CF Moto Fashion By Bashan (Read 27,731 times)

[rapidjim]

Very nice post

Jim

[spandi]

You took better pictures than the advertising for CF Moto!

[kz1000st]

OK, you convinced me. I bought one.

[jct842]

Wish I had got one instead of the majesty. Any way looking good kz.

[Bashan]

Wow, very nice, I love that color. Looks brand new, great find. Rich

[kz1000st]

Sometimes you can't beat Craigslist. 2009, 1850 miles. It's really nice. I saw it on Long Island (about 200 miles away) and using my network down there had my very critical, Harley owning buddy check it out and hand over the cash transmitted through my parents. My friend then stored it in his garage until I picked it up yesterday and rode the 200 miles home via Interstates. The white box you see on the windshield with an "M" is an EZ Pass for motorcycles so you pay electronically instead of stopping and handing over cash at tolls. It worked like a charm. All in all an epic voyage and the scooter handled it well.

I also checked with Kathineid at Scootersonly.net, the shop that it came from. She confirmed that the bike has been "a Charm" and received its care in her shop.

[Cruiser]

A handsome machine, KZ. I wish you the best of luck with your new scoot.

[kz1000st]

Thanks. I've been watching Rich's maintenance stories and so far his has been a peach. Trolling Craigslist constantly pays off. I paid as much for this Sweetie as I did for the 150cc four years ago.

[Bashan]

I hit 6K and developed a slow leak in the rear tire. it didn't look too bad but I thought I might as well go ahead and get another Pirelli:

I had developed an oil leak at 5K that I thought was the base gasket since there was oil coming down on the case. I took the airbox off to find the leak and improvised an air intake so I could watch the engine. It that turned out to give me about 10% more power so I kept it:

The leak was coming from the crankcase breather where it hooked into the intake tube. I scrapped the whole airbox since it junked up the left side of the engine.

I am running my heated gloves off of the battery. I hooked up a volt meter to make sure I wasn't sucking too much juice. The charging system hasn't complained one bit and the volts don't even dip. The gloves draw about 3 amps. I also hooked up a Tiny Tach, I turn about 7,800 at 65 MPH:

I thought while the wheel was off I'd change the CVT belt. First I had to get the variator off. It turns out it has a 22mm bolt which necessitated buying a new 1/2" drive impact to fit the socket. Luckily they had one on sale for $40.00 at Lowe's. The socket was also on sale for $5.00:

I'll post more tomorrow.

[kz1000st]

Those rollers look dry. Any grease at all Rich?

[cookees]

I sent my brother a Fashion a couple of years ago. He lives in Tucson. His wife rides it since I also sent my brother a BMW K1200LT ( What a great guy I am.)
Anyways, he just bought his wife a Burgman 650. I guess she can keep up now with the BMW.

That being said, I think he's probably gonna let the Fashion go.

Like I said, he's in Tucson and I'd be glad to put anyone in touch..

[Bashan]

I don't lube my rollers. The theory is that the rollers release a graphite type lubricant out of the roller material. That's supposed to be the black stuff that accumulates in a variator with some miles on it. Greasing them supposedly interferes with the graphite lubricant. I realize there's different schools of thought on this topic, I just seem to have better luck with them dry. That being said there's some serious flat spots on these rollers and maybe a little silicone based spray lube might have helped:

The ramps are a little worn too:

I'm going to put it back together with the parts I have and put a completely new variator on it next oil change at 7K. I think I might try sliders this next time.

Here's how the rollers weighed in:

The boss was actually rusty, I am going to use some high temp grease when I reassemble it. This is completely different than greasing the rollers for you noobs reading this:

I thought I better look at the clutch while I was at it:

The impact got the nut off but the Chinese got carried away with the white loctite as usual and the bell was stuck:

I had to use the puller:

I use steel wool to clean the belt material off of the variator pullies and the clutch pulley. You MUST be careful to keep steel wool residue out of the mechanisms plus vacuum them and blow them out with your air compressor afterwards:

I also steel wool the clutch pads to get the glaze off. You can see the difference before and after:

I also steel wool the inside of the bell:

The whole point of this is to swap the CVT belt. The CN250 replacement belt is a 828 22.5. I always thought the first number was the outside of the belt in mms. The belt is more like 840:

However, the second number is spot on with the width at 22.5mm. Can anybody shed some light on this?

The old belt was stretched and therefore a bit longer than the new Gates:

The old belt had obviously lost some width too. That's really the measurement you use to pull the trigger on a new belt. When it narrows you not only risk the belt breaking but it slows you down by changing the ratios:

Well the wife is calling for supper, and by that I mean calling for me to get my ash in the car and take her to supper! I'll try to finish this up tomorrow.

[Bashan]

Time to put the new Gates CVT belt on. I cleaned all of the variator parts with rubbing alcohol including the inner pully, ramp plate and boss. The reason I decided to take everything apart and clean was because something was squeeking on the left side of the engine. I'm prettty sure it was the boss since it had some rust on it:

I took KZ's advice this time around and used a lubricant; high temp, dry, silicon spray. This stuff goes on wet by soon dries and leaves a thing silicone layer on the metal. So I put the cleaned up rollers in:

Then put the ramp plate on top of them making sure the rollers are straight on the ramps. I'm going over this for the new guys that have never assembled a variator. I'm not sure ramp plate is the correct terminology but that's what I've always called it. I've seen it called many different things:

Now this next part is kind of tricky, you must hold the ramp plate up against the pulley while your assembling or the rollers will get out of place:

This next part is also a little tricky. Since the boss was squeeking I put some high temp grease down into the variator assembly. You must be careful to use it sparingly and keep it off of the pulley facing or the part of the boss that's exposed. You don't want to get grease on any surface that the belt runs on for obvious reasons:

The object is to get some grease down into here where the boss runs:

Make sure the grooves in the boss face out. They have to fit on the splines on the drive shaft:

Now, while holding the assembly together slip it over the primary drive shaft (crank) and get the boss seated on the splines:

Slip the belt over the clutch pulley and then the boss. You'll have to wrestle with it a bit, the new belt will be a little shorter because the old one was stretched:

[Bashan]

Now it's time to get the outer pulley on. I'm not sure why they call it a pulley since it's only half a pulley. I've also heard it called a variator fan. I probably do this different than most guys but I had a scary experience on a 150 because I thought the variator pulley was secured but it wasn't. These belts are so tough that they can stop an impact from seating the pulley to the splines on the crank. It makes it feel like it's tight against the crank but it's actually held out by the belt. For instance, look at the below pic and you'll see the splines of the crank (arrow)when the pulley should be seated on it and the splines hidden:

Sometimes the force of the impact will force the belt out but sometimes it just stops on the belt. I don't think it's very good on the belt to compress it either. So what I do is use a 1/2" ratchet on the 22mm nut and work the belt and pulley into place. You put a few strokes on the ratchet and then grab the variator fan and rotate it counter-clockwise for a turn or so....repeat until seated. That works the belt up the pulley and doesn't harm it.

Eventually you'll get the belt worked up far enough that the variator fan will be tight on the boss like you see at the arrow:

Then I hit it with the impact. Now you are supposed to get a strap wrench and a torque wrench to do this as Sprocket will make clear to you. You're supposed to do the same to the clutch bell. All I can say is I worked out a system with how much air I put in the compressor and what it does to the bolt I'm trying to torque. Still, you should do it the correct way.

I also wanted to look at the brakes while I had it apart:

They're supposed to be changed when the shoes get down to the thickness of a dime. I have a long way to go with these:

Here's what I did with the crankcase breather. That's a P.A.I.R. filter on the end of the breather hose. I FINALLY found a use for those things!

Also you'll notice in the above pic that you can look straight down the left side of the engine and see daylight. That's because the gerbil tube house is gone. I'm sorry CF but that thing just leaked oil so bye bye.

The wife and I went out Saturday for a ride and the Fashion felt quick for once. Maybe the old belt was slipping. My mileage was going downhill and I know a slipping clutch on a motorcycle will do that. I rode it to work yesterday (33 degrees in the morning and it was a great, comfortable 40 miles) and discovered it was much faster both on take off and top speed. I gained about five MPH on the top end, but you won't see me cruising at 75 on that scooter, even 70 is a little hairy. I'm going to try to ride the CF all winter to work. It saves me a boatload in gas money plus it's a fun ride. Call it couch scooter if you will but I'm a couch potato and it's a good fit.

[Bashan]

I got up Friday the 18th and was stoked because, after six days of rain, I was finally going to get to try out my new cold weather mitts from Scooter Logic.

I use Tour Master electrically heated gloves that run right off of the battery. They work great until it gets down to about 28. The wife told me that she finally got me to smile for a pic:

The mitts mount right to the handlebar and provide great wind protection:

You simply slide your hands in and you've got great wind protection as well as a layer of insulation. My wife laughed again when she saw this picture and said "now there's that dour look I'm used to":

So off I went Friday morning to work when it was 27 degrees. Thursday we had ice and snow to the tune of about two inches. I figured that since it got up above freezing during the day the roads would be clear. NOT! About 15 miles into the ride I started encountering patches of ice and snow. By the time I decided that I shouldn't be on the road I was over halfway to work; no sense turning back. I went through so many ice covered stretches of road I lost count. If you've never had a bike start to slew back and forth on a icy road you haven't lived. These pics will not impress our northern friends one bit. But believe me, this "storm" had everybody scrambling to the store for bread and milk:

The handlebar mitts worked great, I don't think I had the power over medium using the mitts. While without the mitts I would be running them wide open. I installed a voltmeter so I could monitor if the gloves and/or forward running lights sucked too much juice. No problem unless the RPMs drop below 1,500 then the volts drop to 12. That would be a discharge reading. I also installed a Tiny Tach which does not use the bikes electrical system. They are wonderful little (well actually tiny) tachometers:

The forward running lights are LEDs so they do not use very much juice. However, they are extremely bright and make me much more visible after dark:

I also installed an LED tail/stop light for my own peace of mind. Here it is with just the tail light on. If you'll look at the spoiler just below the new tail light you'll see the moving lights that make up part of the scrolling light. It's always on with the tail light:

Here's the rear end with the brake applied: