The Ninja1000 drag bike
- Thread starter Uncle Bob
- Start date
I haven't posted much because I haven't done much, although here's some catching up on a few minor things I've done.
I'm going on vacation in a week, so that has been taking most of my attention lately. But as soon as I get back, I'll be going full bore on this project.
well, had a chance to work on the exhaust housing at work today. I cut off the unwanted section, I'll weld on the dump pipe and O2 bung later. But here's a couple pics.
Using a die grinder and a small sawsall, then cleaning it up with a bench grinder.
Tried removing the broken bolts, and snapped the easy out in it....oh well, I'll just have 2 bolts holding the housing on. Not a big deal, with a dump pipe, not like it matters if it seals 100%. Won't even notice a difference.
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well, not done with it, but here's the modified/welded dump pipe with o2 bung. I'll be shortening it of course. I just welded it on to have it. I've also reclocked the turbo as it'll end up, haven't bolted everything down yet though.
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did some test fitting of the intake on the bike, here's a couple pics:
The blue thingy is the cheap BOV that I bought. I'll be making a offshoot from the intake and placing it about where it lays.
The tank is definitely sitting higher than I'd prefer with the intake in place. I'm going to remove the fuel level sending unit, which protrudes a decent amount from that area, which will give me quite a bit of extra room, and will probably still need to take a hammer to the underside to get the tank to fit perfectly, but as I mentioned earlier, thats perfectly OK with me.
Here's a picture of the underside of the tank.
as with my ZRX, I'm going to hard mount the regulator and fuel pump to the tank, there's plenty of room behind the intake, as you can see in the first picture.. The biggest problem I'm going to have is finding steel AN fittings for the regulator....I'm still annoyed that Mallory felt the need to make the female an AN fitting instead of just plain old NPT threads.....but I'll get over it assuming I can FIND something to weld on the tank. I have some aluminum fittings, but that doesn't give me many options when mating it to a steel tank.
I'm going on vacation in a week, so that has been taking most of my attention lately. But as soon as I get back, I'll be going full bore on this project.
well, had a chance to work on the exhaust housing at work today. I cut off the unwanted section, I'll weld on the dump pipe and O2 bung later. But here's a couple pics.
Using a die grinder and a small sawsall, then cleaning it up with a bench grinder.
Tried removing the broken bolts, and snapped the easy out in it....oh well, I'll just have 2 bolts holding the housing on. Not a big deal, with a dump pipe, not like it matters if it seals 100%. Won't even notice a difference.
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well, not done with it, but here's the modified/welded dump pipe with o2 bung. I'll be shortening it of course. I just welded it on to have it. I've also reclocked the turbo as it'll end up, haven't bolted everything down yet though.
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did some test fitting of the intake on the bike, here's a couple pics:
The blue thingy is the cheap BOV that I bought. I'll be making a offshoot from the intake and placing it about where it lays.
The tank is definitely sitting higher than I'd prefer with the intake in place. I'm going to remove the fuel level sending unit, which protrudes a decent amount from that area, which will give me quite a bit of extra room, and will probably still need to take a hammer to the underside to get the tank to fit perfectly, but as I mentioned earlier, thats perfectly OK with me.
Here's a picture of the underside of the tank.
as with my ZRX, I'm going to hard mount the regulator and fuel pump to the tank, there's plenty of room behind the intake, as you can see in the first picture.. The biggest problem I'm going to have is finding steel AN fittings for the regulator....I'm still annoyed that Mallory felt the need to make the female an AN fitting instead of just plain old NPT threads.....but I'll get over it assuming I can FIND something to weld on the tank. I have some aluminum fittings, but that doesn't give me many options when mating it to a steel tank.
woops! haven't updated this in a bit....I have a few updates here.....
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well, I took some pics anyway.....I was hoping to have her running by tomorrow, but I'm short too many fittings, just not going to happen. Never remember all the fittings I need when I go to the fitting store.....tis life.
But, I got some more done.
First, some pics of the pitot tube, and the intake. This is a little different setup than I've used on my other turbo setups, but have seen good results on bikes that have used it, and its a lot easier to make and is self balancing between the 2 sides.
This is looking down the pipe at the pitot tube:
here's with the BOV installed, and some lines thrown on the pitot tube just for show. They will attach to the carb bowl vents of course.
and here's my setup for the water injection...I haven't installed the lines yet, but its pretty obvious how it'll look when I'm done.
Not the prettiest setup, but hey, those fittings were pretty dang cheap, and this is low budget....
The jet nozle inside the plenum....
And here is my catch can that I'm designing for the turbo drain. I welded on a small brake line for the vent, but have decided to cut it off and use a 1/8" NPT fitting instead on the can.....the brake line is too prone to fracturing, I know it'll leak the first time I ride it....its also a ##### to weld.
roughly how it will look on the turbo:
I attempted to degree my cams, but discovered that I left my degree wheel at work. Just haven't had much luck lately....ah well. Next week!
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well, I took some pics anyway.....I was hoping to have her running by tomorrow, but I'm short too many fittings, just not going to happen. Never remember all the fittings I need when I go to the fitting store.....tis life.
But, I got some more done.
First, some pics of the pitot tube, and the intake. This is a little different setup than I've used on my other turbo setups, but have seen good results on bikes that have used it, and its a lot easier to make and is self balancing between the 2 sides.
This is looking down the pipe at the pitot tube:
here's with the BOV installed, and some lines thrown on the pitot tube just for show. They will attach to the carb bowl vents of course.
and here's my setup for the water injection...I haven't installed the lines yet, but its pretty obvious how it'll look when I'm done.
Not the prettiest setup, but hey, those fittings were pretty dang cheap, and this is low budget....
The jet nozle inside the plenum....
And here is my catch can that I'm designing for the turbo drain. I welded on a small brake line for the vent, but have decided to cut it off and use a 1/8" NPT fitting instead on the can.....the brake line is too prone to fracturing, I know it'll leak the first time I ride it....its also a ##### to weld.
roughly how it will look on the turbo:
I attempted to degree my cams, but discovered that I left my degree wheel at work. Just haven't had much luck lately....ah well. Next week!
some more pretty pictures!
So I finished up the oil pan today....yesterday I welded up the pan where I need to tap it for the scavenge line to the turbo. This wasn't manditory, but I wanted to strengthen the area just in case I (heaven forbid) ever bottom it out.....
My last scavenge setup that was simular to this ripped a huge hole in the oil pan when I went down last year....Not that I'll ever NEED this...but....you know...
Here's the inside of the pan, those that are familiar with the ninja pan will notice that the screen is missing, the hole under the screen is plugged. There is also 2 cutouts to allow oil to flow out of that section directly to the sump, instead of through that side of the oil pump to the oil cooler, as it did when it was stock.
here's a close up of the oil pump inlet, as you can see down the hole, thats where I added the fitting.
Here is the outside of the pan, you can see the custom return line I made for the oil pump outlet....its actually a ZRX1100 oil return line that I cut up and modified a bit. Came out pretty good. You can also see the welding I did around the fitting I added.....just some crappy MIG welding. Didn't care about porousness, since its sealed in the original part of the oil pan, its just to add material in that area
I also started on the tank, cutting out the fuel level sender to make room for the intake plenum, and also adding the fuel pressure regulator. I haven't finished them yet, so you only get the before pictures
So I finished up the oil pan today....yesterday I welded up the pan where I need to tap it for the scavenge line to the turbo. This wasn't manditory, but I wanted to strengthen the area just in case I (heaven forbid) ever bottom it out.....
My last scavenge setup that was simular to this ripped a huge hole in the oil pan when I went down last year....Not that I'll ever NEED this...but....you know...
Here's the inside of the pan, those that are familiar with the ninja pan will notice that the screen is missing, the hole under the screen is plugged. There is also 2 cutouts to allow oil to flow out of that section directly to the sump, instead of through that side of the oil pump to the oil cooler, as it did when it was stock.
here's a close up of the oil pump inlet, as you can see down the hole, thats where I added the fitting.
Here is the outside of the pan, you can see the custom return line I made for the oil pump outlet....its actually a ZRX1100 oil return line that I cut up and modified a bit. Came out pretty good. You can also see the welding I did around the fitting I added.....just some crappy MIG welding. Didn't care about porousness, since its sealed in the original part of the oil pan, its just to add material in that area
I also started on the tank, cutting out the fuel level sender to make room for the intake plenum, and also adding the fuel pressure regulator. I haven't finished them yet, so you only get the before pictures
little more work tonight.....put the motor in the frame....added the oil feed line yesterday, as you can see in the pics.
I put the screwdriver under the catch can to show how much room I got.....lotsa room to slam that puppy!
The dump pipe still hasn't been trimmed.....it won't stay that long.
(btw, thanks stunnah
)
I put the screwdriver under the catch can to show how much room I got.....lotsa room to slam that puppy!
The dump pipe still hasn't been trimmed.....it won't stay that long.
(btw, thanks stunnah
the never ending updates...
tonight I finished the intake completely. Painted it last night (for what its worth....) and finished installing the BOV and water injection. Tonight I tested the water injection, and am really happy with how it came out. The spray is extremely fine misted, and the pump isn't even sweating trying to keep up with the flow. The pump is only running at 30% duty cycle at full blast, so I definitely have PLENTY of room to grow there if necessary.
I also mounted the radiator, but had to remove the radiator fan to make it fit with the header. Oh well.....its a drag bike, who cares? I might try to either work in a couple tiny fans, or mount a pusher on the front, assuming I can find one that doesn't get in the way of the front tire when its strapped, but its not a very high priority. A fan isn't needed on the drag strip, and is only needed on rare occasions on the street, so it can definitely wait.
I do need to reclock the compressor housing a bit, which is a bummer since its not very easy to get to all the bolts now that everything is mounted, but isn't too major of a deal, I think. I'll need to modify how the waste gate actuator is mounted a bit.....
Thats tomorrows project. I *might* get it running tomorrow....have a couple distractions to deal with tomorrow, but they hopefully won't take long and I can spend some quality time with my new toy
BTW, Sean stopped by and commented on the intake....said it looked like a hand, which I hadn't noticed before....a blue thumbed, brass knuckled hand! Bad assed!
tonight I finished the intake completely. Painted it last night (for what its worth....) and finished installing the BOV and water injection. Tonight I tested the water injection, and am really happy with how it came out. The spray is extremely fine misted, and the pump isn't even sweating trying to keep up with the flow. The pump is only running at 30% duty cycle at full blast, so I definitely have PLENTY of room to grow there if necessary.
I also mounted the radiator, but had to remove the radiator fan to make it fit with the header. Oh well.....its a drag bike, who cares? I might try to either work in a couple tiny fans, or mount a pusher on the front, assuming I can find one that doesn't get in the way of the front tire when its strapped, but its not a very high priority. A fan isn't needed on the drag strip, and is only needed on rare occasions on the street, so it can definitely wait.
I do need to reclock the compressor housing a bit, which is a bummer since its not very easy to get to all the bolts now that everything is mounted, but isn't too major of a deal, I think. I'll need to modify how the waste gate actuator is mounted a bit.....
Thats tomorrows project. I *might* get it running tomorrow....have a couple distractions to deal with tomorrow, but they hopefully won't take long and I can spend some quality time with my new toy
BTW, Sean stopped by and commented on the intake....said it looked like a hand, which I hadn't noticed before....a blue thumbed, brass knuckled hand! Bad assed!
today was a little frustrating, but I had some progress. Finished making the charge tube going from the turbo to the intake manifold...that was a bit of a challenge since it had to clear the radiator, and leave a little buffer zone from the exhaust header. Took about 6 sections of pipe to get it just right, but it came out well. I didn't take any pics of it though out of the bike....should have.
Cut the dump pipe, made a flange for the air filter....finished wiring everything but the fuel pump and water injection. Put coolant in it and got radiator all sorted out.
I attempted to start it, using fuel from my ZRX and the damn thing refused to start. This motor has been sitting in my garage for several years, so I wasn't suprised that it was being difficult, and the battery has seen better days.....so I jumped it with my truck, spraying some carb cleaner....cleaned the plugs, checked for spark...etc.
I'm pretty sure my idle jets are clogged....the carbs had been sitting for a while before all this. I cleaned out the idle circuit just to be safe, but didn't pull the idle jets. Thats what I get for being lazy. Got fed up and decided to call it a night.
Cut the dump pipe, made a flange for the air filter....finished wiring everything but the fuel pump and water injection. Put coolant in it and got radiator all sorted out.
I attempted to start it, using fuel from my ZRX and the damn thing refused to start. This motor has been sitting in my garage for several years, so I wasn't suprised that it was being difficult, and the battery has seen better days.....so I jumped it with my truck, spraying some carb cleaner....cleaned the plugs, checked for spark...etc.
I'm pretty sure my idle jets are clogged....the carbs had been sitting for a while before all this. I cleaned out the idle circuit just to be safe, but didn't pull the idle jets. Thats what I get for being lazy. Got fed up and decided to call it a night.
and here is where the story takes an ugly turn. This morning I decided to ignore the starting problems and work on the tank instead. Got it all welded up (some of the ugliest welding in existance....) I gave up on the TIG welder and went back to the MIG, its not optimal for sealing something thats holding fluids, but I was having a much easier time dealing with the very thin metal the tank is made out of with the MIG.
Pressure tested it, had 3 leaks....fixed those, then test fit the tank, didn't like the angle of the FPR, also needed to beat in the tank a bit to clear the intake....after doing that, created new leaks, welded those back up (took two attempts)....but its all good now. Pressure tested it to 20 psi, so that should be good, I'd think!
Made the brackets to mount the tank, and even painted all that stuff....ran out of things to do so I went back to getting it running.
Cleaned the carbs thoroughly, put it back together but still wouldn't even try to start. So did a compression test....well....looks like that might be the problem. Best cylinder was 70 psi
I guess all that sitting in my damp garage didn't do it much good. The motor ran great 2 years ago, I put 500 miles on it. Hell, looking down the spark plug hole, still no carbon on the pistons.
I tried oiling the cylinders to get enough compression back to start it, but its just not interested in cooperating. So I guess I'm going to yank the top end off of this thing and put the top end of the other motor on this on (incase I haven't already mentioned it, I have 2 identical, rebuilt motors for this....well....they WERE rebuilt two years ago)....I could swap out the entire motors, but then I'd have to change out the clutch mods, oil pan....blah blah.
Major bummer, I really wanted to ride it tomorrow....oh well. Thats the way it goes I guess. Guess I'll be rebuild a motor much sooner than I thought I would.
and a pic of the charge tube (had to take it back out to pull the valve cover)
Pressure tested it, had 3 leaks....fixed those, then test fit the tank, didn't like the angle of the FPR, also needed to beat in the tank a bit to clear the intake....after doing that, created new leaks, welded those back up (took two attempts)....but its all good now. Pressure tested it to 20 psi, so that should be good, I'd think!
Made the brackets to mount the tank, and even painted all that stuff....ran out of things to do so I went back to getting it running.
Cleaned the carbs thoroughly, put it back together but still wouldn't even try to start. So did a compression test....well....looks like that might be the problem. Best cylinder was 70 psi
I guess all that sitting in my damp garage didn't do it much good. The motor ran great 2 years ago, I put 500 miles on it. Hell, looking down the spark plug hole, still no carbon on the pistons.
I tried oiling the cylinders to get enough compression back to start it, but its just not interested in cooperating. So I guess I'm going to yank the top end off of this thing and put the top end of the other motor on this on (incase I haven't already mentioned it, I have 2 identical, rebuilt motors for this....well....they WERE rebuilt two years ago)....I could swap out the entire motors, but then I'd have to change out the clutch mods, oil pan....blah blah.
Major bummer, I really wanted to ride it tomorrow....oh well. Thats the way it goes I guess. Guess I'll be rebuild a motor much sooner than I thought I would.
and a pic of the charge tube (had to take it back out to pull the valve cover)
Success! Got my valve springs in, had to grab them from UPS at work today (that only took forever) but got everything I needed, was planning on coming straight home and getting this sucker running, but of course, a friend of mine had a bit of an emergency, so ended up picking up him and his bike with my truck.....
but eventually, around 8:30, I got to start putting the bike back together. Installed the springs, installed the pistons, cylinders and head...the amount of metal that was in the head was pretty impressive. I probably had a tablespoon of metal sitting in each exahust port. The more I thought about what this engine has been sitting in my garage through.....3 different turbo fabrications, I guess I shouldn't have been too surprised in hind sight.
Anyway...got everything together enough to start it, and fired she did! She was cranky and didn't want to start, but I was insistant. Think the carb sync is way off....I'll worry about that tomorrow. I'm just glad I finally got to hear it run!
Its actually very quiet, even with the dump pipe. Much quieter than my ZRX is with a dump pipe. But tomorrow I might even get to ride it on the street
No pics this time...nothing new to snap shots of....
but eventually, around 8:30, I got to start putting the bike back together. Installed the springs, installed the pistons, cylinders and head...the amount of metal that was in the head was pretty impressive. I probably had a tablespoon of metal sitting in each exahust port. The more I thought about what this engine has been sitting in my garage through.....3 different turbo fabrications, I guess I shouldn't have been too surprised in hind sight.
Anyway...got everything together enough to start it, and fired she did! She was cranky and didn't want to start, but I was insistant. Think the carb sync is way off....I'll worry about that tomorrow. I'm just glad I finally got to hear it run!
Its actually very quiet, even with the dump pipe. Much quieter than my ZRX is with a dump pipe. But tomorrow I might even get to ride it on the street
No pics this time...nothing new to snap shots of....
she runs! She drives! Yay!!
Got home from work today (I'm one of those special people that works on saturdays) and attacked the bike. Had to wire and route all the hose for the fuel pump and water injection, put together the coolant system, mount and connect the boost gauge, and figure out something for the indicator for the water injection.....
This turned out to be quite a bit of stuff. I thought I had some extra LED's around for the waterinjection indicator, but it turns out I don't....so I grabbed a spare LED turn signal I had floating around and used that instead
Hey....its a rat bike, why stop now?
Routing the fuel lines was almost harder than all the wiring combined, since I was adding an on/off switch, three quick disconnects, and hoses running every which way, but that still fit under the tank and side panels. I Got it to work....I wanted to keep the fuel filter exposed so I could visually inspect it, but ended up mounting it under a side cover.....so assuming I leave the side cover off when diagnosing/tuning, its not a big deal....compromises, always compromises....
Sooooo....I finally get it all together, steal some gas out of my ZRX, do some last minute checks, let it warm up a bit, and go for a spin.
Clutch is doing some wierd stuff, I think the slave is leaking. I've already tried bleeding it, didn't help much. But it was still ridable.
The low speed drivability is spot on, which I'm pretty proud of. I copied the jetting from the ZRX, even though it s a slight different motor and carbs and turbo system, it seems like that aspect was correct....the mains on the other hand, are way way off. As soon as it even thought about hitting boost it would fall on its face. Which didn't surprise me. Main jets never seem to be the same between systems.
BUT, I could easily tell where it started boosting due to this. I thought this was a fairly large turbo for this motor, but it does have rather small A/R's, but either way, I was seeing boost initialize at 4500RPM's, which is just FINE with me! Lower than I was expecting!
The carbs aren't a joy to pull with all the intake BS on there....but monday I will start the rejetting process.....I still need to mount the WBO2, but I didn't want to do that until I was sure that the turbo/engine wasn't going to puke oil everywhere....the scavenge system is working perfectly, and the turbo seems to be in good condition (used, wasn't sure). All in all, a very successful night!
Til next update! I'll take some pictures with the tank off monday.....the quanity of wiring, hoses, and crap is pretty impressive under the tank now!
Got home from work today (I'm one of those special people that works on saturdays) and attacked the bike. Had to wire and route all the hose for the fuel pump and water injection, put together the coolant system, mount and connect the boost gauge, and figure out something for the indicator for the water injection.....
This turned out to be quite a bit of stuff. I thought I had some extra LED's around for the waterinjection indicator, but it turns out I don't....so I grabbed a spare LED turn signal I had floating around and used that instead
Routing the fuel lines was almost harder than all the wiring combined, since I was adding an on/off switch, three quick disconnects, and hoses running every which way, but that still fit under the tank and side panels. I Got it to work....I wanted to keep the fuel filter exposed so I could visually inspect it, but ended up mounting it under a side cover.....so assuming I leave the side cover off when diagnosing/tuning, its not a big deal....compromises, always compromises....
Sooooo....I finally get it all together, steal some gas out of my ZRX, do some last minute checks, let it warm up a bit, and go for a spin.
Clutch is doing some wierd stuff, I think the slave is leaking. I've already tried bleeding it, didn't help much. But it was still ridable.
The low speed drivability is spot on, which I'm pretty proud of. I copied the jetting from the ZRX, even though it s a slight different motor and carbs and turbo system, it seems like that aspect was correct....the mains on the other hand, are way way off. As soon as it even thought about hitting boost it would fall on its face. Which didn't surprise me. Main jets never seem to be the same between systems.
BUT, I could easily tell where it started boosting due to this. I thought this was a fairly large turbo for this motor, but it does have rather small A/R's, but either way, I was seeing boost initialize at 4500RPM's, which is just FINE with me! Lower than I was expecting!
The carbs aren't a joy to pull with all the intake BS on there....but monday I will start the rejetting process.....I still need to mount the WBO2, but I didn't want to do that until I was sure that the turbo/engine wasn't going to puke oil everywhere....the scavenge system is working perfectly, and the turbo seems to be in good condition (used, wasn't sure). All in all, a very successful night!
Til next update! I'll take some pictures with the tank off monday.....the quanity of wiring, hoses, and crap is pretty impressive under the tank now!
some pics of everything together:
everything is zip tied on the dash right now....since the entire front end will be going away soon, I didn't bother doing anything special there. Note the turn signal next to the boost gauge, thats for the waterinjection indicator
behind the battery is the WBO2 computer, infront of the battery is the fuelpump (mounted to the battery box) and the other motor thing is the water injection pump. These pics are with the intake/carbs hanging off the side, I was rejetting the carbs when I took these.
Right side...
Left side, you can see the water silonoid mounted to the inner fender.
The oh-so creative bottle I'm using for the water injection system. Its a coolant overflow bottle for cars (funny how the one real overflow bottle I have, isn't for coolant overflow)
I'm just about to head out on another test ride, hopefully got the mains squared away, but I'm ot holding my breath.
I took some video of it running and will hopefully find a place to host it shortly. I'll post it as soon as I get that squared away.
everything is zip tied on the dash right now....since the entire front end will be going away soon, I didn't bother doing anything special there. Note the turn signal next to the boost gauge, thats for the waterinjection indicator
behind the battery is the WBO2 computer, infront of the battery is the fuelpump (mounted to the battery box) and the other motor thing is the water injection pump. These pics are with the intake/carbs hanging off the side, I was rejetting the carbs when I took these.
Right side...
Left side, you can see the water silonoid mounted to the inner fender.
The oh-so creative bottle I'm using for the water injection system. Its a coolant overflow bottle for cars (funny how the one real overflow bottle I have, isn't for coolant overflow)
I'm just about to head out on another test ride, hopefully got the mains squared away, but I'm ot holding my breath.
I took some video of it running and will hopefully find a place to host it shortly. I'll post it as soon as I get that squared away.
