories left in the adjoining larger "city" rather than tiny town. But I did a few head bearings, but crank bearings were far more frequent here...

dwire wrote:Don't know - BMX stuff had not really been mainstream then yet; skateboards were just going from metal wheels to neoprene and such, so that's likely why. Traditionally, this town was not upper crust other than the college and those that worked in the few factories left in the adjoining larger "city" rather than tiny town. But I did a few head bearings, but crank bearings were far more frequent here...

I'm way to old for the BMX movement, but in the mid 60's we rode our Columbias and Sting Rays just like the BMX kids do now.

I have no idea how I survived...

That's a funny story. It was as well funny when I wrote that indeed, I am old enough to say, skate boards had METAL WHEELS on them still for the most part as a kid - well at least all the ones the kids around town could afford. Kind of odd too, while we had roller skates that came from God knows where that also had metal wheels; "real" roller rinks when they were "hip" all of their shoes had neoprene wheels - just the ticket for the skater types on their boards...

Some such statements are not indicative of what was really available (somewhere) and such, but we as young children were never aware that we were dirt poor, so I'd think that could make my experiences with such things not quite line up with when they were available.

I rode a 1976 Rupp 125cc motocross bike with 6 speeds and a SACHS racing engine in it - and those things, how few of them were made, won everything that year, but it was not enough to save the company. I was far more into that than the hour ride on my bicycle to get out to a friends house to spend the day burning up gas on that bike. If I had a first born, it might be a tough choice; first born or a mint condition 1976 125cc Rupp set up for the races as SACHS gave you unGodly amount of real estate to bore the jug to size-wise as we bored it first time 0.250" over and there was still plenty left to make it even bigger; let alone just boring it because you seized it up...

The one I got to ride in my youth they just looked up and down the shelves for a stock Wiseco racing piston that was of similar nature and wrist-pin height and used its measurements to bore the holly crap out of that jug - turned out to be a quarter of an inch lol. That bike was truly a gem and very few people even know they ever existed in '76 for some reason; despite them winning everything they entered just as a factory bike - way ahead of its day in '76... I'd expect I could live out my life without ever seeing another - and we had two; one to ride and one to steal from. I wish I had pictures of little old me (I WAS a kid; I had to have been under 8) with that thing leaned over to get one foot on the ground on that bike. I know it would pass cars on the highway like they were standing still and would pull the front end off the ground quite nicely right up to fifth gear.

So for me, I took care of my bicycle so I could go out and try and break my neck on that Rupp...

I only knew of Rupp minibikes, not real motorcycles.

In MY town, there were Rupps, but looked like this:



They were smokin' fast too.

Yes, the snowmobile thing and the little bitty 50cc bikes were the "thing" for those two companies - though SACHS made some phenomenal engines for their snowmobiles.

I wrote up a post and I know, of the sacrilege of it all about that RUPP 125cc Motorcross Racing bike and made its own post - maybe some day someone will run across it and say, "Hey I've seen or had one of those!" Or, "I watched one of those win races at XYZ" This way I don't sound crazy and I did not want to clog up the steering head bearing thread further with OT material. So I made my own thread for it. Maybe one day someone will see it and post to it or contact me with their experience(s) with such a unique and rare bike. Here's the thread on its own. viewtopic.php?f=1&t=4960

What I do want to mention and others may freely comment positively or negatively is the following. As I am sure some of you here have noticed, just like this clamp I could not quite grasp, I truly DO use the search funtions here and elsewhere and if the cards fall my way this winter, I would like to complete what we used to call on a vintage car, a ground up - or body off restoration on the bike. I as I guess for better or much, much worse am a different sort of person than many here or elsewhere. Occasional that works to my advantage, just as often, it does not. But if anyone has noticed, I have been asking questions to sort of "prime" my mind for the task, as I know how to use the search functions here. I am well acquainted with Duane's site and over the years, he has granted me so much latitude in my inexperienced, or easily confused - or just simply CONFUSING questions. I too can that all for that not to taking anything away from any of the other wonderful patient folks here that have reached out to help me, but I thank Duane deeply for his patience, for if I recall correctly my first meeting with Duane was via the old phorum, and shall we say less than gratifying.

What I am eluding to is we all both "work" differently as well as think differently. Myself, I have been posting on regular basis's here questions that are for my benefit when the time comes. Will I recall all the answers or get them right? Of course not, but since I know it was a thread I started, or participated in and we all learned from, I can use that little search box and refer right back to it in a flash. Everyone has their own way of doing things, for better or worse. I often see that those that post with immediate problems occurring "RIGHT NOW" perhaps partially due to their haste to want a solution or a myriad of other reasons, it makes something simple, like checking and changing ones dead generator (alternator) bulb something that need not be so complex. So I apologize if my style or habit of asking questions as I learn more and more about it while my bike is not 110% If preemptively asking questions while the bike is in boxes is an irritant to the community here then perhaps I can modify what I am dong, but I just know from prior experience, I may not need know the entire answer or procedure - but just that I know I had a discussion of one here or elsewhere will allow me in my moment of need to use search functions and such to call that back up with no need to trouble anyone.

Not sure if any of this makes a lot of sense, but.. I'm an imperfect sort and have always been of more use in person than in my writings as I can spit out manic ramblings most can keep up with in person and keep people's attention far better than a medium such as this, but I digress. If the forum community would rather have me on and off of here all day long each day I am doing something to my bike on tear down or reassembly, I guess I could go there; my philosophy has been to try and make a preemptive strike on that which I don't understand and either be done with it entirely, or know I can refer to it when the time arises... Thanks to the forum community.

Douglas