Moving from foot controls to hand controls: I'd made some progress with that problem-child rear brake set up. If you recall, the 63.5mm RS exhaust wasn't playing nice with the road bike rear brake master cylinder: they both needed the same crankcase mount. I didn't strictly need to use that exhaust mount, many photo's of WSB bikes show it unemployed but it was still going to look pretty crap with the exhaust mount hovering around the rear brake master (for genuine RS the brake master is mounted on the rearset not the crankcase, so is a non-issue).
But the fact I'm talking about hand controls and the rear brake is a give away: enter stage left one as-new HEL thumbrake:
For the money they are great quality/value and the tip of the lever actually swivels around that bolt for added positionability. The unit didn't come with a fork mount, but HEL with their usual great service were very snappy in sending out the item above.
In some ways not having a foot pedal made things much easier: no complicated check valve and hose arrangement as is common with dual setups where both are installed. I just needed a long single line straight to the caliper.
HEL have been great but so are Probrake in Germany, offering a super simple custom hose configuration and ordering service:
The deciding advantage for my application is the option of 7075-T5 alloy fittings, which are 1/3 the weight of the usual stainless steel, and the fittings are able to be adjusted through 360deg for perfect orientation. So a complete set of thumbrake, front brake and clutch lines were ordered:
While I waited for the lederhosen-clad hose elves to work their magic deep in the Black Forest, I had to organise some way of mounting the fluid reservoirs I'd previously ordered. Some head scratchin' and beer drinkin' later I came up with this lil' number:
It's basically just a piece of alloy angle with the foot bent up and tacked in place and. By complete coincidence, with no research on my part, it doesn't look totally dissimilar to the Factory bike arrangement:
As you can see all similarity ends right there!
And it works! With no chain fitted the rear wheel spins up a treat and a jab of the thumb brake has it stopping instantly: spin...jab...stop! Spin...jab...stop! (grab a beer) spin...jab...stop! Spin...jab...stop! I couldn't get enough of it, lol.
No such luck with the clutch: depending on your engine model, Testastretta/Desmoquattro clutch push-rods come in 2 different lengths, with all clutch slave cylinders much the same, hence most after-market slave cylinders (STM, Oberon, JHP etc) are all interchangeable. But Americans in true metric vs imperial and dodgy spelling style have to be a little different, and Yoyodyne make 2 different slave cylinders: you match the slave cylinder to the pushrod rather than matching the pushrod to the slave cylinder. Whatever, it was immediately obvious whichever one I had, I needed the other one as the slave cylinder would hydraulic lock before operating the clutch.
This is a pretty common problem and many folks just pop an 8mm ball bearing (same as in most Ducati slipper clutch's) in the piston pushrod orifice so the clutch take up occurs sooner in the piston travel.
I decided to unnecessarily complicate the solution and waste more time achieving exactly the same result by turning up a small "slug" instead. No, I can't explain why, but here you go:
Installed in the clutch slave:
And the job's a good 'un = one functioning clutch!
The front brake reservoir was kindergarten-simple:Sure?
...except turning the bars had it juuuuust catching the low point seam where screen meets fairing so it has since been moved inboard with a similar kindergarten-simple mounting bracket to that above....I can't argue, the fact I had to make a Mkll version means I failed kindergarten at the first attempt.T
Which leaves one forward control remaining (insert "Jaws" music here): the throttle.
Just recapping, I'm using 1098 throttle bodies as a sort of poor-man's RS intake, the 1098 system basically being a production derivative of the unobtainable oval throttle bodies pioneered on the 999F0/RS. The RS inlet ports are also quite different to OEM 999 but Jetprime make RS/1098 intake adapters and RS copy trumpets incorporating an injector standoff for exactly this setup (1098 have the injectors mounted on the airbox lid).
I've shown this before but it's still interesting comparing the 1098/RS TB and trumpet (L) vs 999/OEM TB trumpet (R), showcasing the massively shorter inlet tract:
There is one other carry-over improvement from the 1098: 12 hole injectors for better fuel atomisation vs the OEM 999 single hole injectors:
749/999 road bikes, with their smaller circular TB's have the TPS and cable actuation on the rear TB inside the airbox. 1098 with the wiiiiiide oval TB's have this stuff mounted on the front TB and underneath the airbox so there are no space limitations (see below, front TB uppermost):
You don't have to be Gigi Dall'Igna to see trying to mount it down inside the narrowest part of my airbox, even if it is 15L vs OEM approx 9L, is going to be problematic.
So the hunt was on to find extra realestate, starting with machining a narrower throttle spindle bush (see screwdriver blade below):
This allowed me to then shorten the spindle and spindle nut....it's close, but things still catch over the arc of the linkage motion. And the TPS was nowhere near accessible for the connector to fit. In the end all roads lead to modifying the airbox. A carbon "blister" was moulded and installed for TPS clearance, and an indent for the frame battery holder mount was re-manufactured with a shallower profile.
That finally had things operable by hand....but cable actuation was another battle with frustration. The front TB has very little clearance to the front of the airbox for cable entry, and the cables I had were just a fraction short for the awkward run.
I really was scrimping a mm here and a mm there, using tube benders to modify the steel cable bends, re-routing cables and moving the cable mounting bracket as close as I dared to the cable pull:
....but eventually my inner man-child got to make "Broom-broom!" noises while twisting a functioning throttle.
But we all know how engines work don't we:
Gimme fuel!
I was hoping to just bolt on the 999 fuel "rail" and tick the box, but found another lil' slug in my salad. If you look at the "opposed" injector orientation here:
Versus the "same-same" arrangement of the 1098/Jetprime setup, seen here in an early trial fit:
Which forced some jiggery pokery with that godawful Dorman(?) nylon fuel line. YECCCH! I hate that stuff! Really not sure if it'll stay but for the moment at least we have a workable solution:
