I'll start with apologies for the lack of pictures - never have my phone when I need it, lol...
I purchased this rig, with a Ural side car attached to it. The side car was shortened as it was crashed and was being built for the previous owners dog. We have a couple of dogs we'd like to see if they enjoy the ride...so here I am making this setup reliable enough for my wife to run around in. Bike would run, but then would stop running and liked being on some level of choke. Heard a hissing sound when it shut off after a run up and down my street (couldn't identify where it was coming from, but suspect fuel tank?).
1st step is to get to a baseline from a running perspective.
- Bought a new batter and wired in a trickle charger.
- Set cam chain tension
- Set valve clearance, right bank intake was loose, but otherwise the other valves were good.
Went to set points, but no power turning the key. Found the plug from the key switch is slightly cracked and was loose. Cleaned those contacts and secured the plug.
I'm seeing that plug is part of the wiring harness and probably not something that is easy to fix. At some point if it becomes problematic, I'll replace with a Deutsch connector.
With that plugged in tightly, I got power (lights, neutral switch light, etc) but not to the coils. Found that the ignition switch on the handlebar was wonky - would turn on/off at the slightest touch/movement.
Took that apart and found something I love about 50yr old equipment - almost everything is rebuildable.
Once you remove the screw that holds the wire retention bracket, you can remove the screw that holds the low/high beam switch arm - just slide it out.
The switch itself is a box that slides on a couple of copper rails - this assembly slides up and out at the base of the circuit board - just be careful that there is a spring loaded ball bearing at the top of the plastic box.
Once this is all out - you have access to the c-clip that retains the red rotating ignition switch. Pull the c-clip off with the brass washer under it.
The rotating ignition switch has a ball bearing and a u-shaped brass contact that also has a very small spring behind it.
Making the assumption that the spring has weakened I needed to figure out a way to 'shim' it - so I cleaned up the brass u-shaped contact point and put a dab of solder where the spring makes contact.
Put it all together and now I have solid switch action from on-off-on.
Be warned that getting the c-clip back on the rotating switch post is not easy - I ended up using a gear puller to lightly, but firmly, hold the rotating switch in position and compressed so that I could use 2 small screw drivers to get that c-clip back on.
I'm now ready to set the points.
I purchased this rig, with a Ural side car attached to it. The side car was shortened as it was crashed and was being built for the previous owners dog. We have a couple of dogs we'd like to see if they enjoy the ride...so here I am making this setup reliable enough for my wife to run around in. Bike would run, but then would stop running and liked being on some level of choke. Heard a hissing sound when it shut off after a run up and down my street (couldn't identify where it was coming from, but suspect fuel tank?).
1st step is to get to a baseline from a running perspective.
- Bought a new batter and wired in a trickle charger.
- Set cam chain tension
- Set valve clearance, right bank intake was loose, but otherwise the other valves were good.
Went to set points, but no power turning the key. Found the plug from the key switch is slightly cracked and was loose. Cleaned those contacts and secured the plug.
I'm seeing that plug is part of the wiring harness and probably not something that is easy to fix. At some point if it becomes problematic, I'll replace with a Deutsch connector.
With that plugged in tightly, I got power (lights, neutral switch light, etc) but not to the coils. Found that the ignition switch on the handlebar was wonky - would turn on/off at the slightest touch/movement.
Took that apart and found something I love about 50yr old equipment - almost everything is rebuildable.
Once you remove the screw that holds the wire retention bracket, you can remove the screw that holds the low/high beam switch arm - just slide it out.
The switch itself is a box that slides on a couple of copper rails - this assembly slides up and out at the base of the circuit board - just be careful that there is a spring loaded ball bearing at the top of the plastic box.
Once this is all out - you have access to the c-clip that retains the red rotating ignition switch. Pull the c-clip off with the brass washer under it.
The rotating ignition switch has a ball bearing and a u-shaped brass contact that also has a very small spring behind it.
Making the assumption that the spring has weakened I needed to figure out a way to 'shim' it - so I cleaned up the brass u-shaped contact point and put a dab of solder where the spring makes contact.
Put it all together and now I have solid switch action from on-off-on.
Be warned that getting the c-clip back on the rotating switch post is not easy - I ended up using a gear puller to lightly, but firmly, hold the rotating switch in position and compressed so that I could use 2 small screw drivers to get that c-clip back on.
I'm now ready to set the points.
