Scooterotica

6LDA 28B wrote:

eden wrote:If an engine is built properly with good parts including gaskets it shouldn't need to be stripped down every 7.5 hours, lamb46 is correct also about motorcycles, I have a 6 year old GSXR that has a full service history, in those 6 years its done 15k miles and only had 2 sets of spark plugs and I ride it hard, it red lines at around 17000 revs and red lines every time I go out on it, I'm sure if its engine was stripped down every few hours it would have had loads of things fail.

now stick a turbo and nitros kit on the GSXR and thrash it
that's the equivalent of what we are doing to scooters with RB's and TS1's
but put together correctly you shouldn't have problems but keep an eye on them

john mates that run the tuned r1s that we were with on the ferry have two engines and are always having them and the bikes for that matter re built. there is a threshold even with rice rockets where they wear through everything at a rate of knots. id like to know where the money comes from too as it cant be cheap.


rings and re torquing the head is worth considering, its what cost me my engine. wast the base gasket a manufacturing failure though?

hopefully mark gets all these gaskets back so he can get them checked over
it could of just been a friday afternoon batch, does it make it harder for gasket manufacturers now you can't use asbestos

ive got a roll of cork gasket in the shed, no idea why but it gives me a Fred Dibner moment now and then when im smoking my imaginary pipe.

i cant see anyone sending their gaskets back with a sae though somehow, its not blue peter

mark will be just be eagerly stamping "scoot rs" on his dodgey ones and ebaying them..........while im having my ts1 barrel welded to my casings just in case.

ok every componant can fail and has a life expectancy,now what stresses we impart on these componants is down to the idividual,state of tune,exhaust type etc.ie we are not running motors all the same and at constant rpm.so we cannot react on a known milage or hr count before our pistons fail.....but on a highly tuned high revving motor would it be advisabel to change say a 130quid race tour piston at say 5k miles?or wait til she lets go and wrecks the barrel....there must be a ball park figure for the majority of people on here running revvy ts1,s and rb,s........surely?

sorry eden forgot to mention cast cylinders also, im getting at piston/ring failure times not the actual barrel

Any Lambretta that is tuned will or may be full of any combination of new, used and or crappy remade parts that if you think you have one area covered it may still fail in another area and you will chase your tail trying to find the next potential failure. Building a decent engine requires a great degree of skill and knowledge to use the best parts in the correct areas and to be able to fit or fettle to fit parts so they do their job well. On top o this the user will then need to get to know their engine and it's characteristics and sounds and what it is capable of doing as well as recognising by sound or feel when something isn't right. I'd wager that not many have such an engine or adequate skills to to be able to do the above or to carry out the checks, adjustments and fixes to a good enough standard to keep their bikes in tip top condition. So, an hour meter would be useless as far as general condition is concerned as there are too many variables, these are not off the shelf MX motors that you could just bolt on a pre-jetted carb and away you go with your engines all running at the same 580 degrees Centigrade on your EGT, these are far more sophisticated and consitently engineered motors

any tuned motor needs careful building and good maintenance.... but cutting edge power is always going to be potentially more unreliable.

For the road personally I think i well built and maintained engine is quite capable of an annual strip and check. i have a road mugello 225 - Charlie Edmonds tuned barrel.... 4000 miles last year never missed a beat ..... but shortly it will be be stripped and checked over. like people have said..... 7.5 hours running between rebuilds.... erm..... consider another form of transport i reckon! For a race engine run totally flat out - yes fair enough - but for the road! thats just crazy

ok...lets take all other influences out of the equation.....should a piston be changed at a known milage before it lets go...if so what would be a good ballpark figure?......if my ts1 gets to 5k miles id happily spend 130 quid on say a new small end and piston....and have piece of mind on that companant

Mate of mine whose doing the lcgb championship this year, changed his piston in his ts1 start of this season, 15000 miles on last one !!! Think it had a ring change in that time , barrel lining still very good , How many hours would that equate too!!!!

camel wrote:ok...lets take all other influences out of the equation.....should a piston be changed at a known milage before it lets go...if so what would be a good ballpark figure?......if my ts1 gets to 5k miles id happily spend 130 quid on say a new small end and piston....and have piece of mind on that companant

Theres no hard and fast rule mate .... depends on the quality of the piston!