TKO

I left off with a spark starved dnepr. I went to ebay for a points plate made with easily replaceable Chevrolet V8 points mounted on a dnepr friendly plate. $60 later, the parts were on their way.

Eventually I made my way out to the garage and installed the points plate, which fits nicely in place of the stock Russian piece of shit. So nicely that I again forgot to take pictures I guess. I was too excited to wait for the new coil to ship so I was hoping the old coil would work for a few days. I will never know if the plate would have worked with the old coil because when I tried to muscle the kick start, I realized the motor was siezed. Ahhhhhhhh!!!!

Next chapter, I partially remove the heads to break loose the pistons and see what happens. The engine spins but no life whatsoever. I remove the heads, cylinders, pistons. Uh oh. I can hardly believe this thing was running at all. The carbon and whatever else build up is pretty substantial. I did the kerosene test on the heads and both leaked like a sieve. I thought about cleaning them and hoping for a couple more months but decided I'll bite the bullet on the heads and build them to put on my new engine later.

Why is the front of my sidecar on the ground you ask???? Well, to remove the right head/cylinder, the sidecar has to be at least partially removed. Anyway, I take the heads to my friendly local machinist and ask him to do what he has to do with the valves/seats to give me some compression and see what he can do to clean up the ports on the flow bench. A day later I get the call to come see what he has found. He shows me the nicely cleaned heads, sticks a valve in it's guide, and asks me to feel guide/valve stem play. Not good. I need new valves, stems, seats, and seals. I did find a source online for valves with oversized stems that would allow me to save the guides but am awaiting a response to see if they have both the exhaust and intake available.

So there it is. I'll be installing the new coil soon, most likely under the gas tank since it won't fit under the front cover. I'm going to try honing the cylinders and replacing the rings since I'm building another engine soon enough that will be more reliable. I think the cylinder/piston clearances will still be tight enough to allow such step skipping. Judging by the condition it was in when previously running, it should purr like a kitten with clean, mildly out of tolerance parts. That is me, hoping.

Speaking of hoping, I hope to have some parts to the machinist in a week or two and maybe the dnepr will see the streets again mid to late September. Or October.

I will detail the rebuild process with words and pictures in my DNEPR how to blog when the time comes.

I should know better........

Ok, so it's been over a month since I've posted anything. And, well, that was only my first post. Already failing at diligent blogging but nobody is watching this one anyway. Thank god for practice runs.

After seeing an oil leak only days after the transmission/clutch repair, I left the three wheeled tank alone, slowly pooling 80w90 on the garage floor. I knew it would be simple, a seal or gasket, or a bolt forgotten but life got in the way.

Finally, I took a few hours to pull the transmission again to find a torn seal around the input shaft. Just happens that a bag of seals was included with the purchase of the DNEPR, one of which was the input shaft seal. Three hours of removing/installing the transmission for a ninety second seal swap. Guess I'll be more careful next time.

Happy was my first ride until she overheated and vapor locked on the North side of Chicago, about ten miles of city driving from home. My guess is the eighty something degree day was just showing me what has been present since before I took possession a few months ago. I'm guessing it is running lean at mid throttle, the area I use most around the city. I adjusted the slow circuit a bit richer but the problem remains for me to tackle another day. I've since ridden a couple times until...........

I gave Dean a ride home after our brewery tour, grey skies looming overhead, black skies very near to the west. The rain started to fall abruptly and fiercely. When the rain was sideways, the winds seemingly over 50mph, and the cars only a few yards away were disappearing, I though "damn, this looks like a tornado!". Then, "should I stop? I'm already wet......". I didn't stop and felt a bit reckless when I got home and saw a tornado HAD touched down, though quite a few miles away. I then realized what all those sirens were, tornado warning sirens. Oh, yeah.

Anyway, long story long, when I kicked her over this morning, there was no life or appearance of anything resembling it. I checked for power to the coil and it was there, but no spark. I suppose the notoriously horrible coils hold true to their reputation. Again, I have a spare to use for now, and will break down and get a quality coil and points plate soon. Or sort of soon if I know me.

I took no pictures of the repairs but I did take one really boring picture when I parked near the brewery.

More soon.

introduction

My first post will be a short intro about myself, my dog, and my DNEPR-MT16. My name is Joshua and I currently reside on the South side of Chicago with my dog, Hendricks. I have for years thought of traveling via motorcycle to the furthest reaches of South America but figured it to be impossible when I adopted a six month old pit bull who had been abandoned in a warehouse.

The first summer I had Hendricks, I decided to adapt a bicycle trailer meant for children to suit the needs of my dog. It was a rough looking contraption but it served its purpose well as I lugged Hendricks around the streets of Chicago to the delight of many awestruck observers. Children pointed and laughed, grandparents smiled and waved, and others just stared slack-jawed. The next summer, I realized that I didn't necessarily have to give up my thoughts of moto traveling if I could get Hendricks to ride safely in a sidecar.

So began my first affair with a sidecar rig. I bought a yellow 1975 Honda GL1000 that came with a sidecar, though not attached,

and even a "taxi" theme. I got the old beast running, mounted the sidecar, rigged a short lead to hook into Hendricks' harness, and hoped for the best. It took only a ride or two for me to see that I was not the only one who loved riding on two (or three) wheels. And again, children pointed and laughed, grandparents smiled and waved, and others just stared slack-jawed. We took a couple long trips and he did well as a sidekick.

I soon realized that this would not be the ride which would take us through Central and South America. Though a blast in

the city and a great ride on the highway at 70mph, it was a bit too flashy and lacked the rough/off road capabilities that I saw necessary for travels on rural mountain roads and occasional off road stints that are in our futures. So, it was off to the auction block and away it went to an Ebayer in Florida.

I soon found a DNEPR MT-16 on craigslist froma very kind and honest gentleman in New Hampshire. It wasn't the prettiest sight when it arrived but I knew its poten

tial. Here you see the first photos I took before doing any extensive work to it.

I have done some minor work to it in the past several weeks which I will detail in posts to follow. For now, I will end with a picture of the DNEPR's current state, one which I hope to improve over the next few days to continue my riding and testing.