Which gp kickstart shaft?

[alanscottj]

My kickstart is slipping again!!! As I have changed the kickstart piston 3 times and it happens again and again I have decided to change the shaft as well in case the cheap one that is on it is the problem. There seems to be a few different ones out there ranging from around £15 to the MB one for £85. Can anyone recommend one for a GP150 casing with a Mugello in it? Many thanks

[storkfoot]

Hold one of these next to a SIL one and you'll see the difference in quality. Don't worry that they aren't GP, I have used them on several engine builds with absolutely no problems;

http://www.lambretta.co.uk/shop/kicksta ... p-617.html

[alanscottj]

Hold one of these next to a SIL one and you'll see the difference in quality. Don't worry that they aren't GP, I have used them on several engine builds with absolutely no problems;

http://www.lambretta.co.uk/shop/kicksta ... p-617.html

Cheers Storkfoot, will this be ok on an Indian engine?

[alanscottj]

Also, would it be worth me buying and fitting an LI kickstart piston ramp? would adding one of these make much difference???

[rosscla]

I do that on my engines, hacksaw the ramp off the GP end plate and drill and tap the holes in the side casing. It gives you some adjustment in the throw on the kickstart and takes a load of pressure off the end plate.

[storkfoot]

No problem on an Indian engine, my current TS1 is in Indian casing. You will, more than likely, need to take a dremmel to the shaft to stop it catching on the clutch top plate (see Sticky's book).

The old LI ramp appears a better design, engineering wise, to me. However, both of my current engines have the GP endplate. I've never had any problems and, being inherently lazy on such things, I'd only contemplate adjusting it to LI if I did have real issues.

[rosscla]

Also I once got an allegedly SIL shaft off eBay from a supposedly reliable ebay seller. Came in a sealed SIL logo marked bag but I looked at it when it arrived and knew it wasn't 'right'. I tried to fit it and absolutely could not get it in the right place with the spring under tension.There's also some out there's with the splines machined a few degrees out which means you can't get the pedal on the correct spline, it's either too low or too high.

Ordered a proper SIL one from SR and you could see the difference immediately. Fair enough the Genuine SIL isn't pretty but it fitted first time and works.

[alanscottj]

Cheers guys, this 'issue' is doing my head in as it is the only thing that is wrong with my scoot after spending a fortune on the engine. Once she starts she is a pleasure to ride, it's just the messing about getting the kickstart to engage that is a pita.

I am going to order one of the CamLam ones you recommend and a new piston and see how that goes. Also gonna take the sidecasing off tomorrow and see if there is any damage on the 1st gear cog as it seems weird that it will engage when I move the bike forward in first, it is obviously engaging intermittently???

Will leave the ramp for now me thinks

[joey]

...best advice from my experience is to find the best gp original shaft you can along with an original plunger..robbed a plunger out of a vega side for my brand new Targa....

[joey]

..oh.. another idea I tried on my Targa to try and enguage the kick start sooner on the kick was to put a small cheese head screw in the plunger spring ?.. thus pushing the plunger out and making it enguage sooner...
nice try but unfortunately this did not work as it was stuck in enguaged.. but I think this could be due to tighter tollerances as i'm using 5 speed...with a normal 4 speed if I'd of ground the screw down and had more garage time it would of worked...?