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Interim Update
Thanks to everyone who has contributed recently, I’ve been a bit sparse with my postings, as I wanted to document the airfield test, and it took ages to organise. But, today I ran the C90 on the airfield, with mixed results.
The day got off to a bad start when the bike refused to start and delayed our schedule by a couple of hours. This made me very tense and caused me to abandon some of my plans for the session, which meant running the bike in a hastily prepared state. However, it did run for about an hour, on and off, as I worked through a programme of tests. There was good and bad, and I’m only now getting my head around the lessons (this is written two hours after my return).
The positives – the machine is very stable at speed and safe to ride, which means I can push forward with my plans to run it on the road. Steering effort is all done by push and pull in the arms – there is no weight shifting or body movement of any (other) type, and because you don’t use your torso to brace against the frame, it has a different “feel” to a normal motorcycle.
Driving position and visibility are both good. My first tests were in a very confined environment (post #209) and my appreciation of proximity to objects was affected by this. On the wide, open strip I was able to evaluate my view of the road more carefully. Currently I have some components mounted quite high in front of me, but they did not affect vision at all – it was just like my car!
The negatives – engine cooling will be very dependant on the fan. Due to time constraints I did not run the cooling fan, and only had the internal engine cover loosely in place. I had hoped that this would provide sufficient cooling for the motor during these low-power and undemanding tests, but the thermocouple read-out from the engine barrel showed that the airflow that got to the engine was incapable of keeping a reasonable temperature. I need to finish this system and retest it
Gearing is too high, or power too low. The spacing of three 3 ratios does make it quite hard work, but acceleration in top is poor. I always knew it would be difficult, but I think I will need to drop down one tooth before using it on the road.
There are probably many other small issues that I will find when I do a check-over this week, but that’s the big picture.
On the subject of pictures – a family friend shot video this time. Hopefully better quality that last time. I will give him a week or two to cut it into a decent youtube posting, then I will link to it next time.
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