We have all the parts manufactured and in stock to install the first starter system on a customer's bike. Due to the length of time that it took us to complete this development, the economy and available resources, we have manufactured only a limited number of starter components. We have taken five firm orders, which leaves us with only five systems available until we run the next batch of components. The five firm orders are to be installed by us, and we will not deliver any of the other five systems until we have installed and tested the system on a customer's bike. As any of you that have been following this development know, our time estimates for this project are worthless, but we hope to have the starter up and running on the first bike within the next three months. As we install the first system, we will take detailed notes and pictures so that we can develop an extensive installation manual. After this manual is completed and we feel confident that a mechanically competant person can install this system on there own, we will take orders for the final five systems. If the demand is sufficient (after you see the pricing listed below) we will expidite another production run and make the starter system available as soon as production warrants.
The wiring still needs to be developed, but we feel confident that the bottom button of the right hand stock switch clusters can be made to work as the starter button. The pricing listed below does not include any wiring or switches and will be added later when we complete our first installation.
Thank you for your patience.
For the status on the first installation, some pictures and procedures see first installation.
Not all the items listed will be required for every conversion, but we have listed all the items that might be involved in a conversion. The following pricing is current as of 03/08/10.
This starter is based on the original design by Bob Oswald (Quiet Power Drive) that he has developed and sold for a number of years. The QPD starter system was used as the base design for Kenny Dreer on his VR-880 Commandos.
Old Britts has taken the evolution of this starter design a bit further making what we believe to be a fool-proof electric starter for Pre-MK3 Commandos. The improvements to the previous designs are:
This starter has been mounted on our engine dyno and used to start a freshly built Combat, 10 to 1 compression, engine. The starter turned over the engine with ease, almost like the spark plugs had been removed. We have well over 300 starts on the new ring gear and it does not show any signs of wear.
We will be installing this system on a customer's bike in the next couple of months and will describe the installation process and how the starter worked later.
We will update the following pictures as we do our first installation. Some of the pictures and information are out of date, but for now the following information should provide you with an idea of what this starter system looks like.
We have a manifold available to address the issue of the placement of the breather body for 1972/73 750 engines that have been modified by Old Britts to fix the oil scavenging problem.
The starter motor in the first picture has a black body where the starter in the next picture has a chrome body.
These starters are the ones used on the Harley Sportster and have proven to be very dependable.
For pre-MK3 engine cradles, the drive side adjuster slot needs to be filled in by welding a blanking plate into the slot and then drilled for the correct top bolt placement. The timing side slot does not need to be filled in due to the fact that the starter bracket fixes the alignment of the starter to the clutch ring gear. All this work will be eliminated when the modified MK3 engine cradle is used.
This bracket is one piece and has an outrigger bearing pressed into it.
We have modified the inner primary cover to fit around our starter bracket. The center mounting stud pillar has to be removed for clearance for the ring gear and allow a cross shifting shaft if left hand shift is desired. Two screws were added that screw into the starter bracket as shown in the third picture below. The stock three bolts that screw into the crank cases along with the two starter screws secure the inner primary. The outer primary cover will be altered where the two locating pins fit the two cases together. The outer cover will have the locating pin holes drilled through the case. The inner cover locating holes will be tapped and two allen head bolts will secure the outer cover to the inner cover. Old Britts 1972 race bike with left hand shift has had the two primary covers attached this way since it was built and it has never given us any problems.
This outer primary cover has been modified to bolt to the inner primary cover. It has also been modified to accomodate left hand shift.
To provide left hand shift, we use the MK3 gearbox covers and cross shaft. The outer primary cover is bolted to the inner cover and mounted on our mill at the correct angle for the cross shaft. We then bore out the outer cover and fit the MK3 shaft bushing. We modify the cross shaft end to fit into the shift lever. At this time this arangement will only work with rear sets.
This cover fits over the starter bracket and has one stainless allen head bolt securing it the the starter bracket. The cover in this picture has been bead blasted, but the final cover will be polished.
This is the prototype clutch basket. The production version will be anodized and the small clearance holes that show up between the bolt heads will not be on the production versions.
One more picture of the chrome starter mounted on the Old Britts engine dyno.
Several owners of MK3 bikes have asked if this starter will work on their bikes. The answer is probably, but development of modifying the inner MK3 primary cover will have to be done.
This page was written and designed by F. H. Eaton
& Associates if you have any questions or comments please
contact us at infon@fheaton.com