Bakker 443

[Tobyjugs]

The Rockane Classic Races was the first proper shake down tests for the bike.

I had deliberately geared the bike up to be long as to keep it a bit sluggish on the circiut Kees told me he only hit 5th gear. This was using a 19T front sprocket and 36T rear sprocket with a hybrid banshee/YPVS gearbox and 2.65/1 primary gear setup

Unfortunately the pilot is a very relaxed person to get feedback from and i was also very relaxed so the day wasn't exactly filled with questions and action.

The cooling worked very well and stayed at an average temperature of 48 deg C. It did climb up to 70 deg C but that was with it idling for almost 10 minutes at the start line due to delays but once off i quickly dropped back down.

The  front brakes worked very well and Kees loved the feed back etc. He did not ride the bike very hard but he could out brake most bikes which meant he still finished in the top five. An ex NK racer came over and asked what was wrong with the bike as Kees kept out braking him and then didn't ride off after corner exit. We explained that we were just basically testing the bike. I think this upset Kees a little and i had to keep telling him and reassuring him he was doing the right thing.



As you can see in the picture above the front brake discs have discouloured a bit and the fork indicater is a bit low or close to the end of the travel.

I'm not really sure about the colouring on the front discs, i have informed about the colour and the feed back i get is mostly that is is ok. With the front wheel lifted it does free wheel easily but you can hear the pads slightly rubbing the discs. These are the pads i used. they are sort of begginers racing pads.

20210817_113506 by Tony Macfarlane, on Flickr

The indicator on the fork leg looks low but i have been assured this is good according to the forks i have.

These are some of the niggles i dont like but are supposed to be ok. I guess time will tell. Monday i will be with two very experianced riders, which i am looking forward to. One of them has ridden in 250 GP races at Assen in the 90's on wildcards.

All feedback over these niggles are very welcome.

Next i will post the biggest problem that occurred.

[tipfinchy]

i was looking at the ISR discs a little while ago and will be interesting to hear further feedback on them
i had some EBC race discs on my R1 20 odd years ago and they was exactly the same as yours colour and slight interference noise when spinning the wheel , same wheel too.

mart

[midlifecrisisrd]

Oh no, what was the biggest problem 😰

Steve

[Tobyjugs]

Jun 4, 2022 10:43:10 GMT 1 midlifecrisisrd said:

Oh no, what was the biggest problem 😰

Steve

This 




Yesterday evening i started checking the possible causes.

[midlifecrisisrd]

Did the chain jump 🤔

Steve

[Tobyjugs]

Yes. I will write about it when ive finished some checks

[JonW]

Looks paintful, I hope it didnt do more than paint damage

[Tobyjugs]

Ok chaps time to pick the story up again.



So the chain fell off and luckily it went into the inside and not the outside. It did scuff up the rim a little but it was more paint and a tiny bit of magnesium.

After a lot of checking i put it down to mostly down to poor maintenance on that day. I was full of strong painkillers and wasn't paying attention to what was really going on and only telling Kees not to ride too hard on it. Another two smaller issues which wasn't helping too much was the rear spring was too soft and the bike was squatting under acceleration, making it prone to wheelies.

The bike was set up for a 90kg rider, this time i would set it up for my own weight. On closer examination the actual spring fitted to the bike was also too weak for a 90kg rider as it was bottoming out on a dip in the road on the straight. From the information i got later from Kees this was about 125 mph in 5 gear.
I called up HK Suspension, told them the problem and ended up going for a much heavier spring. I went from 120 n/m to 160 n/m rear spring. I also changed out one front fork spring. Both fork springs were 8.5 n/m one was swapped for a 9 n/m spring to slightly stiffen up the front end.
I changed the front fork spring under the guidance of Pieter, the tuner i use. He was very busy with work and lots of people were turning up when he was dealing with a difficult customer. He asked me if i would take the bike outside and start it. He knew this would drag everyone out to see the bike and he could deal with the customer without any distractions.

Press on the picture to see the video.



The bike was ready for it's next track adventure, but due to the nature of my work and recuperating from my sore back that ended up being in September. I couldn't get any track time in Holland or Belgium so ended up doing some track days in France. The biggest worry i had was the noise limits, on classic TT type events there is no noise limits as such. The Bakker 443 is very loud, due to this i took my 400cc RD as a backup bike.

It took a little head scratching but i managed to shoe horn both bikes into the back of a Caddy with all necessary extras packed in here and there around the two bikes. I think owning an MG Midget has given me some good training for inventive storage.



The plan was to do two separate weekends at Mettet and Clastres and Folembray on consecutive days. I missed the first weekend at Metett and decided not to do the next event at Metett as my father invited me to his favourite classic car meeting. He is 82 and at the age where he could live to be 102 or next week i hear some sad news so it was not a difficult decision.

[marrcel]

It is a joy to read your adventures Tony😋

[Tobyjugs]

Nov 6, 2022 20:21:33 GMT 1 marrcel said:

It is a joy to read your adventures Tony😋

Hi Marrcel, thanks we need to meet up again it's been a while.

[Tobyjugs]

Hmm i waffled on a bit in the last post and was interrupted so had to stop. Anyway heres some more waffle.

With everything packed in the van off i went to Clastres. I arrived the evening before and it was horrible muggy weather. Once i arrived and started unpacking everything i soon realised that it's best not to be Billy no mates. and i wished i had more load space for a canopy.
I just managed to unload everything before it rained very hard. I had to pack a lot of stuff into the front of the caddy (stuff that needed to stay dry} and the rest under the tarp between the two bikes. my bed was the cargo bay. The facilities at this track were very good and very clean.



The next morning i went to the briefing and signed into the novice category, then it was time for the sound test. I was a bit slow getting to the test which consisted of an inner circle for the bike and an outer circle for the tester painted on the floor. I saw a few bikes get sent away to get DB killers fitted due to too much noise. When it was my turn the tester sent me straight away and told me he couldn't measure the noise. He told me to go out on the track and if i see a black flag come in as your too noisy
Later i asked one of the organisers about the sound testing and translated he said "It would be an insult against God not to let a two stroke out on the circuit"

Due to being in the novice group we got a bit more advice and they were asking about our bikes etc. When i told them about the Bakker bike they let me go out for a couple of rounds on my own with a Guide/Instructor just to make sure nothing fell off the bike.

Clastres is a narrow twisty track which i didn't like too much. A few weeks after thinking about it i would like to go back more to that circuit as its a good place for sharpening the skills for the corners i find difficult. I had a bit of fun with a rider on an old R1. On the faster part of the track i could reel him in and then on the small twisties he would reel me in.
If your into Supermotards I think this would be a great circuit for you.



At Clastres the first problem started to show up. This was the carbouration on 1/8 to 1/4 throttle. It was machine gunning and a few times it put the bike into a small weave mid corner.
Looking at the plugs they were black and wet/oily. Ok i will lean it off. This made it even worse. wrong way!
When opening the carbs up the i had that ping experience and the white plastic collar for the spring and slide launched itself into the paddock. You might think easy to find on black tarmac. Probably yes but the area i was in was painted white. I looked all over the place but could not find it. I kicked myself for not having a spare and started to think about improvising. Luckily it started raining again which turned the painted area a bit grey which enabled me to see the little white collar, which was a good 3 maybe four car lengths away from me.



After the day was finished, everything was dried off packed into the van. A small drive of about 30 minutes and i was at the next track Folembray

As soon as i turned up to Folembray i immediately liked the look of it. It's a small fast track that basically is very easy to ride and goes up a hill turn around come back down the hill, turn around and start again.
The facilities at this track are basic.
Again no noise check for me



I brought my 400 for nothing, but knowing my luck if i had not brought it the Bakker bike would fail the noise test.


Whilst riding this track i was trying to dial in the carbs a little but i also noticed if you drive full throttle and no throttle the bike was fine. I made one silly mistake i switched the fuel tap off instead of on and did less than a quarter of the track before rolling to a stop on the grass. i then had to wait 20 minutes to come back in. I tried bump starting it a few times on the grass but that really wasn't going to happen. It only aggravated the marshal each time.
Another lesson learned from this track was due to the gravely pit area it was very difficult to start the bike, which meant i was out of breath a few times when i was just starting.
On this track i learned just how good the brakes are on this Bakker bike they are powerful enough but the feed back is superb. I started off braking at the same times as the other bikes just before the corner then had to start giving a bit of throttle to get to the corner.
It was easy to get the back wheel skipping along the tarmac. No doubt helped by the heavy rear spring and lack of rebound damping from the shock.
I found the harder i drove it into the corner the more i could feel the tyres digging into the track giving even more confidence, i just had to be careful exiting the corners as it was still squatting and trying to wheelie a bit.



On this track i found my radiator starting to leak from the matrix a little.

Also the R6 gear linkage was a little slack. The picture is of the first one i tried which was a bit magled. The next one was in perfect condition but also loosened up with use.




It was a great two days which has shown me some weaknesses and good parts of the build.

I now have the following items to address;
1) Repair radiator. The cooling temperature on track never went over 48 degrees C.
2) The tacho shit itself i think due to how fast the revs pickup with initial starting. I might need to fit a battery.
3) The R6 linkage that fits onto the selector shaft is loose. I now think this part is not fitting correctly to start with. I will have to make my own linkage using an old selector shaft as a broach.
4) Serious thought has to be given to the rear suspension linkage and shock.
6) The fairing inside edges next to the radiator need to be tweaked as they rattle. you probably noticed the yellow duct tape in the pictures.
7) The gearbox needs to be modified as 1st gear is only good for parking mode.
8) Buy some spare part for the carbs.
9) Get a starter for it. i'm no spring chicken any more!

[donkeychomp]

An insult to god. I love that. Keep us informed of the antics!

Alex

[JonW]

Super write up Tony! Just like being there in person!

[mouse]

Hey Tony, great write up!
What a fantastic time you must have had, off in your van, two track days, brilliant!
Ok, so the bike has a few teething problems but considering all you have done to it, they are very small and you'll get them sorted easily.
I really love this bike and glad you got to sample the fruits of your labours!

All the best
Mouse

[Tobyjugs]

Nov 9, 2022 20:00:17 GMT 1 mouse said:

Hey Tony, great write up!
What a fantastic time you must have had, off in your van, two track days, brilliant!
Ok, so the bike has a few teething problems but considering all you have done to it, they are very small and you'll get them sorted easily.
I really love this bike and glad you got to sample the fruits of your labours!

All the best
Mouse

Yes it was fun and i really do like the Bakker 443 it will be great when its dialled in a bit.

[Tobyjugs]

There was something else i forgot to mention about those two track days. At Folembray both the soles of my Sidi boots fell off!!!



I bought them about seven years ago secondhand/new off a chap that just went out and bought a brand new sports Ducati rode it a few times and decided it was too much for him and sold everything and bought a new Harley. They lasted well and I've even used them flat tracking without a hot shoe without any problems or signs of failure.
I replaced them with a brand new pair because i liked them so much.



About two weeks ago i found out that you could buy replacement soles. Hmm not sure if that is a good sign for quality. Anyway i would rather buy the soles and spend the money on repairing the radiator for example.

The radiator has been delivered to specialist to be repaired.

Nico Bakker has been interested in how the bike has been performing so it was brought back to him and he checked the suspension linkage and suggested the length of the shock should be lengthened between 5 to 7mm longer. He also altered the hole in the swingarm to give the shock a bit more clearance.

I have also got an Ohlins shock rear shock which is being modified to the specification of the bike and Nico's advice. No other action will be taken with this until i ride and test the bike again. I'm not sure if i ever mentioned it but the geometry is the same as an NSR 500 Honda from the mid 80's.
I think this can be improved upon, but being realistic the bike rides better than my ability as is.

Oh and for any other PING moments i ordered some extra carb spares and some other needles to try and dial out the hiccup at approximately 1/8-1/4 throttle openings.



I have Googled roller starters and they are not cheap, first i had a plan to make one, then i decided it would be much easier just to buy one. Now i've seen the retail prices I'm not sure what i will do. For some reason there seems a lot to be bought in Australia.

To Do List

I now have the following items to address;
1) Repair radiator. The cooling temperature on track never went over 48 degrees C.
2) The tacho shit itself i think due to how fast the revs pickup with initial starting. I might need to fit a battery.
3) The R6 linkage that fits onto the selector shaft is loose. I now think this part is not fitting correctly to start with. I will have to make my own linkage using an old selector shaft as a broach.
4) Serious thought has to be given to the rear suspension linkage and shock.
6) The fairing inside edges next to the radiator need to be tweaked as they rattle. you probably noticed the yellow duct tape in the pictures.
7) The gearbox needs to be modified as 1st gear is only good for parking mode.
8) Buy some spare part for the carbs.
9) Get a starter for it. i'm no spring chicken any more!

[abar121]

Love the track write up, if not the Sidi boots!

I built a roller starter a year or two ago, works brilliantly. rdlccrazy.proboards.com/post/546427/thread
I used this kit: www.ebay.co.uk/itm/155243197947

Matt has another one, also posted on that thread. Enjoy.

[Tobyjugs]

Nov 10, 2022 18:23:31 GMT 1 abar121 said:

Love the track write up, if not the Sidi boots!

I built a roller starter a year or two ago, works brilliantly. rdlccrazy.proboards.com/post/546427/thread
I used this kit: www.ebay.co.uk/itm/155243197947

Matt has another one, also posted on that thread. Enjoy.

Thanks for the suggestion, that really does save a lot of the faffing around.
I have seen the one Matt has and it's expensive but still cheap compared to its big brother and the make does look like a quality product compared to some others i looked at.

[JonW]

No idea why there would be so many available here, tho lots of racers do use them in the pits. Expensive to post I fear...

That kit looks great.

[Tobyjugs]

Nov 11, 2022 13:16:25 GMT 1 JonW said:

No idea why there would be so many available here, tho lots of racers do use them in the pits. Expensive to post I fear...

That kit looks great.

I think thats a very easy question to answer JonW. As a middle aged slightly overweight man in northern Europe, bumping a motorcycle is hard work. In the warmer climate of Ozz it becomes Bloody Hard Work.

[Tobyjugs]

Ok time to update this thread a little. Basically because Mouse gave me some inspiration when i saw his FZ in it's new colours 

Since the last time i posted i have been slowly but surely working through the to do list. The red text has been adressed

1) Repair radiator. The cooling temperature on track never went over 48 degrees C.
2) The tacho shit itself i think due to how fast the revs pickup with initial starting. I might need to fit a battery.
3) The R6 linkage that fits onto the selector shaft is loose. I now think this part is not fitting correctly to start with. I will have to make my own linkage using an old selector shaft as a broach.
4) Serious thought has to be given to the rear suspension linkage and shock.
6) The fairing inside edges next to the radiator need to be tweaked as they rattle. you probably noticed the yellow duct tape in the pictures.
7) The gearbox needs to be modified as 1st gear is only good for parking mode.
8) Buy some spare part for the carbs.
9) Get a starter for it. i'm no spring chicken any more!
10) Try to sort out the low down stutter which was causing the bike to weave a bit in the corners.

The radiator matrix was damaged due to debri on the track hitting it. This was fixed by a radiator special list using solder. i was very happy with this as i thought i was going to loose one cooling channel. It's not the prettiest of fixes but it's fixed.

Hmm yes what do i say about the tacho! basically the only soldered connection on the bike failed. I have read many times that soldered connections are a bad idea on vehicles. At the time of making that part of the loom i did not have the correct size connection but i did have an old one which had been crimped. because i couldn't crimp the new wire on i soldered it the wire broke exactly at the end of the solder where the copper wire begins.
That's not all on closer inspection of the dial it was noticed the dial face was warped. I tried to contact the makers of the tacho but my email came back to me because the adress didn't exist any more. Further checking on the internet showed that they had stopped making that particular gauge and sold that part of the business to another company. On the positive side it does still work.

Ok this could be down to me for not tightening the fitting correctly. I have been using a bolt with a large round contact area kind of like a built in washer. Even though the bolt was very tight there was not enough flex to get a good purchase on the shaft. I ended up elongating the holes and fitted a normal bolt and washer, it now has good purchase on the shaft. Looking at the picture below you can see that it is still dodgy and badly deformed. Making a new one could still be on the cards.





The shock has been fitted so here's a picture of it before fitting.





I had a few different sets of needles and the type that worked best was the CEL type. I ordered two other sets of needles with the next size taper up and down. Kees took the bike to the dyno bank for me to try and get the partial throttle hiccup out of it. After trying a few different needles they reverted back to the CEL type and ended up dropping the pilot jet down one size to 48 putting the needle in the lowest position. When i heard that the needle had been dropped down so far i was not so enthusiastic about it. I have now odered another two sets of needles, these are CGL and CEN. The hiccup is supposed to be cured but i would like to see if i can get the needle up a little higher again.

I bit the bullet and bought a new starter. I want to do so many things but reality is i don't have enough time. This starter came from a company called MPF.





For just over one year now i have been trying to get some stickers made for the bike as i find it a bit boring all white. I decided not to go the usual Yamaha colors and route and would like to have my own fake racing team.
Finally the sticker company and I managed to get a day where we were both free to do the work. The basic design had been spoken about ages ago so it should have been just take the bike to the workshop and stick a few stickers on. Well i changed the plan slightly as i wanted yellow number plates stuck onto it as well.
I made and printed two designs on paper and stuck one onto the tail of the bike and didn't like it







I went to the workshop and explained what i wanted with the yellow stickers and we worked out a plan. I was also told that they had to get a trailor stickered up before the weekend so my bike would be finished after the week end and that i should leave it there. The next thing i know is i have to go away for a job and fly on the Saturday   . I asked Kees if he could pick it up for me. I really thought Kees would't like the design because he is crazy about the red and white classic Yamaha designs. When he picked it up he just said it was sick. I really didn't know what he meant by that. Any way it turned out he really liked it and he sent me some pictures of it. It turned out better than I expected even though i will be making the the stickers on the sides of the fairing bigger as they are to small for me.
When i got home yesterday it was even more of a wow as it looks much beter in the flesh. Oh i do know it was used on Suzuki's Mr Whitam will probably cringe if he see's it.

[donkeychomp]

Love it! I assume you'll be using the correct numbers to go with the Durex design...

Alex

[Tobyjugs]

Would that be 69

Maybe a logo that says  Durex burning rubber since 1929

[4l04ever]

"Ride Safe"

[mouse]

Good colour choice Tony, it looks great!!

That is such a lovely bike, glad you are working through the issues.

Mouse

[Tobyjugs]

At the moment i'm just preparing this bike for it's next outing when all of a sudden out of the blue the postman delivers me a package.

Last september i decided i liked the little "mountain bike sized back brake caliper" the one fitted is a Chinese copy. Last September i ordered the genuine caliper only to hear "We are not sure when we will make some more of this model, "we will return your money" i told them to keep the money and i would wait.

At last it turned up and here it is.

Happy as Larry

[Tobyjugs]

An inspection of the bike revealed this!





All fixed now.

[mouse]

Christ! Glad you found that now, is it the swingarm?

Mouse

[Tobyjugs]

Yes the end where the rim is held.

Not having much look with swinging arms this year. That's the second one.

[donkeychomp]

Bloody hell. I'm just glad you spotted it before anyone rode it!

Alex