Unofficial Royal Enfield Community Forum

Royal Enfield Motorcycles => Bullet Iron Barrel => Topic started by: mustangdave on November 04, 2013, 01:32:48 pm

Title: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: mustangdave on November 04, 2013, 01:32:48 pm
Ok...winter project time is approaching...considering doing a FIREBALL upgrade, however $$$ maybe an issue. So I thought of just going the CLUBMAN route to get a bump in performance and keep my cost down a bit. Tom, I'm familiar with the upgrades involved in the FIREBALL conversion...could you educate me on the CLUBMAN level please.
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: ace.cafe on November 04, 2013, 01:56:15 pm
Ok...winter project time is approaching...considering doing a FIREBALL upgrade, however $$$ maybe an issue. So I thought of just going the CLUBMAN route to get a bump in performance and keep my cost down a bit. Tom, I'm familiar with the upgrades involved in the FIREBALL conversion...could you educate me on the CLUBMAN level please.

The Clubman head mod is basically a porting job with high-quality big valves and our custom valve seat angles, and some valve stem seals for oil control. It is essentially the same port and seat angles as the Fireball, and it can be upgraded to a Fireball head later on, since the porting is already done to it. The valves are not the same as the Fireball, because the Fireball uses different valve gear that requires a modern valve stem cut for modern valve locks, so we use the Kibblewhite big valves that have the old Enfield style retainer cuts for those original valve locks, and use your OEM valve springs and parts. This keeps cost down.
The Clubman with stock valve gear imposes a lift limit to no higher than the stock valve lift, if you want to keep the valve stem seals on there. And it also imposes a 5000 rpm rev limit, because the stock springs really can't control those valves at higher rpms.
If you want to rev higher, you can install the Hitchcock competition springs.
If you want more lift, you will have to remove the valve stem seals and use competition springs.

The intended arrangement of the Clubman set-up was for a budget system that gave very good results for the money.
It is intended to be used with re-phased stock cams which obviously will have the stock lift height, so the head needs no special springs to handle high lift or deal with aggressive cam profiles, since the re-phased cams are stock cams with only a valve timing adjustment. And you just re-phase your own stock cams, so there are no cams to buy, and that keeps cost down. However, you can increase lift height and rev range with the Shotgun Rockers and Hitchcock competition valve springs, if you remove the valve stem seals.

You will need to buy a piston like ours and have it installed in your barrel(preferably alloy barrel), because you need a high compression piston to work with the re-phased cams, or your compression will be too low. So, at this juncture, we recommend moving to the big bore 535 and the high compression piston to suit the other mods. Since this can stress the bottom end, we recommend using our Ace piston, which is the lightest weight of all forged 535 hi-comp pistons for the Bullet, and will place less stress on the bottom end than other choices. And it's the same piston we use on the Fireball.

Include a VM32 or TM32 and a free-flow kit, and you are in business at a reasonable cost.
If you can do the bottom end rebuild with better bearings and a better rod, that would also be a good decision for reliability/longevity.

In the tightest budget scenario, where you kept your cast iron barrel and had it bored for our uncoated piston, re-phase your own stock cams, and bought the Clubman head mods, and a Mikuni VM carb with rubber manifold kit, and you already had a free-flowing exhaust of any kind, and were going to keep the stock bottom end as it comes from the factory, you could get the whole Clubman performance package for just over $1k. If you already had a carb and manifold, it would be under $1k(plus your labor to install it on your bike).

This is a lot of bang for the buck. And there is a clear upgrade path to the full Fireball kit at any time, without obsoleting anything except the valves and springs. Everything else would be compatible to full Fireball upgrade.
I have been rather shocked, actually, that more people have not taken this Clubman route. It's amazingly good for the cost of it.
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: mustangdave on November 04, 2013, 02:48:57 pm
Thanks Tom...good info...
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: ace.cafe on November 04, 2013, 07:13:39 pm
Thanks Tom...good info...

We made it with the upgrade path, because we considered that the Fireball would be the eventual goal, and we put the Fireball port in it for this reason. That way, the owner gets a good taste of what kind of performance our parts offer, and they are already halfway on the way to a full Fireball head.
This is the lowest cost performance package that we know of, and we went to great length to figure out how to do this at with the most benefits and least cost, with minimum obsoleting of parts when upgrading. I don't see anything else around that is likely to beat this out for the cost involved.

We named it the "Clubman" after the original meaning of the term in the 1950s, where the everyday workman would hot-rod his daily rider bike, and ride it to the races on the week-ends to race it, and then ride it home. It had to be affordable, still be easily ridden on the street, and have enough "go power" to make it a sporting machine. That's what the original Clubman bikes were, and we tried to keep this Ace Clubman package true to that tradition. It's  sporty, it works well as a daily rider, and it's within the price range that anyone can afford. 
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: Hog Head on November 05, 2013, 03:27:58 am
I have a Clubman head using the Hitchocks valve springs which I understand are the same ones sold by our Host.
Piston is an 8.5 Accurlite from Hitchocks in an aluminium cylinder bought in India. I am in Thailand so not so easy to get the work done in the US and I hand carried the head to Tom when in Canada on holiday.

I bored the cylinder using torque plates, and trued up both mating surfaces, along with the head sealing surface to make it all seal properly - machine work is cheap here

The TM-32 carb with an ACE filter is ideal, and so much better than the stock POS that the bike is now a joy to ride

Money well spent, and I am very happy with the end result. If you can afford it get the bottom end work done by Tom/Chumma as it is only a matter of time. The ACE piston is better if it is in your budget

Tom now has new ratio rockers coming to market, and I will be fitting those to my new head once I figure out how to deal with the valve seal interference

Highly recommended
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: mustangdave on November 05, 2013, 02:49:43 pm
what about using the stock crank shaft and main bearings, and upgrading the ignition to a Boyer ignition.
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: High On Octane on November 05, 2013, 03:12:19 pm
Boyers are nice and will help a little, but without any internal upgrades you won't see a whole lot of improvement.

Scottie
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: ace.cafe on November 05, 2013, 03:24:23 pm
what about using the stock crank shaft and main bearings, and upgrading the ignition to a Boyer ignition.

At this level of mods, you can use the stock crank and bearings, but they will be shortened in life by some amount. We don't know exactly how much shorter life, but sometimes it has been seen to be quite short after performance modding, and sometimes it will last somewhat longer. It depends on how hard you run it.

A boyer ignition is fine to use, and we often use them.
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: mustangdave on November 07, 2013, 12:47:31 am
Hog Head brings up an interesting point...the stock Mikuni carb, while I understand the a flatside TM32 is preferred, will the stock unit do in a pinch until I could procure a TM32?
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: tooseevee on November 09, 2013, 08:37:30 pm
The Clubman head mod is basically a porting job with high-quality big valves and our custom valve seat angles, and some valve stem seals for oil control. It is essentially the same port and seat angles as the Fireball, and it can be upgraded to a Fireball head later on, since the porting is already done to it. The valves are not the same as the Fireball, because the Fireball uses different valve gear that requires a modern valve stem cut for modern valve locks, so we use the Kibblewhite big valves that have the old Enfield style retainer cuts for those original valve locks, and use your OEM valve springs and parts. This keeps cost down.
The intended arrangement of the Clubman set-up was for a budget system that gave very good results for the money.
It is intended to be used with re-phased stock cams which obviously will have the stock lift height, so the head needs no special springs to handle high lift or deal with aggressive cam profiles, since the re-phased cams are stock cams with only a valve timing adjustment. And you just re-phase your own stock cams, so there are no cams to buy, and that keeps cost down
I have been rather shocked, actually, that more people have not taken this Clubman route. It's amazingly good for the cost of it.

           Ace,

                 Couple questions about the Clubman head mods (possibly) for my '08 AVL. As you know from the AVL forum I have the stock BS-29 rejetted for wide open exhaust & intake (cone K&N directly on carb) with less than 1,000 miles carefully broken in, but not babied. It's running really well & I'm happy with it.

            Would I like just the head work if I shipped it to you over the Winter? Would I be more happier with my engine?  :)(http://) Would it be worth it to me seeing as how I'm not looking for more RPMs or more speed, just a better running engine?

             I had the heads on my shovel done by head pros who had all the right stuff when I rebuilt the engine in 2002. They used Kibblewhite valves & of course new seats with all the correct angles ground in.

             Also what's involved in "rephasing the cams" on an Enfield?  Is that like removing a gear & replacing it up a tooth or back a tooth?

             You can email me offline with a quote if you'd rather. I recall the harley heads cost me $500 each which was 1/10 of what I spent in total on the engine & transmission.
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: ace.cafe on November 09, 2013, 09:01:42 pm
Tooseevee,
I think that the best thing I could recommend to fit your stated requirements is to let us do a performance valve job on it.
This is a fairly low cost procedure that will not change the basic character of the engine, but it will flow more air at all rpms, and so you'll get more torque and hp at all rpms. This kind of valve job might be called a sort of "streamlining" of the valve seat area, which allows more flow without any other real changes.

The valve job on most any stock engine, especially Enfields, is not something that the production line spends much time on, and is a place were good improvement can come without much expense.
We may even be able to use your existing valves, and just do the re-cut of the valves and seats. We haven't done any AVL heads yet, but we know what they are like, and when we get the head, we can relatively easily determine the best courses of action and make recommendations and costs to you.
If it's just a valve job, we should be able to do that for a rough estimate of about $150. If you want some new valves or other stuff, we can discuss that when we look closer at the head.
Re-phasing the cams is not always possible or productive on all engines. IIRC, the AVL is not a candidate for cam re-phasing of the type that we do on the Iron Barrel. The AVL has different cam timing. Re-phasing like we do with the Iron Barrel does change the power range and characteristics of the engine, and also requires a different piston.  Probably best to leave the cams alone on that engine, or check with Bullet Whisperer about the "S cams".

We might be able to do some roller rockers on that head, if it turns out to be similar to the "Big Head" on the iron barrel bikes. But that's a lot more expensive.


How's that sound?
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: tooseevee on November 09, 2013, 11:02:23 pm
Tooseevee,
I think that the best thing I could recommend to fit your stated requirements is to let us do a performance valve job on it.
This is a fairly low cost procedure that will not change the basic character of the engine, but it will flow more air at all rpms, and so you'll get more torque and hp
snip                       snip           snip   snip

We might be able to do some roller rockers on that head, if it turns out to be similar to the "Big Head" on the iron barrel bikes. But that's a lot more expensive.

How's that sound?

           That sounds like exactly what I'd like to do. We'll agree on what else we might want to try (besides the full valve & porting cleanup) after you see the head.

           I won't put the bike down until December because I'm still hoping to hit my 1,000. There might be two more (1/2 way) warm days in November. That's all I need.

          I want to change all the fluids at 1,000 & was going to retorque the head then also so we'll kill two boids with one stone.

          Good. We'll talk later. I feel good about this & it will give you an AVL guinea pig to play with. It will also give me that perfect time to install those deep socket super push rod adjusters I ordered quite a while ago (Z91503) from CMW.

           Thanks, Joe.
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: ace.cafe on November 09, 2013, 11:17:20 pm
Sound like a plan.
Looking forward to it.

Thanks,
Tom
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: tooseevee on November 10, 2013, 01:40:02 am
Sound like a plan.
Looking forward to it.
Thanks,
Tom

            Sorry Tom, I feel like an idiot.

             For being a history buff, I've just proven the old adage "Do your research FIRST before you stick your foot in your mouth" by sticking my own foot in mine.

             I thought YOU were Joe Mondello & I've just gone & found out that he died in 2011. So sorry. He must have been a great old guy & aren't you lucky to have known him?
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: ace.cafe on November 10, 2013, 02:07:13 pm
            Sorry Tom, I feel like an idiot.

             For being a history buff, I've just proven the old adage "Do your research FIRST before you stick your foot in your mouth" by sticking my own foot in mine.

             I thought YOU were Joe Mondello & I've just gone & found out that he died in 2011. So sorry. He must have been a great old guy & aren't you lucky to have known him?

It's okay.
Joe was a good friend and the best head porting expert ever. It was an incredible experience to know him.
Anyway, we still do the work at his shop which is now owned by his wife  Mary. The guys there are really talented too and they do a great job.
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: High On Octane on November 10, 2013, 02:09:46 pm
.......Anyway, we still do the work at his shop which is now owned by his wife  Mary. The guys there are really talented too and they do a great job.

Those guys obviously learned from the Best!   :)  Can't wait to see what you guys can accomplish with my heads.  Hopefully I'll have them shipped out his week for you Tom.

Scottie
Title: Re: CLUBMAN upgrades/mods
Post by: ace.cafe on November 10, 2013, 04:09:46 pm
Those guys obviously learned from the Best!   :)  Can't wait to see what you guys can accomplish with my heads.  Hopefully I'll have them shipped out his week for you Tom.

Scottie

Thanks Scottie!
Looking forward to getting those heads!
We'll give you the results you want.