Zenrat's Flying Circus

[Weaver]

Looking good Fred! 

May I ask how you make the exhausts?

It's easey peasey with the FIAT design, line up the
drilled timing holes on the camshaft drive pulleys
with the cast in place arrows on the head, measure
the gap with a feeler gauge, determine the needed
shim, depress the bucket with the neat little lever tool,
pull out the old, slip in the new.
Simples.   

Until you drop a shim down the cam chain tunnel... 

Honda did a DOHC 750cc inline 4 (CBX750) with hydraulically adjusted buckets, similar to hydraulic tappets on pushrod designs. It didn't catch on, probably because the accountants pointed out how much money they were making from selling shims and the dealers were making from fitting them...

I've got a Japanese market Suzuki GSF-400V-Ltd Bandit in a sad state in the garage (got stolen, damaged and recovered just before Xmas... ). That has DOHC, rocker-actuated valves, and variable valve timing. There are three cams and rockers for each pair of valves: when the engine management wants to shift cam profiles, it rotates the rocker shaft on eccentrics causing the middle rocker to bear on the peakier cam lobe and it's forked end to press down on the other two rockers, 'overriding' the normal cam action.

Upside? Goes like a short-stroke 16-valve 400 at the top end, but pulls like an 8 valve long stroke 750 through the rev range.

Downside? 32 valve clearances to check (screw & locknut, fortunately)...

[zenrat]

Your Bandit engine sounds like a solution in search of a problem.  It would be much simpler to have the 8 valve long stroke 750 with a simple nitrous oxide system for when you wanted the top end.   
I had a Suzuki GR 650 which was a parallel twin with a centrifugal clutch in the crank so it had a heavy crank at low revs for chugging along and a light crank at high revs for loosing points on your licence.  Another solution in search of a problem.
Nice to ride though.

I made the extractors the same way they make them in 1:1 - by trimming and connecting a number of pre-made bends.  In this case bends made from styrene rod (bent with steam) rather than steel tube.

There has been a bit of discussion in another thread about flashy kits.  Rather than hijack that thread I will present my exhibit here.
This is an Arii Yokosuka D4Y2.  It was very very cheap on Hobby Link Japan.  Arii have been repopping old LS moulds (this one from 1961 - it has the hinomaru moulded as raised detail) and it looks like this one has been popped about as many times as it can be without some TLC.
Yokosuka D4Y2 by Fred Maillardet, on Flickr

I have today recommenced work on the Airfix Comet I abandoned when I got sick of the PSR.  Such a graceful aircraft and such an ill fitting kit.
I had thought about painting it like Bulldog from Planes but may go another way now.
DH Comet WIP 02-12-18 by Fred Maillardet, on Flickr

[Weaver]

Your Bandit engine sounds like a solution in search of a problem.  It would be much simpler to have the 8 valve long stroke 750 with a simple nitrous oxide system for when you wanted the top end.   

Not in Japan, where you have (or had) to pass a much tougher riding test and 'MoT' to ride anything over 400cc. That's why their 400s are 'Rolls-Royce' versions compared to the 'disposable-cheap-tiddler' versions we get here. The UK-market GSF-400 had a God-awful flat spot in the middle of it's range, single disc, twin-pot caliper, cheap suspension and cheap, tacky paint & fittings. The Japanese-market version, ever without the VVS, had dinner-plate-sized twin discs, 4-pot calipers, much better suspension and much classier paint & fittings.

I had a Suzuki GR 650 which was a parallel twin with a centrifugal clutch in the crank so it had a heavy crank at low revs for chugging along and a light crank at high revs for loosing points on your licence.  Another solution in search of a problem.
Nice to ride though.

I remember them! Always wondered what they were like. Were they ever a UK-market model? I know some came in during the 90's Grey Import craze.

I made the extractors the same way they make them in 1:1 - by trimming and connecting a number of pre-made bends.  In this case bends made from styrene rod (bent with steam) rather than steel tube.

Okay cheers. That's the way I'd do it, I just wondered if there was some specific car-modeller technique I hadn't thought of.

There has been a bit of discussion in another thread about flashy kits....

I remember quite a few flashy kits even back when I was a kid, and it didn't seem to be a problem, as long as the flash was thin.

I have today recommenced work on the Airfix Comet I abandoned when I got sick of the PSR.  Such a graceful aircraft and such an ill fitting kit.
I had thought about painting it like Bulldog from Planes but may go another way now.

Floats...

[ericr]

I have today recommenced work on the Airfix Comet I abandoned when I got sick of the PSR.  Such a graceful aircraft and such an ill fitting kit.
I had thought about painting it like Bulldog from Planes but may go another way now.

Floats...

[PR19_Kit]

I have today recommenced work on the Airfix Comet I abandoned when I got sick of the PSR.  Such a graceful aircraft and such an ill fitting kit.
I had thought about painting it like Bulldog from Planes but may go another way now.

Floats...

But Dave Kitbasher already did that, albeit with only one engine, so perhaps there is some scope.

Maybe a single float?

[NARSES2]

Or, I could start a new one...

Go on, you know you want to 

I enjoyed the old Airfix Comet when I bashed it into my RAF P.R. aircraft. Certainly suited a nose wheel

[jcf]

It's easey peasey with the FIAT design, line up the
drilled timing holes on the camshaft drive pulleys
with the cast in place arrows on the head, measure
the gap with a feeler gauge, determine the needed
shim, depress the bucket with the neat little lever tool,
pull out the old, slip in the new.
Simples.   

Until you drop a shim down the cam chain tunnel... 

Not an issue, camshafts are belt driven from outside. 

[Weaver]

It's easey peasey with the FIAT design, line up the
drilled timing holes on the camshaft drive pulleys
with the cast in place arrows on the head, measure
the gap with a feeler gauge, determine the needed
shim, depress the bucket with the neat little lever tool,
pull out the old, slip in the new.
Simples.   

Until you drop a shim down the cam chain tunnel... 

Not an issue, camshafts are belt driven from outside. 

Jealous.... That kind of system tends to incure involutary lower-limb amputation issues on an across-the-frame bike engine though...

[zenrat]

I had a Suzuki GR 650 which was a parallel twin with a centrifugal clutch in the crank so it had a heavy crank at low revs for chugging along and a light crank at high revs for loosing points on your licence.  Another solution in search of a problem.
Nice to ride though.

I remember them! Always wondered what they were like. Were they ever a UK-market model? I know some came in during the 90's Grey Import craze.

I bought the GR here in Melbourne so I had a bike while my Triumph was shipped out accompanied by all our less important belongings.  The ADF military police used them although mine wasn't ex army.  Being a Suzuki of a certain age I was convinced the alternator wasn't going to last very long.  They were official imports but are rare so you can not rely on wreckers for parts.  Suzuki dealers were not much help either unless the part you wanted was also used on a more popular model.  There was a lot of taking parts in to show to an experienced store man with a good memory.
It went OK and sounded like a well set up British parallel twin but without the rattles.  It also didn't leak oil and as far as I can recall no bits fell off.
They qualify as learner bikes here and the bloke I sold it to bought it for his wife to ride on her Ls.

Or, I could start a new one...

Go on, you know you want to 

I enjoyed the old Airfix Comet when I bashed it into my RAF P.R. aircraft. Certainly suited a nose wheel

I am feeling the urge to build something with good fit and fine detail and have got an Eduard FW190A box out of the stash.

I have today recommenced work on the Airfix Comet I abandoned when I got sick of the PSR.  Such a graceful aircraft and such an ill fitting kit.
I had thought about painting it like Bulldog from Planes but may go another way now.

Floats...

But Dave Kitbasher already did that, albeit with only one engine, so perhaps there is some scope.

Maybe a single float?

Well, I do have a Nakajima A6M I bought for parts.  I was going to use the float on an FW190 but it turns out that aircraft actually weighed more than a Zero.  Unlike the DH88 which was lighter.
So that's feasible.
The A6M is another super flashy Arii kit.

[NARSES2]

I am feeling the urge to build something with good fit and fine detail and have got an Eduard FW190A box out of the stash.

Possibly not the kit then. The earlier tooling is notoriously fiddly and fussy albeit a very accurate kit. Eduard themselves recognised this and have since completely re-engineered it. Looking at it though I think the A5 is from this second tooling ?

Latter edit : Thinking about this I'm not sure it was the 1/72 kit which was fussy, it may have been the 1/48th. I have the 1/72 A5 Profipack in the stash and there's no way I would have bought the fussy version.

So I'm probably just wittering on, so apologies 

[zenrat]

The box I have out is the Grunherz dual combo boxing A5s & A8s IIRC.  It contains a bewildering number of sprues.
My birthday is on Sunday and Mrs z took delivery today of a box from BNA Model World into which I am not allowed to see yet.
I may just wait.

Mind you...

[NARSES2]

The box I have out is the Grunherz dual combo boxing A5s & A8s IIRC.  It contains a bewildering number of sprues.

I think you are ok with that one 

Happy birthday for Sunday 

[zenrat]

Well I made a start on a 190.  Gonna be a racer.  I'll start a thread in the appropriate place.
The dual combo boxing contains enough parts to build an A5 and an A8 and I will have two fuselages and two sets of wings left over for other whiffing porpoises.

I also got out the very flashy Nakajima A6M, clipped off the floats parts, shaved them and glued them together.
The single float looks right under the Comet but because of the low wing and underslung engines the props are going to be mighty close to the water unless I extend the float legs.  Comet props are small diameter two bladers so we'll see what needs doing when I offer everything up.
If I use this float i'm toying with using the undercarriage bays in the nacelles as bomb bays.

[zenrat]

Fun morning at work today.
It's always good to be told to get f**ked by a customer.

[NARSES2]

Smile at them and say "thank you". Pees them off even more