[Bill Harris]

6 AM, Sunday, July 28, 2013, left my house in Roy, Washington and rode the Harris Scrambler to Eatonville and south to Morton, then to Randle and past Mt St Helens down to Carson.  Miles and miles of smiles and foot peg dragging twisties.  At Carson I gassed up and headed north to trail ride the first section of the Washington Backcountry Discovery Route.  After the trail ride, I headed to Trout Lake and south to White Salmon.  From White Salmon I rode down highway 14 along the Columbia River back to Carson.  Got gas and then back up all those wonderful twisties.  Arrived home 394 miles later at about 8 PM that evening.  A very good day on the Harris Scrambler.

Cheers,
Bill

I took these photos of the Harris Scrambler and me on the Washington Backcountry Discovery Route.  One can just see Mt Hood in Oregon, in the background on the first shot.     

[barenekd]

Sounds like a perfect day to me! Great shot!
I did a short 250 miler with the BSA Club on the Guzzi. We went up to Big Bear and environs
Bare

[boggy]

Harris Scrambler looks stellar, as always.  Glad you are getting it in the dirt.  We need to get you a GoPro camera so you can capture these Pacific North West rides. The scenery must be incredible.  Great pic.

Boggy

[DanB]

Very nice Bill.  Can I ask, how did you get the nice 'Alloy' look on your forks? Strip, polish and clear coat?

[Bullet Whisperer]

The bike looks very well, Bill, nice scenery, too! Hope you are still enjoying this machine.
 B.W.

[Ice]

The bike looks very well, Bill, nice scenery, too! Hope you are still enjoying this machine.
 B.W.

 Hi B.W.
Trust me, he does,,,,,daily. 

DanB

 Bill's secret sauce polishing trick is as follows; ride it like the wind,get it dirty, clean it up when you get home, lather rinse repeat as often as necessary 

[Bill Harris]

Very nice Bill.  Can I ask, how did you get the nice 'Alloy' look on your forks? Strip, polish and clear coat?

DanB,

I used a non-caustic aircraft aluminum paint stripper and then polished with Mothers Mag & Aluminum Polish.  No clear coat used.

Cheers,
Bill

[Bill Harris]

The bike looks very well, Bill, nice scenery, too! Hope you are still enjoying this machine.
 B.W.

B.W.,

I enjoy the Harris Scrambler very much.  Your 'S' cams are working outstanding, even with the intake cam retarded.  The bike pulls very strong from idle, all the way up.  It pulls a lot like my old BSA 441 Victor did.

Royal Enfield people are good people

Cheers,
Bill         

[DanB]

I used a non-caustic aircraft aluminum paint stripper and then polished with Mothers Mag & Aluminum Polish.  No clear coat used.

Thanks! 

[jest2dogs]

Bill, I am trying to set up "Ennie" with a set of old 4 spd handlebars I got from Vince several years ago. They measure 27" wide with a 4" rise and a 3 1/2" pullback (no crossbar). When I mount them, as yours are, with the rise vertical to the ground they look and feel great, however the clutch and  brake cables will not route through the casquette. The angle is too great and they want to either kink or, if left to find their own direction, point left and right, extending beyond the levers, inches from connection. I cannot see in your photo, how your cables are routed.

Perhaps your bars are pulled back (more rake?) or are much wider than my 27" bars. My stock bars are 29" wide, ~2" rise, with a 5" pullback (more rake) and I had no problem with routing. I wonder how they ran cables on the older bikes with these bars?

If I run them over the top of the casquette there is no kinking but they look like hell! And I haven't tried them with the tank in place, because the bike is pretty well stripped down right now. I hope to have some kind of finished product (with maybe the option of reversing the changes, if the need arises?) by the next Nickerson meet.

Today I bought a new, rather small battery, 3.2lbs!, shedding about 10lbs!! I am happy with it but not the cable routing issue.

Any ideas or pics/measurements of your bar setup?
(and I do not mean scotch and water )

Jesse

[High On Octane]

I would say that your control cables are now too long for the shorter handle bars and that's why they are not routing correctly.  I had the same problem when I switched up from my British style cruiser bars to the Super Bike bars.  With the shorter bars, my throttle cable and front brake cable were bulging out of place and looked bad.  I trimmed about 3" off of each cable/housing and re-soldered the cable nipple back onto the original cables.  After I did that the cables went right into place with no issues.

Scottie

[jest2dogs]

Scottie,

Thanks for your reply, re-soldering has been a consideration, but the only soldering I've ever done is plumbing and small wiring. I've never soldered items subjected to the extreme tension force of control cables.

Secondly, I found that my clutch cable is an optional heavy duty affair that I got from ?Vince?, I don't recall. It has a monster necked bulb on the transmission end that I had to trim to fit into the cage in the tranny. I must be getting old because I, just now, recall changing out part of the clutch cable connection innards to relieve stress on the cable end. (When did I do that?)

Anyway, the heavy duty clutch cable has a thicker housing/shielding than a stock cable (I found a stock one in my part bin to compare) and an added "wear" housing section where it runs through the casquette. All of this contributes to the lack of flexibility of the heavy duty cable.

I removed the extra layer, which also had a heat crimped label, which, in turn, peeled off part of the inner housing as it was cut free. Oh joy. I will now have to affect a repair on the housing with heat shrink tubing or...

Without this extra "wear" sleeve, the cable now bends sufficiently to attach to the lever. I must really be getting old because the last time I rode this girl it was a real tussle pulling in the clutch lever. Not sticky, nor rough, just hard. My Moto Guzzi clutch is a not as hard but then, too, like me, it's an older model )

I shall continue on now. Thanks for your advice. If you can get back to me with any pointers on soldering the stressed joint of a cable end, I would appreciate that.

Thanks,
Jesse

[High On Octane]

You solder cable ends exactly like you solder water pipes.  The only difference is sometimes you need to wiggle the cable a bit in the nipple to get the solder to seat all the way down.

Scottie

[jest2dogs]

Thanks, Scottie!

[High On Octane]

No problem!  Also I highly recommend using a cut off tool for trimming the housing and cable, it does a much cleaner job but a good pair of dikes work good too.  Another little tip, wrap masking tape around the cable where you want to cut it.  This will keep the cable from wanting to unravel.

Scottie

[jest2dogs]

Thanks for the tip Scottie!

Jesse

[Bill Harris]

Jesse,

I got my handlebars from Hitchcock they are the motocross style, 800mm or about 31 1/2" long and with a 130mm or about 5 1/8" rise.  I use the standard length cables, routed the same as  stock.  Hope this helps.

Cheers,
Bill   

[barenekd]

Bill just had to brighten your shot a little.
Bare

[Bill Harris]

Thanks Bare,  looks great!

Royal Enfield people are good people.

Cheers,
Bill