dadof2

The "best" option is 316L stainless steel. I would have thought (because of safety implications) whoever is doing this work would know what they are doing without having to ask on the internet.

Sounds like its running rich as the revs rise, is your air filter clean?

I would be inclined to replace only the bearings that area faulty. Properly maintained the life of these bearings is very very long. I have bikes between 20 and 30 years old that still have all or nearly all of their original linkage, swinging arm and steering head bearings.

That's really superb, I have always admired a Howdens kitchen with Blackstone worktops and stainless handles

A properly designed cable disc brake will work nearly as well as hydraulics and is more than adequate for 99% of trial riders. Cable brakes are cheaper and easier to repair away from the workshop. They also have some technical advantages such as they do not suffer from piston push back and excess lever travel when the disc is bent. On my car, 4 wheels and not subjected to crashing and other such abuse I prefer hydraulics, on a trials bike I would prefer cables.

Yes I have ridden an EFI Ossa (briefly) and it ran decently but not any better than carbed bikes. The owner of the bike liked it a first as well but then it had reliability problems, poor starting, linkage broke and dealer seemed unable to update EFI map properly and he sold it having suffered a lot of depreciation. I have also seen an Ossa win a trial. I have nothing against Ossa it just my opinion at this time EFI has not showed a performance improvement over a carb and is much more expensive and complicated.

Despite a very long post you have missed the point completely. We are not talking about high mileage road bikes here, we are talking single cylinder trials 2 strokes like the ossa. A carburettor as fitted to a 2t trials bikes is a far simpler, cheaper and more reliable device than the EFI equivalent. If EFI had so many advantages on 2T it would be dominating trials, it is not. My cars have EFI and I would not wish to change to a carburettor, my road bikes (4T 4 Cyl) have carbs but I would be OK with EFI, but when it comes to 2 stroke trials bikes I prefer carbs to EFI by a long long way.

The only "fault" I can see on the TRS is where the hoses attach to the clutch and front brake master cylinders, they look a bit weak and vulnerable. Would be better with 90 degree banjos to bring the hoses nearer to the bars. The rest of the bike looks spot on.

I would have tried a mix of hot water and a freeze spray before resorting to drilling. Dropping the stanchions out of the yokes and removing the mudguard stay usually enables stuck axles to be removed.

It depends on what you mean by superior. An EFI system may be able to give better "at the limit" performance but does that matter on a trials bike? The carbs advantage is its simplicity, low cost, low weight and reliability.

My impression is the TRS has raised the bar a shade.

http://www.sparkplugs.co.uk/amfinder/?find=spark-plugs-ngk-motorcycle-and-atv-motorcycle-and-scooter-gas-gas-contact-jt25-238-----------------7948683

Check the reach (length of threaded part) of the that the plug should be by measuring the thickness of the cylinder head with a bit of hooked wire in the plug hole. It will be about 19 to 20mm. If you are using a short reach plug it could be causing the problems you are having

Hardly remote with the M6 motorway running virtually between the towns you name. Probably about the easiest place in the world to find a trial, some weekends a choice of 2 or even 3 Do take time to find practice areas that its OK to use, being surrounded by National park littered with SSSIs its easy to upset some people.

Italian army tanks were rumoured to have special gearboxes to facilitate rapid reversing movement, perhaps their trials rules are a variation on this theme.

Pretty certain plug is an NGK BP5ES Get an air filter before trying anything else. Often cutting out after a few minutes running and plug has fuel on it is due to coil failure. Usually HT coil but occasionally source coil. Change plug for a known good one.

The coil(s) that generate the electricity for the fan could be failing The new regulator / rectifier you have fitted could have failed. Is it a combined regulator rectifier or are they separate items. Check the coil(s) output with you meter on AC volts Check the coil(s) resistance with the regulator rectifier disconncted

There are other additives in petrol that are less harmful to the environment or health than those used previously. Petrol has definitely changed significantly since the oily mineral based stuff of the 1980s. However the above was not the topic, the topic is the potential of ethanol to cause harm to vehicle components, especially as its % increases.

Probably the worst thing on your 300 beta will be the rider.

You should find plenty of welders in the midlands - search alloy welding, aluminium frame repairs, and similar phrases. The reason it has cracked is probably because of bearing corrosion or corrosion between the outer bearing housing and the aluminium. Before it is welded it needs the bearing removing and a solid steel form, with the same OD as the bearing pressing in. If it is welded without support it will shrink and IF you can get the new bearing in it will wear rapidly.

Thank you S E Lucas. I have now checked back and I did write "Although ethanol could be put in petrol since petrol was invented in the UK". I missed a full stop that should have been after the word invented. I also should have started the new sentence with a capital I on in so that it should have read as follows Although ethanol could be put it petrol since it was invented. In the UK the addition of Ethanol pretty well ceased a few years after the end of WW2. I guess I mistyped something slightly amiss and the auto correct changed it in a way that completely changed the meaning. It seems petrol (in name at least) was invented in the UK "Variant spellings of "gasoline" have been used to refer to raw petroleum since the 16th century.[41] "Petrol" was first used as the name of a refined petroleum product around 1870 by British wholesaler Carless, Capel & Leonard, who marketed it as a solvent"

I am not keen on powder coating - fine when new or on roadbike. But difficult to match or touch in on an offroad bike, Consider a sprayed on epoxy.

Bit of a strange post that - Did I (or anyone else) claim petrol or gasoline was invented in the UK? I and I assume quite a lot of other TC readers know full well most petrol is derived from crude oil (petroleum) by distillation. That was not the issue. The issue is that in the UK and several other countries problems are occurring with engines / fuel systems and the evidence is pretty compelling that these problems are related to the addition of ethanol to petrol. In general these problems occur in older vehicles. The most recent vehicle in which I have seen severe damage is a 1998 BMW 3 series - seals on the fuel pump housing. However on much more recent vehicles there is corrosion on metal components that did not occur with petrol solely derived from mineral oil. Shell petrol in the UK contains about 3% ethanol and powerful cleaning additives. Together these can cause "gasket" shrinkage and removal of gum that leads to air leaks on fuel injector and inlet manifolds. To the owner of the 1995 Gasgas who said he had no problems - I suggest you check your plastic tank for swelling and dismantle the breather system inside the fuel filler cap - post what you find. See http://web.ornl.gov/sci/ees/itp/documents/ORNL%20Ethanol%20Pipeline%20Corrosion%20Literature%20Study%20Final%20Report.pdfand there are plenty of other such articles. My advice remains same as previously posted - try to use only ethanol free fuel and write to your MP to have fuel composition accurately labelled at the pumps and and ensure that ethanol free fuel continues to be available. Ethanol free petrol is still a lot healthier than diesel.

http://www.mag-uk.org/en/campaignsdetail/a7059 See the above link, ABS is quite a way down but the rest is well worth a read. More pointless EU regulation. Studies show in many accidents the motorcyclist does not apply the brakes, usually when they are applied they are not applied hard enough to lock the wheels or activate ABS. In most motorcycle accidents the difference in retardation rates between ABS and non ABS have have a negligible influence on the outcome.

As Woody notes, the early cars including the model T ford ran on ethanol until petrol became available. Ethanol probably did not matter until the 1960s as prior to that the parts of the engines exposed to the fuel were rebuilt routinely and so did not have time for many of the negative effects to take place. Also fuel contained other substances (now removed for emissions / health reasons) that counteracted the negative effects of ethanol. Ethanol attacks some metals and many plastics, some severely and rapidly, that is fact and well documented in studies. Although ethanol could be put in petrol since petrol was invented. In the UK the addition of ethanol pretty well ceased a few years after the end of WW2. It was an EU directive in 2005 that aimed to have 5% ethanol in petrol by 2014 and 10% by 2020 that has led to the present problems. The amount of etanol added varies from area to area and brand to brand. That may be why jonnyboxer has not had any problems, he is quite probably buying petrol with little or no ethanol. Someone elsewhere however may be routinely buying petrol with 5% or more. The pump should be labelled E10 not suitable for all vehicles if the content is more than 5%. In addition to its component damaging properties ethanol can affect driveability and performance. Kawasaki for example say that some of their current models may not be able to run properly with more than 5% ethanol. Although adding ethanol increased the octane rating it does not increase power unless the engines compression is raised. Ethanol needs a ratio of 10 parts air to 1 part ethanol, much different to petrol which needs 14.7 parts of air to 1 part petrol. Given what is known about ethanol it is probably wiser to avoid it if you can and certainly if you have an engine that does not seem quite right its worth cleaning out the fuel system and putting in good quality ethanol free fuel.