would it not be more economical to buy a stainless steel body complete with seals 99-7027 they retail in the UK for around £55.00

 

This is my budged background project, i'm sinking my money as i can afford it into my indian chief, wla bobber, and various hot rods and this is my "i'm bored and broke" time sink... This is the "build on pennies in my spare time thing" I'm trying to keep this as basic and original as possible, plus with dot 5 i dont see a reason for SS.

Ebay - cta 1120 1/2"-2 1/4" small brake hone

Just what i needed and i'll get it off amazon for the weekend

Did you do tear down yet? Unless you just want a spare hone & seal kit I'd most strongly recommend a tear down first to make sure you can even reseal old master. Plus you must be able to remove master from perch.

Everything looks fine, i've done a number of wheel and m/c's in the past and i feel these should be fine..... I'm used to terrible brakes, my last daily driver was a '59 ford before that a '65 el camino all stock brakes. If i was looking to update or replace anything, i think i'd start with the heavy ass calipers, then step the size to match my current m/c for biggest bonus.

 

Take a piece of wooden dowel that will fit in you drill chuck and using a junior hacksaw or other thin blade, cut a 2” slot in the end. Insert a 2” wide strip of 1000 grit wet and dry paper in the slot and wrap it round with the abrasive side out.
Adjust number of wraps to get a fit that works.
Lubricate with thin oil or WD.
Finish off with some metal polish on plain paper or the w&d reversed. I’ve refurbished a few dodgy/ leaky masters and slaves like this.
Cheap and worth a try!

 

Ebay - cta 1120 1/2"-2 1/4" small brake hone

most hones are too big, starting at 3/4" so you have to be careful.

Clean the cylinder many* times with soapy water then rinse thoroughly.

Honing is Surprisingly effective but you definitely don‘t want that grit residue in the brakes, it will destroy them-so afterwards clean,clean, clean.

regards
Peg

* many = more than ten in this case.

 

A bit like spinach?

 

Hi Shag, The cheap small 2 arm hones are a trace too large. So you're left with brush hones. In my area nobody stocks the 5/8, so your left with ordering. Indeed, shipping has gotten rather costly.

Did you do tear down yet? Unless you just want a spare hone & seal kit I'd most strongly recommend a tear down first to make sure you can even reseal old master. Plus you must be able to remove master from perch.

I and all the T140 owners I know have used the LF Harris stainless barrel complete with the pistons & seals already installed. All have been 100% reliable so far. A dud may happen with a burr or something wrong, but so far we've not experienced that. Bonneville Shop sells it for $110. You need to purchase oring for reservoir & any other parts separately. Sometimes the threads in perch are corroded so bad you cannot unscrew master. If you force it, then threads are junk. But usually they will unscrew even though a fight. Deburr threads on slot of new master (they have slot instead of flat for set screw). Grease the threads with anti sieze or water proof grease on assembly.

If you're going to keep bike & actually ride it, the stainless cylinder is a good value.

Bonneville Shop also sells a 13mm barrel assembly. I've never used one. I might install one for an experiment on my bike. Front only. They are too powerful for rear disc.
Don

 

Another fix is to sleeve the cylinder. The master is oversize for a single caliper anyway. You can get 5/8" smooth bore stainless tube with a 14mm bore. Drill the reservoir hole - 0.025" and epoxy it in place. get a piston kit from K&L 32.1081 (clutch master on several H*nda motorcycles). Forget at the moment if you need to change the pushpin.
You will get push back from others on using a 14mm master. It makes the brake feel more like a modern disc rather than a drum.

 

Hi,

sleeve the cylinder. The master is oversize for a single caliper

Mmmm ... Lockheed were hardly amateurs at designing brake systems ...

Fwiw, I've had Lockheed 0.7" ID master cylinders with twin Lockheed calipers on my T160's since I upgraded 'em, 5/8" ID master cylinder with single Lockheed caliper on my T100 since I built it, I wouldn't have 'em any other way - I've tried a T160 with 5/8" ID master cylinder and twin Lockheed calipers, awful, horrible, vile.

Years ago, I improved the infamously-poor single front disc of a popular Honda just by replacing the Honda 14 mm. master cylinder with a Lockheed 5/8". When Honda superseded that version a year or so later, while the new version still had the 14 mm. master, the caliper slave diameter was smaller ...

Hth.

Regards,

 

Hi
RGM produced an excellent kit for the woeful Norton Commando front disc brake, sleeving it down to 13mm, this can be adapted for use on a Triumph front brake, I used several before the aftermarket suppliers finally woke up and started to supply stainless steel 13mm bore master cylinders, correcting the miscalculation made by Triumph/Lockheed.
The brake is transformed by the 13mm cylinder, from a nasty wooden, no feeling poor stopping brake, into a two finger haul up brake, with lots of feel and feedback.

Here is a link to the kit, but for the price you are probably better off buying a new 13mm cylinder if you want to take the opportunity to upgrade the front brake.

MASTER CYLINDER RELINE KIT WITH INSTRUCTIONS FOR ALL COMMANDOS

RGM NORTON 050136 MASTER CYLINDER RELINE KIT

www.rgmnorton.co.uk

regards
Peg.

 

Hi John,

With the bikes and components I described in my previous post, I'm not aware of any great effort to stop either a T160 with twin front discs or a T100 with a single front disc. T160 with a single front disc could be puckering, but the additional front disc fixed that. And, no, I'm not built like Arnold Schwarzenegger ...

Otoh, T160 with twin front calipers but a single-disc master was horrible because it was like squeezing a jelly, there didn't seem to be any 'relationship' in the lever - either set-up I have, the harder you squeeze the lever, the faster the bike stops.

Also, given the T160's also have dog-leg levers, it's possible twin front calipers with a 5/8" ID master isn't possible given the amount of extra lever travel.

Hth.

Regards,

 

We disagree on this. My Wenco frame racer, which is a lot lighter than a stock bike, has a 5/8" master with two Grimeca calipers on 11" discs and I would not like the braking to require any more lever force. If the lever feels like jelly I would suspect air in the system somewhere. Or else something is flexing badly. Hydraulic fluid is fairly incompressible. I use braided line. One place that is always a problem with the Lockheed master is the space between the end of the banjo bolt and the bore of the cylinder. The through hole is small, maybe 0.1" and the bolt does not bottom in the hole. If the cylinder is not held near vertical it is impossible to get the air trapped in that area out. I also have never been a fan of the way Lockheed tells you to set up the piston clearance. To minimize lever travel you want the front seal to move just behind the reservoir hole so the pressure in the line can escape but not have to move the lever further than necessary to cover the hole and start pressurizing the line. To do this I blow in through the line end until air escapes from the reservoir hole then turn the cylinder in until the flat aligns with the set screw. My cylinders are different in that they do not have the flat and the set screw has a nylon button under it. My cylinders are hard anodized aluminum.

 

Hi Dave,

If the lever feels like jelly I would suspect air in the system somewhere. Or else something is flexing badly.
One place that is always a problem with the Lockheed master is the space between the end of the banjo bolt and the bore of the cylinder. The through hole is small, maybe 0.1" and the bolt does not bottom in the hole. If the cylinder is not held near vertical it is impossible to get the air trapped in that area out.

The guy who built the bike was an experienced Triumph owner and builder years before there was an internet, I learned much from him. I also know what air in the brake line feels like. It was not that. It was far too much lever travel for my liking.

Hth.

Regards,

 

Summit racing has a two blade hone from 0.5" - 2.5" $17

https://www.summitracing.com/parts/oes-25032?seid=srese1&gclid=Cj0KCQiAyMKbBhD1ARIsANs7rEGof5UW4JVvsjCH5m_u3lt03XXHxa1pumNaUWquaFIGepx5JzYtjggaApz8EALw_wcB

 

Never ran DOT5, always 3 or 4. DOT 5 is dimethicone, DOT4 is polyglycol ethers, a completely different animal.
DOT5.1 is glycol ether and borate ester compounds, so closer to DOT4 than DOT5.
Unless you ride a Bummer with ABS and DOT5, air in the fluid is not typically a problem. ABS uses rapid pulsing to modulate the brakes for you which can aeriate DOT5. I do not consider DOT5 a usable brake fluid.
However, notice I did say "fairly". Everything is compressible. Granite is compressible, not much but still is.

 

Never ran DOT5, always 3 or 4. DOT 5 is dimethicone, DOT4 is polyglycol ethers, a completely different animal.
DOT5.1 is glycol ether and borate ester compounds, so closer to DOT4 than DOT5.
Unless you ride a Bummer with ABS and DOT5, air in the fluid is not typically a problem. ABS uses rapid pulsing to modulate the brakes for you which can aeriate DOT5. I do not consider DOT5 a usable brake fluid.
However, notice I did say "fairly". Everything is compressible. Granite is compressible, not much but still is.

The compressable thing doesnt matter to me, it is the ability to absorb mosture, which as people in ethonol gas areas have figured out, is a huge issue on a rig that may sit for months at a time.

 

I have twin discs on my T140, using the Triumph 'special' version Lockheed alloy caliper with 36mm pistons.

My bike originally had the combined twistgrip / master cylinder / switchgear on the right side. I replaced all that with a Norton master cylinder so I could use the 169SA switchgear, and a Tomaselli fast action twistgrip.

The Norton master is notoriously oversized in the Norton world, and sleeving it down is the usual remedy, (and I have had it done on my Commando's master cylinder) but the 'full bore' version works nicely on the two alloy calipers I now have on the T140.

The hydraulic ratio is approx 20:1.

 

"it is the ability to absorb mosture, which as people in ethonol gas areas have figured out, is a huge issue on a rig that may sit for months at a time. " - which is why DOT5 is worse. The water does not get absorbed into the fluid but puddles so there is more risk of corrosion.

 

Hi Dave,

it is the ability to absorb mosture, which as people in ethonol gas areas have figured out, is a huge issue on a rig that may sit for months at a time.

- which is why DOT5 is worse. The water does not get absorbed into the fluid but puddles so there is more risk of corrosion.

never explained is how this moisture would get into a sealed system in the first place?

. as of this year, I've been using DOT5 exclusively in all my hydraulically-braked bikes - British and Japanese - for forty years;
. currently, this is nine separate systems (nine bikes I wish, some have front and rear systems); however, over the aforementioned period, it's probably double or treble that number of systems as bikes have come and gone;
. the bikes' use varies/d from day-in, day-out all-weather dispatching and commuting to some might not be ridden for months, especially during the winter;
. I haven't ever seen water in any system, to the extent I don't bleed any system unless it's taken apart for other reasons.

Hth.

Regards,