[Superchuck]

Howdy folks,

I've got a 2009 Electra AVL 500 which I purchased new in 2011.  I've put just over 13,000 miles on it.  (21,000 km)

After troubleshooting a number of electrical issues over the past few years, the bike runs great.  I burn a tiny bit of oil, so I assume my piston rings might need replacing sooner rather than later, but that's not something I really want to dig into until it's essential.

I realize this forum doesn't get the traffic it once did, especially since the AVL was sort-of the redheaded stepchild of the Enfield line, and I wager there probably aren't very many of these bikes seeing regular travel these days. 

Do you have an AVL?  What does your odometer read?  How is it holding up?  Any major rebuilds in the past or future that you're planning on?

Cheers and ride on,
Chuck

[tooseevee]

Howdy folks,

I've got a 2009 Electra AVL 500 which I purchased new in 2011.  I've put just over 13,000 miles on it.  (21,000 km)

After troubleshooting a number of electrical issues over the past few years, the bike runs great.  I burn a tiny bit of oil, so I assume my piston rings might need replacing sooner rather than later, but that's not something I really want to dig into until it's essential.

I realize this forum doesn't get the traffic it once did, especially since the AVL was sort-of the redheaded stepchild of the Enfield line, and I wager there probably aren't very many of these bikes seeing regular travel these days. 

Do you have an AVL?  What does your odometer read?  How is it holding up?  Any major rebuilds in the past or future that you're planning on?

Cheers and ride on,
Chuck

     So to misquote Dylan just a little bit:

      "Oh, my god, are we here all alone"?

       The saga of my 2008 Black Classic would fill a small book of 11 chapters; one for each year since I got it brand new, but an orphan, from the lawyers for an out-of-business dealer in Missouri, with zero miles and the original CMW Title with Kevin's name on it. It sat in a back room for a long time and I got it with no battery and a drained gas tank.

      Anyway. Last season I turned over a grand total of one thousand two hundred and ninety six miles. One of the reasons for the low mileage is my own physical condition plus many many mods and tweaking and retweaking and bullet-proofing and improvements and detailing. Plus there's lots of stuff I have to do just to do "life" other than ride and yard and housewise that gets harder and harder. I have to pick my days blah, blah, blah and if I do one thing I can't do another    The bike is still cosmetically perfect and all its original factory stickers are still stuck

     Anyway. Here's a few of those miles from a couple years ago that starts with a dead-cold kick start by a worn out old cripple :   

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELxQPdhh5mU

[Superchuck]

You've got some beautiful back roads near you... That video makes me yearn for spring!  Thanks for sharing.  I know there are a small handful of other AVL owners out there, hoping they swing by as well.

Cheers,
Chuck

[tooseevee]

You've got some beautiful back roads near you... That video makes me yearn for spring!  Thanks for sharing.  I know there are a small handful of other AVL owners out there, hoping they swing by as well.

Cheers,
Chuck

       I think we're all alone here, Chuck 

[Adrian II]

17250-ish miles on my Electra-X before the big-end went. 

A.

[Superchuck]

Dang, sorry to hear that Adrian.  I just found your post summarizing it. 

I'm nearing your mileage, especially since I plan to commute on mine a lot more this season.

Sounds like by your other thread that that issue was fixed on newer AVL's (mines an '09).

Since there aren't a lot of these bikes left, do you know of any major issues I should be looking out for?  (I'm a little nervous to be racking up the miles and don't want to get into a dangerous situation during my commute because of potential engine failures) hopefully that's not expected though?

Any other folks still putting around on their lovely little AVL's?

[Adrian II]

Most serious is the big-end. Just fit a good sump magnet to stop steel fragments making a mess of the scavenge oil pump chamber, and if the original does go crunch-clonk-clonk-clonk, rebuild the crank with a UCE/EFI 500 rod and pin. The last Electra-X AVLs in the UK were imported in 2007, the USA allowed non-EFI bikes into the country for an extra couple of years after that.

The sprag clutch in the electric start mechanism can also fail, either remove and use the kickstart, or ditch the unhelpful (IMHO) valve-lifter mechanism and modify the cylinder head to take the decompressor valve off a cast iron Bullet, and use it for stopping and starting with the E/S. Some people manage to get the valve lifter to work by replacing the feeble plastic lever in the l/h switchgear with a decent handlebar lever. Or maybe something like this:



https://www.ooracing.com/lever-clutch-includes-a-choke/decomp-lever-p3286.html

Tappets can snap where the foot joins the spindle (which was slimmed-down in the AVL redesign), with some modifications the tougher iron barrel tappets can be used, though this will need some additional work adapting iron barrel push rods to take AVL push rod tops.

My Electra had the lot!

A.

[Superchuck]

Thanks for the synopsis Adrian,

I removed my E-start solenoid when it crapped out years ago, and I only use kick start now.  Haven't removed the sprag but I think it's still intact.  In any case, I haven't found toothy metal bits in my primary case, etc.

I left the useless decompresser on, but I don't use it.

I've thrown a pushrod twice in the life of the bike, and now have fitted the performance tappet lifter cups.  I don't think that eliminates the brittleness of the thin adjuster things though, so I'll keep an eye on that.

If I understand your response correctly, the Big End is a weak part in all carbed AVL's, which includes my '09 model in the US.  When it goes, is that likely to immediately seize up your engine, or is it just a clump clump clump loss of power?

[tooseevee]

..... or ditch the unhelpful (IMHO) valve-lifter mechanism . Some people manage to get the valve lifter to work by replacing the feeble plastic lever in the l/h switchgear with a decent handlebar lever. Or maybe something like this:



A.

         I removed the sh*tty, useless plastic lever from the switchgear housing quite a few years ago and replaced it with exactly the lever in the picture, but handlebar mounted. I never was able to get it exactly right because of the housing/cable length of the original cable. Endless experimenting and tweaking never resulted in anything but still useless.

       The following year I removed EVERYthing to do with the pushrod jammer "decompressor". Never looked back.

        I have learned to tweak the kicker just enough to kick start it just fine with NO "decompressing" at all.

         As far as kickbacks go when shutting down with the key goes, I have not had one single instance  of that since switching to the Champion plug (previously I ALLways shut down with the "decompressor"). Changing to the Champion "miraculously" solved a number of "problems" I had chased for years because I kept thinking it was a carb problem. Don't ask me how or why, but it did. I can't explain it.

[heloego]

Back to the original whatchamacallit.

My '06 Electra AVL has 8K miles on the analog speedo and an additional 100 miles on the GPS unit I recently installed.
Stage 1 mod with Mikuni VM32 carb and Goldie exhaust, fly screen, complete re-paint, etc.

[Superchuck]

Heloego,

Nice, and still goin strong!

[Adrian II]

If I understand your response correctly, the Big End is a weak part in all carbed AVL's, which includes my '09 model in the US.  When it goes, is that likely to immediately seize up your engine, or is it just a clump clump clump loss of power?

It wasn't meant to be a weak part, it was SUPPOSED to be an improvement to cope with the higher compression ratio of the AVL engine! If the crankpin has been 1) made of the correct grade of steel, 2) properly hardened and heat treated, 3) finish ground to the correct dimensions 4) assembled with crank run-out within tolerances (the less the better), 5) supplied with good oil and finally 6) shown a bit of mechanical sympathy by the rider, there is no reason it shouldn't do as well as the Japanese big-ends from which it was copied.

Should your big-end fail prematurely (hope it doesn't), it is unlikely to seize the engine but make on ominous and very loud clonking from the bottom half of the engine, when that happens, turn the ignition off immediately and get the bike recovered home for repair.

A.

[Superchuck]

Many thanks for the advice Adrian!  I also googled it a bit and found a number of explanations on the Hitchcock's forum, I think also penned by you?  Screen name Adrian at least.

Hoping some more AVL owners chime in too!  There's gotta be at least a handful of us, right?

Cheers,
Chuck

[Adrian II]

Yeah, that's me. Forum junkie.

There's gotta be at least a handful of us, right?

Maybe that many! "We few, we happy* few... "

A.

* until the meds wear off!