Honda MadTrax V Twin Quad.. Nearly Finished.. Woo Hoo

[Ian 2,417]

On 05/01/2018 at 6:08 PM, nigel said:

Ha! Ha! I hope you know koen there is a real sad story behind that hip joint,😏

 

Well, do tell us the story..

[nigel 1,877]

9 hours ago, Ian said:

 

Well, do tell us the story..

It belonged to my poor uncle Gilbert ,  back in 1948 the war had just ended and uncle Gilbert came home from the front he had fought hard and it had taken its toll on him and he had lost an ear, on returning to his cottage on mr, Loderc Raps farm he found out his mrs had left and moved in with one of the land girls and become a rug muncher, so he jumped on the old fordson and went down the pub and got pissed . To be continued 

[C-101plowerpower 548]

3 minutes ago, nigel said:

It belonged to my poor uncle Gilbert ,  back in 1948 the war had just ended and uncle Gilbert came home from the front he had fought hard and it had taken its toll on him and he had lost an ear, on returning to his cottage on mr, Loderc Raps farm he found out his mrs had left and moved in with one of the land girls and become a rug muncher, so he jumped on the old fordson and went down the pub and got pissed . To be continued 

 

this allready sounds interesting, please continue

[nigel 1,877]

Anyway at closing time Gilbert had flaked out on the bar stool with his head in the ashtray after every one had left the land lord woke him up and walked him to the door and layed him on the bench outside locked up and went to bed, about 3 in the morning Gilbert woke up again. Freezing his bollocks off and soaking wet, it was pissing down now it was a 2 mile drive up the narrow lanes to get back home, so Gilbert started the tractor and set off, still completely pissed, anyway he got about half a mile up the road zig zagging all the way then he spotted the gate on his left hand side and remembered as a young lad he used to cut through there on foot and across 2 fields would bring him out home so off he went round the outside of the field driving into the blackthorn hedge many times, into the second field and strait into the duck pond right outside the cottage his mrs was living in with the batty girl  he fell of the tractor it over turned and crushed his pelvis and smashed his hip the 2 girls heard his cry and rushed out the house in just knickers and bra and managed to pull him out, gertroid the batty girl called the medics who turned up with sirens blaring and blue lights flashing they couldn’t believe there eyes what was in front of them, two fat birds in there under crackers tending to a pissed bloke that looked like a porcupine and claret every where, anyway back to the hip joint coz I always took the piss out of him my dear old uncle Gilbert left it to me in his will, he died of a broken heart, and that’s why it’s a sad story 

[Ian 2,417]

On 10/01/2018 at 8:26 PM, nigel said:

Anyway at closing time Gilbert had flaked out on the bar stool with his head in the ashtray after every one had left the land lord woke him up and walked him to the door and layed him on the bench outside locked up and went to bed, about 3 in the morning Gilbert woke up again. Freezing his bollocks off and soaking wet, it was pissing down now it was a 2 mile drive up the narrow lanes to get back home, so Gilbert started the tractor and set off, still completely pissed, anyway he got about half a mile up the road zig zagging all the way then he spotted the gate on his left hand side and remembered as a young lad he used to cut through there on foot and across 2 fields would bring him out home so off he went round the outside of the field driving into the blackthorn hedge many times, into the second field and strait into the duck pond right outside the cottage his mrs was living in with the batty girl  he fell of the tractor it over turned and crushed his pelvis and smashed his hip the 2 girls heard his cry and rushed out the house in just knickers and bra and managed to pull him out, gertroid the batty girl called the medics who turned up with sirens blaring and blue lights flashing they couldn’t believe there eyes what was in front of them, two fat birds in there under crackers tending to a pissed bloke that looked like a porcupine and claret every where, anyway back to the hip joint coz I always took the piss out of him my dear old uncle Gilbert left it to me in his will, he died of a broken heart, and that’s why it’s a sad story 

 

A real sad story there mate, it brought a tear to my eye

 

 

Well, a bit stuck on the drive train at the mo.. The Honda Silverwing final drive/90 Deg thingy I was planning on using just won't work!

I did the maths on sprocket sizes to work out the 5 - 1 ratios I would need and the big sprocket would need so many teeth that it would be nearly a meter diameter!

Price wise it would be very much the wrong side of £1000 and the sprocket would be so big it would cut the quad in half!

 

So.. some more thinking needed.. I need a strong 1 - 1 ratio 90 Deg drive that will fit in the rather small space available!

 

Sooo... What to do next.... Some welding me thinks

 

At the back where the new tubes meet the Quadzilla suspension mounts it looked ugly as I had just cut the tops of the mounting panel off..

A bit of cutting and welding later had a couple of bits of box welded in just above the anti-roll bar tube.. That looks better and stronger

 

 

 

Part of the plan has always been to box in the pressed steel suspension mountings as I hate the look of pressed steel, and they never looked strong enough anyway

 

Starting with one of these, a bit of tube with washers welded on both ends.

 

 

 

Which happens to be a perfect fit inside a thicker bit of tube that has been cut in half..

 

 

 

Bolt it to the suspension mounts and you have an ideal way of making sure all the bit's of half moon tube fit in the same places..

 

 

 

A bit of tack welding later..

 

 

 

Best check for clearance, plenty of and more travel than will ever be needed

 

 

 

 

Now to fill the gaps, the top of this speaker stand is about the right thickness

 

 

 

Four plates cut to size and tacked on plus a template for the next panel..

 

 

 

The right side almost done.. A few welds need a clean up, and a few of the welds won't be done until the frame is stripped and on it's side.. I hate welding upside down and I'm rubbish at it!

 

 

 

 

Best make a start on the other side, templates cut out..

 

 

 

And marked out on steel... It's a good job speaker stands come in pairs

No idea why this photo has turned around, it's the right way on my PC..

 

[Ian 2,417]

Forgot to add this..

 

 

[Ian 2,417]

Not much to report, I have made a good start on the left side with the suspension mount strengthening..

When I put the TB in I had to cut a bit of tube out, so back in it went..

 

 

 

A close up. The captive nut is for the TB side mount.

 

 

 

Only a couple of small plates to go in at the bottom and a lot of welds to grind down..

 

[Stormin 4,458]

You do know you  have a 7mth deadline to get it finished, Ian?

[Ian 2,417]

On 20/01/2018 at 8:43 PM, Stormin said:

You do know you  have a 7mth deadline to get it finished, Ian?

 

You never know Norm, I'm on a bit of a push to get MadTrax done so I can start on Wheel-Vo

 

Starting with a video to try and keep things in order..

 

 

To finish off the strengthening on the left side I needed a couple of small plates to go at the bottom.

Due to the small size of the holding them in place just wasn't going to work without setting fire to my fingers, so I welded a couple of small off-cuts to the plates to act as temporary handles.

 

 

 

Plates tacked in place..

 

 

 

Once the plates had been fully welded on the time had come to tackle a job that thus so far had caused me lot's of head scratching.... Removing the rear diff/final drive thingy..

 

 

 

The right side already had a removable plate..

 

 

 

The left side didn't, but if I could make it removable them I might stand a chance of getting the rear end out..   HHmmm... Some nice welds to cut through!

 

 

 

But before I started cutting metal a template was needed!

 

 

 

Ok, I needed the bit's marked F and R but the off-cut in the middle is a funky shape

 

 

 

This was part of the Quadzilla front end.. some cutting needed but it's just the right thickness for what I need.

 

 

 

Here's the plate cut out of the frame and the extra couple of bit's of steel which will make the plate removable..

 

 

 

With all the parts bolted back on some tack welds were added.

 

 

 

Back on the bench the now removable plate was clamped around some box and a bit of angle to hold it all square while I zapped the joins up..

Don't think it will be moving now

 

 

 

Now to try and get the rear end out.... Eeerrrr!

 

 

 

Ummmm!

 

 

 

Until eventually I was left with this open space...

 

 

 

Which was only possible once I had cut this bit of tube out the frame... Another bit to make removable!

 

 

 

The rear end on the bench..

 

 

 

Rob picked up a wire brush and started to attack it to see what it would come up like

 

 

 

Not bad but I fear some mechanical cleaning help is needed.....

 

Now where did I put those wire brush cup thingys that go in the drill???

 

[Ian 2,417]

Morning all, back to the metal work..

 

The removable bit needed to be made bolt-in-able, so some more metal was added..

 

 

 

Some captive nuts would be handy to bolt it on, but I didn't fancy burning my fingers trying to hold the nuts in place while welding...

 

So may I introduce to you all the sacrificial pencil  

 

 

 

Not only does the pencil screw into the nut very nicely, any pencil that burns off is easily removed from the thread

 

 

 

Welded in with not a welding splat on the threads in sight

Ok, this pic may be of the opposite side to the above pics, but it does point out the big hole in the end of the tube where it's been cut off..

 

 

 

To fill the holes I found a couple of washers about the right, cleaned them up and clamped them onto a bit of brass plate.

 

 

 

THe holes in the washers were then welded up, the weld won't stick to brass..

Then a couple of "trimmings" were tacked on to give something to hold on to.

 

 

 

Once removed from the brass they looked like this..

 

 

 

Or this!!!!

 

 

 

Washers welded in..

 

 

 

 

And once the welds had been cleaned back the removable bit was bolted back in..

 

 

[the showman 4,074]

I think there's gonna be a shortage of grinding disc's in the south soon, I'd better stock up before everyone runs out, 

[Ian 2,417]

Time to sort the steering..

The problem I had was the Quadzilla steering column didn't fit the mount on the frame, and the gauge pods I made would not bolt on!       But I still needed the bottom of the column as it does the steering bit!

 

So I needed the Honda top half and the Quadzilla bottom half, of course they are not the same diameter and one would not slide into the other!

A little bit of lathe work later had the solution to joining the coulnms together and keep them straight..

 

 

 

A close up.

 

 

 

To make sure nothing would move lot's of holes were drilled so I could plug weld through to the adaptor thingy..

 

 

 

My Murex Mig welded won't go all the way up to "Spinal Tap", so I turned it up a notch to 6 and zapped the parts together..

 

 

 

Cleaned up..

 

 

 

The good news is the column ended up exactly the right length, straight and the top and bottom halfs lined up, so it was bolted back in..

To celebrate the light and gauges were also bolted on..

 

 

 

 

 

MadTrax looks kinda strange with no wheels, tank or seat on!

 

Just now, the showman said:

I think there's gonna be a shortage of grinding disc's in the south soon, I'd better stock up before everyone runs out, 

 

 

I would

 

Now onto something fun, or not.. Wiring!!!

I had already removed anything not needed from the Honda CX loom, but I also needed to splice in some of the Quadzilla loom!

 

 

 

With the Quadzilla loom trimmed back to what I actually need things didn't look that scary!

 

 

 

I now need to find an "easy to read" early Honda CX 500 wiring diagram to double check which wires do what as the loom had been hacked about before I started at it!!

 

 

[Ian 2,417]

Morning all, to try and keep this in some sort of order, here's the latest 2 MadTrax videos..

The 1st vid is lot's of metalwork, the second is wiring and the 1st start of the engine

 

 

 

 

[Ian 2,417]

Although the wiring was operational enough to get the engine running, for some reason I just could not get the two warning lights on temp guage to work...

 

These three!

 

 

 

The one place where the lights/temp guage connect wiring wise is the voltage regulator which should (or so I thought) power the lights etc..

 

Now I will admit to to getting the power leads to the battery around the wrong way once, that coupled with finding out the regulator should be rubber mounted to the frame (so it doesn't earth through the frame) rather than bolted directly to the frame as I had done once!

So... Everything pointed to a fried regulator being the problem, a replacement with correct mounting bracket with the rubber bits was ordered..

 

 

 

 

The result???

 

No Change!

 

 

 

The problem is this black wire from the regulator, there should be power in it but it was missing!

 

 

 

Time for a coffee and a bit of research on the internet to find out exactly what the blasted black wire does..

As it turned out it's the wire the regulator uses to keep a check on the voltage and should be connected to a live..

 

At the front-ish of the loom is this connector that has been taped up as I thought it wasn't needed... Yes it's the other end of the black wire and it should of been connected to a live feed form the ignition switch!   "Bangs head and has one of those Doooohhhhhh moments"!

 

 

 

With that black wire connected to a live this was the result

I know that in the grand scheme of things a couple of warning lights isn't a big deal, but it was really bugging me as to why they were not working!

 

[Stormin 4,458]

 Don't you just love modern electrickery.

 

 Oh for the days of three fuses, no idiot lights, gadgets and gizmos.

[Cub Cadet 613]

Looking good! Sounds good too 

[Ian 2,417]

On 14/02/2018 at 1:03 PM, Stormin said:

 Don't you just love modern electrickery.

 

 Oh for the days of three fuses, no idiot lights, gadgets and gizmos.

 

The wiring isn't too bad (well it feels that way now most of it's sorted), only 2 fuses and 2 idiot lights, but I do have a lighting circuits and the 4 wheel drive mode circuit to add.. And as the horn switch works I might as well try and find something loud to wire into it

 

 

On 14/02/2018 at 2:28 PM, Cub Cadet said:

Looking good! Sounds good too 

 

Thanks Ewan, I wasn't sure what she would sound like, but I like what I hear

 

With the wiring (mostly) sorted I couldn't tidy the loom up without knowing where all the wires would run to...

All of which means I had to find somewhere to mount the battery!

 

The only place for it to go was just infront of the rear R/S wheel (no pics as it's hard to hold a battery in place and take photo's at the same time), no ideal but it just would not fit anywhere else!

I had already built a battery box, but hope to mount it???

 

This TB mount looks a good start

 

 

 

Lot's of chopping and welding later it looked like this

 

Inside view.

 

Outside view.

 

 

 

Checking the battery box fits..

 

 

 

TB/Batt mount bolted back on to MadTrax

 

 

 

Battery plonked in place.. It feels nice and strong with no movement and will hold the battery in place no problem

 

[Ian 2,417]

Now, back to the wiring...

 

This isn't what's left of the loom, it's all the bit's I didn't need mostly chopped from wires that were too long!

 

 

 

As I went along all the crimp connectors were removed and the joints soldered up before being wrapped in tape.. At least I know the loom won't pull apart now

 

Battery end of things.

 

 

 

This bit of the loom was a massive mess with lots of crimp connectors!

It looks way better now

 

 

 

The front end splits nicely into two, it will split nicely into three when the headlamp is wired in..

 

 

 

Speaking of the headlamp, these "not yet connected" wires go to the Quadzilla switch gear and are the very wires that give life to the lighting circuit.   And the horn  

 

 

 

Monday was spent turning this mess....

 

 

 

Into this non mess...... A day well spent

 

[Ian 2,417]

Having already mounted the voltage regulator the wrong way ie bolted directly to the frame, I needed to find a good way of rubber mounting it..

Which is where the random bit of Quadzilla comes into play as it has a few holes already with rubber isolating mounts in it... Just not quite in the right places.....

 

 

 

Soooooo..

 

Chop of the unwanted bits.

 

 

 

Slice 4mm from the middle.

 

 

 

Weld the two halfs back together.

 

 

 

That should be strong enough

 

 

 

 

Drill a hole.

 

 

 

Bash the bend flat.

 

 

 

Drill a second hole then test fit.

 

 

 

Cut and grind the bracket to shape.

 

 

 

Bolt the regulator back on to the bracket.

 

 

 

Bolt the whole thing back on to MadTrax, plug the wires in.... Job done

 

[Stormin 4,458]

Are you going to make a cover for the battery, Ian? I think it could do with one.

[Ian 2,417]

On 21/02/2018 at 2:35 PM, Stormin said:

Are you going to make a cover for the battery, Ian? I think it could do with one.

 

I most certainly will be making a cover for the battery, it's in an ideal place to get covered in all sorts of mud and stuff..

 

While digging through the Quadzilla wiring loom for connectors to pilage I found something that would most certainly be a good upgrade..

So this small bracket was made..

 

 

 

It was welded onto the frame just under the seat.

 

 

 

If you hadn't guessed it holds up a modern fuse block, much better than the oold Honda one

 

 

 

With the 4 wheel drive bit wired in, the time had come to think about lights starting with the er.. headlamp..

 

Not having the correct bulb holder (which would of been for a really old style bulb anyway) I had this problem to overcome!

 

 

 

I had an idea on how to solve the er..gap problem but not the materials until Nigel found me this old pully.. Thank mate

 

 

 

No photo's of all the lathe stages (plenty of that in the next video) but the pulley ending up looking like this..

 

 

 

The shallow slots were done with a milling bit in my pillar drill. Not ideal as the bed does try to move sideways!

 

 

 

The bulb pokes through like this.

 

 

 

Then the whole thing drops into the back of the lamp bowl.

The little black slot through the bowl is a handy bolt hole, as is the one the other side

 

 

 

Now something to hold the bulb to the holder.

Starting with this.. Thanks again Nigel

 

 

 

It was turned into this..

 

 

 

Which of course fits here..

 

 

 

I found some nice small bolts to use but I didn't have a tap to cut a thread.....   So I made one 

 

 

 

Best test it.. Yep it works...

 

 

 

 

Lots of drilling, thread cutting and countersinking and bolt shortening later..

 

 

 

 

 

Tad-Daaa     A lot of work for something that won't be seen

 

[nigel 1,877]

Just now, nigel said:

 

Like 3 days to make a posh washer 😄👍🏻

[Anglo Traction 1,016]

On 01/03/2018 at 7:20 PM, nigel said:

Like 3 days to make a posh washer 😄👍🏻

That's about my pace to do things Nigel.....sometimes longer. I hope to speed up when it's warmer though ! .

 

Glad to see you're progressing Ian. great work 

[Ian 2,417]

On 01/03/2018 at 7:20 PM, nigel said:

Like 3 days to make a posh washer 😄👍🏻

 

You know me, why do it the easy way?

 

 

On 04/03/2018 at 4:25 PM, Anglo Traction said:

That's about my pace to do things Nigel.....sometimes longer. I hope to speed up when it's warmer though ! .

 

Glad to see you're progressing Ian. great work 

 

Thanks Richard, it's getting there, hope to have it test driveable in a few months.

 

Let's start this update with the latest video.. Lot's of timelapse bits

 

 

 

 

Back to the headlamp but only very quickly..

When it came to wire the lamp in I found there wasn't enough space around the outside of the bulb holder to run the wires,so three holes were dilled and then slotted to feed the wires through.

 

 

 

Time to turn to the other end of NadTrax..

Starting with a cardboard template..

 

 

 

Which fits about here..

 

 

 

I'm sure you will of guessed by now it's for a rear light.. Even though I've no plans to put MadTrax on the road it needs a rear light to balance out the front light..

Not having any rear lights that will fit I need to make my own, starting with this Honda Silverwing light lens.

 

 

 

Trimmed to shape including the lens inside.

 

 

 

 

Hard to hold in position and take a picture!

 

 

 

I have an idea on how I want the rear light to look, template time..

Rubbing dirty fingers on paper to make some marks and then cutting out didn't work too well..

No idea why this pic keeps turning around!

 

 

 

Template number 2 involved cutting lots of bits of cardboard but it looks much better and is much more usable as an actual template

Turning this into steel is going to be fun

 

 

 

The transfer box gear stick needed a tweak so it wasn't in the way of any knees, so it was moved in by an inch, lengthened and a new hip and groovy know was put on the end 

It needs a little tidy up but it looks good

 

 

[Stormin 4,458]

You must have the patience of a saint, Ian.