Liquifire #621, Part II, Take III

[JoeRainville]

Now it was back to working underhood, with test fitting the new brake system was first:



The new Willwood unit fit very well, and the bolt holes even lined up with the factory caliper mounting holes. The unit comes with one 1/4" spacer, but you need to use two of them, so another was ordered:



Until that comes in, the fuel lines were installed, with a new pick up line in the tank, and the wiring install was started...

[JoeRainville]

After re-assembling the throttle cable with a fix from Kenny, the kill switches were tested out. Next was priming the carbs with premix fuel and seeing if she would fire up:



While purging the oil injection systems, she was a bit smokey until she was topped up with straight gas...

With only a few weeks to go, need to finish up the wiring like the handle bar heaters and dimmer switch, get the caliper shim installed and check the clutch calibration...

[JDT]

Lookin' my-t fine there Joe.

Hope to see it at the finish line.

[chriszildjian17]

I did not know that caliper would bolt on. Looks like I will be be ordering a few for my self. Good work Joe

[JoeRainville]

Chriszildjian17,

The caliper seems to fit well, once properly spaced and shimmed. The shims will need to be clearanced across the bottom so they do not contact the brake disk. I used a flapwheel on a body grinder on the bolted together stack of spacers and the shim. Show below from the chaincase side you have the regular Deere inner brake pad, a 1/4" spacer, a HD brake kit shim, another 1/4" spacer from Wahl Racing and the the Wilwood caliper:



Once installed and tightend up, it looks like it was made to fit the Deere chain case:



You could also reverse the 3/8" X 3" bolts so the nuts are held in by the retaining feature of the case.

[JoeRainville]

With the installation complete, bleeding air from the system was next. I am using the same master cylinder that has been with the sled since it was first build in 2010. It's a Cat ZR era Wilwood unit with the integral brake light switch:



I had to call in for reinforcements to help me bleed the unit, as I didn't want to get brake fluid everywhere. Cari came to the rescue and lent a hand with purging the system. Since the bleeder screw was in the center of the caliper, I took it off and held the piston with a set of waterpump pliers (a C-clamp would have worked also) and bled the system by holding the caliper at 90 degree's from the installed postion:

[JoeRainville]

With the brakes done, last few details were installing the airbox, doing another test fire with the drive belt on, verifying the lights all work, and giving the sled another once over. With that done, I added a few well placed decals:

[JoeRainville]

The sled was then considered complete. By Sunday afternoon, January 26 he is basically race ready:



A couple of trips across the lawn showed the updated clutch set up a major improvement over last year. Motor was hitting max rpm, and she pulled hard to the limits of my yard:



I plan to arrive in TRF Thursday night before the race to put a few miles on her, and do any needed testing and tuning before the Vintage Class on February 8th. I would also like to thank Todd Strupp and Dustin Erikson for volunteering to man the gas stop for Wade and I again this year. Maybe I will even get there this time.

No matter the outcome, it will a great time racing and BSing with our friends. Thank you all for reading, I hope you found this intersting and maybe a little useful...

-Joe Rainville
#621 Liquifire, I-500 attempt #3

[motoXman]

Good luck!

[air mechanic]

Very nice build of a race sled! Good luck in the race!

[kawidave]

Great thread. Good luck Joe.