1984 WR 400

Starting to look like a bike, motor in the frame, getting the swingarm in. looking tidy. Having trouble getting the radiator mounts. the little 6mm threaded 10mm long rubber dampers. smallest 6 mm i can find are 15mm long. may have to go original! Exhaust is finished so need to pick that up nxt week. got a couple of hours to fart around with all the little bits and pieces.

I do like a fiesty redhead . Whats the car? I think I want one.

Its a 1969 Holden Monaro GTS 5 litre. it was a 4 year resto!
Got the guts of the bike back together today, Radiators and shrouds, put some contact on the sidecovers (looks crappy) sorted the brake and pedal, fitted all cables etc etc lots of dinky little bits and pieces. Now getting to the point where the odd bolt is missing or i have used the wrong one somewhere. time consuming pulling things apart again...just awaiting shox and pipe. It has spark and kicks over pretty good.)
Had a disaster with the tank. gave it a good scrub and clean and picked it up by the airvent hose which slipped of and the tank hit the ground. No big deal until i went to put the fuel line on... the nipple had snapped clean off the tap!. Doh!

Solved the radiator mounts issue, CB 900's use then as well, $20 ea. have also solved the exhaust. the spark arrestor has come apart and the outside sleeve will take some perforated tube and will slip inside the main muffler tube nicely. Will get it all welded together and will be able to repack it easily. will also loose about 4 inches and a half kilo in the spark spiral. still waiting on the shock rebuild and the seat. hoping to get to the Broadford Vintage extravaganza.

Failed to get all my bits so thought i would fire it up. not such an easy task! ive given it a couple of dozen kicks but no go, not even a hint. theres spark, fuel and compression. what more could a motor want?. timing is possibly out., just dropped the stator back on to the existing marks but may need to get it set right. any suggestions? i dont have any specs in regard timing. think i ride the kato for a hour or so...

Also, what volume of gearbox oil should go in the hole in the top? cheers

Spent a couple of frustrating hours trying to fire the thing up yesterday. timing is ~ 1.5mm BTDC so its in the ball park.

The more i look at this bike, the more it think it was owned from near new by a young kid who had no idea. i suspect the jetting is still "restricted spec", the clutch had been "kept in tension" by a series of spring washers to space the slop out?? (i put 4+ turns on the clutch adjusting rod to pull it back into the clutch Lever adjuster.) Zip ties abound on broken rubbers, all clamps and fittings were std and hardly used. i suspect that when it failed, it was pushed into the shed and forgotten until some enterprising fella bought it for a song, shipped it to aus and flogged it to me for too much!

while i have been trying to achieve a deadline, i think i will go back to basics and check the jetting, and the ign to ensure its set right. i have been reading a series of the "ign posts" and although i have a spark when turned over, i have memories of husky ign's being notoriously unreliable. I will get Mr McHanic to check the vitals once i get it rolling with an appropriate meter.

Did the petrol tap dance for an hour yesterday untill i got it sealed. dripped petrol over my painted ign cover which wasnt all that pretty! (Teach me to be cheap with $2.99 export paint)

so at that soul destroying part of my rebuild when i find out what i st*ffed up.. (i pulled the clutch cover off yesterday and turned the water pump seal around to the right way!)

now for some waiting...

I know the feeling all too well. I'm held up too but havn't even got close to trying to start the thing, not expecting it to go on the first kick. I got 2mm btdc on the timing but the main jet has been so mangled I've no idea what size it is. Setting the float height might help? theres afew threads on here for that. Nothing I can do til next week so I'm off to treat the wife to a day out at the Devon classic twinshock followed by a shed load of beer.

Gear oil 30wt 1.4L there is no oil level screw on watercooled models but there is two lines on the left side cover below the fill hole. So you can look down the fill hole and tell how much oil there is.




The timing on a 400 is 2.05mm btdc should still run at 1.5mm but a little less power and easier to kick over with less kick back. Make sure you have a good BLUE spark. Bosch W3C or Ngk B8es gapped to 0.5mm.

Getting my 430ae started the first time was a bear. Try some starting fluid, take the air filter out and while holding the throttle open give it a good long squirt and start kicking throttle wide open, choke off. It took several tries with the starting fluid and about 50 kicks till it finally popped and shot old nasty black oil all over my clean fender. She starts easy now, two three kicks cold.

Penrite Monograde SAE 30 [ Briggs and Stratton engine oil ] from Bunnings or Supercheep.
1.6 ltr listed in my book for WR400/430.
1.4 ltr listed for WR240/250.
Are you getting a spark while kicking ?
The SEM ignitions can and do go off giving you less and less trigger voltage so you have to spin the motor faster to get a spark.
Fitting a deco valve helps.
I have used a $8 Chinese CDI and coil on both my 240 and 400s with 2nd kick starts the norm.
The Chinese CDI uses less voltage to trigger and works well with a rooted SEM ,even works well with a just rewound SEM that the rewinder stuffed up.

Just incase you missed it in your other thread, here's some help.

Champions the lot of you! thanks for that everything sounds good.
Oil, ive actually gone Belray gearsaver as thats what i ran years ago with no trouble and now i remember the two lines of course ( im an idiot!)
Timing: will readjust the timing to what sounds more like it. there is a good spark on a descent spin over, just moving it through the stroke doesnt spark. Got a new NGK 8 but gap is tighter, will adjust accordingly and the ign's a motoplat.

once again thanks for the help, should have it running end of this week woo hoo. will hang a few slides and pull a few mono's to celebrate. got a vintage mx in fortnight, might take it down for a run around. we will see. not sure how the 53 yo bones will cope with table tops! best get some brownie points happening outside... cheers

she is a runner! picked up the shox and fitted the springs on friday and got them on yesterday. Had to remove the powder coating from the shocker mounts on the frame to get them on. Got it of the stand and gave it two kicks and away she went!

Blew sh*t out of the exhaust all over my car!

Wheeled it out of the shed in time for a downpour so only did a quick 1st gear lap around the drive way. yep, no real front brake! clutch is nice and motor runs smooth. still waiting for the seat. Will post some finished product pics when it comes together. Looking forward to the next Vinduro.

Not the Monaro ! !

yes! had to get the blower vac out and give it a quick spruce up! luckily it was all hard baked crap from the dint fixing job and not oily goop...that would have been just wonderful! cheers

Cranked the beast into life last nite and gave it a run down the road, runs a bit rich but has a lot of poke, will out strip the 300 Kato no worries. No brakes to speak off so i will need to do a marvel number on them to get something. Forks are stiff, probably should loosen all the bolts and slap it around a bit before tightening.
Getting some coolant spluttering out of the over flows every so often, but probably just getting rid of air bubbles. oil is clean (no water in it!) so the water pump repair looks good!

Have just lifted the needle clip to clean the mid range up ( i dropped it 1 thinking the new muffler would like more fuel). Just waiting on the seat and ill post a clip. ..cheers

hi all, got a loan seat and fired it up and went for a long ride. bike is tight and good to ride. strong motor, likes to paw the air with the front wheel. foot pegs arnt sharp enough and boots slipped off every now and then. muffler too loud. forks are good,front tyre (cheapy)is poo..ffrronnt bbbrrakke is poor!! jobs that popped up. front brake fix. more packing in the muffler. replace radiator rubber(the only original has torn in the 1st ride) a good clean and get a taillight for rego. pretty happy with the outcome. next project please.....

Finally got the seat back and fitted it up. now it looks like a genuine 1 owner low mileage church on sundays bike... no?

not sure about my color scheme but the next rebuild can sort that!

now awaiting the right event to give it a run

cheers

oops, the monaro snuck in there... nothing to do with husky's

I have an 86 wr 400 that I'm parting out if you need any parts, I would be glad to shoot you a price if I have them.