{"id":21398,"date":"2023-03-12T00:01:30","date_gmt":"2023-03-12T08:01:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/?p=21398"},"modified":"2023-03-08T12:52:42","modified_gmt":"2023-03-08T20:52:42","slug":"potpourri-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/2023\/03\/12\/potpourri-part-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Potpourri Part 1"},"content":{"rendered":"
By Joe Gresh<\/h6>\n

Clutter tends to accumulate in our lives. The unfinished and the left-hanging gather dust motes and wind up in soggy cardboard boxes of odds and ends. So it is with ExhaustNotes stories: some of them just sort of fizzle out inconclusively yet what remains is not enough meat for a stand-alone follow-up story. In an attempt to close the books on a few articles and give our dear readers peace of mind here are a few loose ends, tied.<\/p>\n

The Harbor Freight Tire Machine<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve used the Harbor Freight tire machine to change five motorcycle tires and can report a 100% success rate. These successes include installing stiff knobby tires on the wide Husqvarna rims. Five in a row without a leak is unheard of for me. I\u2019ve pinched a tube 5 times in a row! My usual success rate is around 50%. While the tire changer makes the job easier it\u2019s still a bit of a work out. The built-in bead breaker is a godsend for old, stuck on the rim beads and having the rim held securely at waist level is nice on my sore back.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Working the machine, I ended up mostly using regular tire irons instead of the plastic duck-on-a-lever contraption. I haven\u2019t given up on the duck lever and it may be a case of user error. I plan on making the duck part pivot on the lever part to allow it to mate with the curve of the rim better. My experience with the HF tire changer has been positive even if I did have to do a few modifications to make the thing function. I feel like I no longer have to fear the Husky\u2019s tires and am confident I can change them in a reasonable amount of time without too much damage. I\u2019m not sure HF still carries the motorcycle tire adapter so if you want one you might have to check several stores to see if they have the thing in stock.<\/p>\n

The Husqvarna 21\u201d front wheel conversion<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

After spending several hundred dollars and several days labor on the failed Husky wheel conversion I\u2019m happy to report the bike is now back to stock configuration and rideable. After grinding clean through the old caliper I had to buy a new 4-piston Brembo caliper. I also replaced the wheel bearings as the originals had suffered enough of my abuse pounding them out of the wheel hubs twice.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Since I have given up on the 21\u201d wheel idea I bought a Continental TKC knobby in the Husky\u2019s original tire size. The tire cost $140 from Amazon and the knobs are about as high as the worn out knobs of a real dirt tire. The TKC is the knobbiest 17\u201d tire I could find that fit the rim. I\u2019m hoping the TKC will provide a bit more grip off road.<\/p>\n

\n

Help us bring more content to you:\u00a0 Please click on the popup ads!<\/span><\/h3>\n
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My buddy Mike graduated from a 390 KTM and has bought a new 890 KTM and I\u2019ll have to work the Husky a bit harder to stay up with his 100 horsepower dirt bike. I\u2019ve also raised the Husky fork tubes up \u00bd\u201d inside the triple clamps, effectively steepening the rake a bit. The old street slick on front would push in the dirt making corners a sit on the gas tank type of deal. Loose gravel was like riding on marbles and mud would coat the old tire within one revolution making the bike feel like it was on ice. Maybe the deeper grooves between knobs will give the mud some place to squish. Anyway, the bike looks much more dirt ready if a bit silly with the tiny front wheel.<\/p>\n

Yamaha RT1-B 21\u201d front wheel conversion<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

After my not so shocking failure converting the Husky to a 21\u201d front wheel I had a brand new 21\u201d knobby tire just sitting in the shed. Mirroring the same poor tire choice issue as the 17\u201d Husky, the 1971 Yamaha\u2019s 3.25 X 19\u201d front tire is an oddball. I have been running through my inventory of $10, new old stock Metzelers but those tires were approaching 30 or 40 years old and had weather checking on the sides. I was getting a bit of chunking on the side knobs also as the rubber was just plain old and breaking apart.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Luckily for me, the Yamaha 21\u201d conversion went smoothly. I bought a 1975 Yamaha DT400 front wheel, which is nearly a drop in conversion. The actual size of the tall-ish Metzeler 19\u201d is only about \u00be\u201d shorter than the new 21\u201d tire. I thought the bigger wheel might rub the fender but there\u2019s clearance. I like the low fender look on the old Yamaha so I might raise the fender a tiny bit for more mud room. It\u2019s usable as is, I\u2019ll just have to budget my mud riding.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The old, looping, brake cable guides were in the wrong spot for the new wheel. The brake cable on the new wheel is routed straight up from the wheel, in front of and parallel with the fork legs making the cable shorter and more direct as there is only one turn in the run. So I had to buy a new brake cable. I bent up a small piece of file cabinet to make an upper cable guide, for the bottom I used an off the shelf Adel clamp.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Old Yamaha Enduros are not known for having powerful brakes so I was surprised to see the 1975 conical hub had a \u00bd\u201d larger brake drum. The extra braking power provided by the 6\u201d drum is counteracted by the larger diameter wheel so it\u2019s kind of a wash in the braking department. At least I didn\u2019t go backwards.<\/p>\n

At the end of all this back and forth motion I have two motorcycles with new front tires and a warming trend on the way. Spring is right around the corner and Mike has a new 890 KTM that we need to get dirty. We have the whole state of New Mexico to explore. I\u2019ll have some more potpourri for ExhaustnNotes as I continue to tie up those loose ends.<\/p>\n

\n

Never miss an ExNotes blog:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Joe Gresh Clutter tends to accumulate in our lives. The unfinished and the left-hanging gather dust motes and wind up in soggy cardboard boxes of odds and ends. So it is with ExhaustNotes stories: some of them just sort of fizzle out inconclusively yet what remains is not enough meat for a stand-alone follow-up … Continue reading “Potpourri Part 1”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21400,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[96,64,66],"tags":[2941,3421,2526,2015,3422],"class_list":["post-21398","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-feel-good-stuff","category-gear","category-joe-gresh","tag-harbor-freight-tire-changer","tag-harbor-freight-tire-machine","tag-husqvarna-motorcycle","tag-ktm","tag-yamaha-rt1"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/0-900.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21398","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21398"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21398\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21414,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21398\/revisions\/21414"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21398"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21398"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21398"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}