Motorcycle Starter

[Peternick]

Hi guys not been here for a while, hope all are well.

I need to build a starter for one of my bikes and wordered if anyone has any experience, I was thinking of joining a couple of rollers to a car starter motor held together in a suitable frame and I wondered if anyone has built one or has any ideas on the best way to do it.

Thanks as ever
Peternick

 

[pedrobedro]

Weren't you looking to knock one up from some tubing or something, did you come up with any plans ? I think you could make one from angle and rollers with axles through pillow blocks. Anyone who has built a car ramp should be able to make the frame up

 

[graffian]

I made one, but it was driven by a car. I can't see any difficulty using a starter motor. The gearing is the only hard bit.
My rollers were rollers made from heavy wall pipe, running in bearings mounted on a box section frame. We made them the first time we started my drag bike, a Mate pinched the tube on his way over after work[about 6pm] and the bike was fired up an hour and a a half later! so it wasn't very sophisticated;-)
I guess old diesel starters would be a good starting point, I do land rover engine conversions and have chucked montego starters and flywheels away, they would be my starting point. The starter is a nice geared denso starter, if it was possible to encoprorate an old flywheel in the design it would make the overall gearing pretty simple[maybe a bit slow?]. The monty starter is all ball bearings and the geared nose is fairly easy to customise, plenty of other starters are probably the same.

 

[rtbcomp]

I'm playing with rollers made from CO2 mix bottles, about 5mm thick.

 

[Peternick]

Thanks for the pointers, the starter I have lying about is off a 1300 Triumph (never throw anything away you never know when it might come in useful) and the bike is a 250cc single with a very high compression ratio running on Methanol, any comments on the power of the starter??

 

[chunkolini]

The bike sounds interesting, can we have a peak at it? can I have a go on it? I like singles. I fact I love Honda 250 singles, I had a great time on a 250RSA many years ago.

Chunko'.

 

[graffian]

I would guess the old lucas starter will do fine, just thinking about what it has to start. I mentioned the Monty starter as I have used the gears out of them and they seem pretty easy to incorporate into things.
I would look at gearing the rollers to spin the motor at about the speed the motor spun the car motor, maybe a bit faster but not to fast. Allow for possible alterations in speed if you don't get it right. My bike was a blown 750 triumph.

 

[TheJoker]

Sadly I don't know the specs of it, but it does start Corser's and Xaus' bike.

They're all run by petrol engines, I'd guess some sort of lawn mower engines. I also think they have quite a big flywheel so that you get the rpms up on the machine, then you push it towards the rear wheel and the rpms doesn't drop very much when you engage the engine.

 

[MrFluffy]

Theres also the much simpler option of big nut on the end of the crankshaft, and a car starter inside a double handled frame with a socket on the bendix. Apply starter to big nut, hold on to handles and crank, when it fires pull it off and the bendix flys the socket off anyway...

 

[chunkolini]

Looking at the starter in the picture I can see huge capacity for chaos when the adults are out of the way, sit on top and have impromptu pit races.

Chunko'.

 

[TheJoker]

What do you mean by "adults"? If we go by age, I'd be classified as "adult", and I'd love to have an imprompty pit race!! If we go by "mental age" I'm a kid.

 

[pedrobedro]

The starter in the picture needs the bike on a paddock stand with a rider operating the front brake and a crew to push it up against the rear wheel. If you made something like MOT brake rollers with a remote or foot operated solenoid type switch it could be a one man operation. If you have a selection of sprockets you could experiment with the gearing.

 

[TheJoker]

If you're using a paddock stand that's using bobbins on the swing arm, then you could hook onto these bobbins with the starter too. That way it would be a one-man operation if the bike's on the stand.

Just don't forget about potential slipper clutches though!

 

[Peternick]

Thanks for the ideas I will post some pics of the bike when I have got it complete.

MrFluffy love your idea, I think it has to be the first place to try as the primary is exposed.

 

[Peternick]

Forgot to ask, does anybody know where I can get some rollers from? I thought plastic/rubber would do the job.

 

[michael1703]

could you get a piece of tubing knurled in a lathe? that would give you the grip and then you could interference fit bearings in each end

or

http://www.roscosrollers.com/

http://www.bikernet.com/garage/PageViewer.asp?PageID=2641

 

[MrFluffy]

Thanks for the ideas I will post some pics of the bike when I have got it complete.

MrFluffy love your idea, I think it has to be the first place to try as the primary is exposed.

Its not really my idea, its just the way that its been done traditionally.
In fact for popular bikes as a base for a drag racer you can buy "starter nuts" which go on the end of the crankshaft for this reason.
Check out APE's site, they even do busa ones now as the high compression on comp motors destroys the oem starter :-
http://www.aperaceparts.com/newstuffarchive.html

Someones ghetto setup here, not particulary nice but you get the idea :-
http://www.abilenetexas.net/cr500/cr500-2.htm

Another (nicer) starter cart

 

[Pete.]

The bike sounds interesting, can we have a peak at it? can I have a go on it? I like singles. I fact I love Honda 250 singles, I had a great time on a 250RSA many years ago.

Chunko'.

I just sold a complete roadgoing one of those for £150.

 

[Pete.]

Peternick - for a roller you could use a go-kart back wheel.

Theres also the much simpler option of big nut on the end of the crankshaft, and a car starter inside a double handled frame with a socket on the bendix. Apply starter to big nut, hold on to handles and crank, when it fires pull it off and the bendix flys the socket off anyway...

Like this one I photographed at North Weald last year?

 

[SAFC73]

Look on the UK Karting web site for sale 0 wanted and you can pick up a starter for around £50 second hand. I have used them to start TZ750's Tridends and Quakers in race sidecar outfits. Just a case of lifting the back end on a paddock stand and engauging the nut on the rear wheel in a high gear.
Simples.

J

Hi guys not been here for a while, hope all are well.

I need to build a starter for one of my bikes and wordered if anyone has any experience, I was thinking of joining a couple of rollers to a car starter motor held together in a suitable frame and I wondered if anyone has built one or has any ideas on the best way to do it.

Thanks as ever
Peternick