A missing part causes a Wrench-Intensive weekend.

Recently, in the hopes of finally getting past the heat-related "fails to start" engine issues on Natasha, my Ural Sidecar Rig, I'd bought a gently used Ducati Ignition system from a fellow member at sovietsteeds.com.

The price was less than 1/2 of the retail price for the latest ignition module type for Urals so how could I say no right?  The parts arrived promptly and on Thursday afternoon of last week, I dismantled the existing Type IV ignition module and took it off Natasha.  It was when I got stuck removing the mounting plate for the old system that I realized that I was missing a seal plate for the new Ducati system!  Doh.

You see, I'd been following the illustrated "how to" guide published by JohnBG of sovietsteeds.com and neglected to notice that I was missing this part:

old seal plate on left, new one on right
 photo source: JohnBG's Ducati Ignition Install Guide

The function provided by the seal plate is to keep the oil from the engine from leaking out into the front cover area where the ignition's rotor and electric pickup is located:

Here's the front of the engine, the cam shaft's end poking through from inside the engine.

photo source: JohnBG's Ducati Ignition Install Guide

Here's the new seal plate which I was missing

photo source: JohnBG's Ducati Ignition Install Guide

I emailed the previous owner of the ignition kit and he promptly replied telling me he'd thought the piece was not Ducati-specific.  He also mailed it out to me the next day so I should have it by Tuesday of this week.

So Friday afternoon was spent removing the old mounting and seal plates from the front area of the engine.  Dang P.O.S. Russian pot metal flat tip screws proved stubbornly hard to remove without damaging them.  There were seven in all and all but one I managed to remove using penetrating oil and time.  The last one involved the removal of the front wheel and fender so I could line up an impact driver on it.  Three hits and it was loose!

Knowing the seal plate was not missing and on the way, I spent most of Saturday doing what I could with the ignition components I did have.  Here's a shot of Natasha with her fuel tank off so I could get at the mounting points for the new module and install all the associated wiring.

A bit messy in terms of wiring, grease and such under the tank, I know.  All that would be cleaned up and corrected over the course of the weekend.

A view of the front of the engine, plastic cover and old ignition pieces removed.  As you can see, the old alternator is still mounted, serving only as a 7 lb+ cover to keep engine oil inside the front engine area.

I spent some time cleaning up the areas exposed by the removal of the gas tank.  Did some rust removal and paint touch-up.  Cleaned up the wiring underneath, routing wires cleanly and installing the wiring for the Ducati ignition system at the same time.

Two holes needed to be drilled into the support frame welded onto the frame which the gas tank straddles when mounted.  This procedure went well, though I did introduce a slight nick in the speedometer cable's sheathing with the drill bit.  

Here's the Ducati coil, mounted securely onto the support frame above where the old ignition's plastic cover goes.  You can see part of the electric pickup that will "sense" the rotation of the new rotor/interruptor on the camshaft for ignition timing purposes.

The "brains" of the Ducati Ignition system, bolted onto the support frame under the motorcycle's seat.  Those exposed wires you see I ended up covering with some black duct tape to keep water out.

Once I'd gone as far as I could without the missing seal plate, there were two other tasks that came to mind that I'd been meaning to do.  Service the splines on the drive shaft and try removing the failed alternator and putting a metal cap in its place to keep the oil inside.

 A shot of twin rainbows visible from my driveway, this on the afternoon after the work above was done.
I am hoping it was a good omen for the work.

Sunday was spent doing the two tasks above.  Neither was a major ordeal, just time intensive, especially the removal of the final drive and the drive shaft from the rear of the gear box.  For this operation, I was following the excellently illustrated and annotate guide from Bill Glaser's myural.com site.

I was way too engaged by the procedure, not to mention having grease-coated hands, that I didn't shoot any pictures while I did the spline lube service.  Instead, here's pictures from Bill Glaser's site which show you a bit of what was involved.  

Here's a view of the drive shaft, it connects to a rubber donut behind the gearbox that acts as a shock absorber and coupling unit.  The splines to be lubed are visible on the left end of the shaft.

photo source: Bill Glaser

Here's a view of the final drive and one of the four bolts which affix it to the rear swingarm

photo source: Bill Glaser

Here, the final drive is unmounted from the swingarm and being moved to the left to uncouple it from the swingarm and the sidecar propeller shaft

photo source: Bill Glaser

The Final drive, ready to be cleaned up and serviced.  

Mine was much greasier and dirty than Bill's unit above!

photo source: Bill Glaser

My final drive had apparently never been serviced until that day.  The splines were bone dry, with some minor damage due to lack of grease, some light rust and some wear.  I believe it's still usable though.  Due to the lack of prior service, it took quite an effort for me to free it from the gearbox's coupling device.  The final drive unit is pretty heavy and unwieldy so picture me with it in my lap, my feet braced against the centerstand's legs and pulling backwards with all my strength!

I pulled so hard I ended up pulling the rubber donut/coupler off the rear of the gear box!  No big deal as it just gets pushed on, which I did using a large flat tip screwdriver as a lever.  Once I finally got the drive loose, I spent quite some time cleaning it up and servicing the splines.  I used Honda Moly 60 grease as it's got a good reputation among Beemer and Honda owners for such usage.

Along with some assistance from my loving wife, I got the final drive installed and it snicked into the coupler unit with nice and smooth due to the new grease I'd applied.  The hardest part of the install was aligning the yokes for the sidecar's propeller shaft!  I am quite certain the next time I go to pull off the final drive, that it'll come out quite easily!

Next task, the removal of the failed 35Amp Russian alternator, otherwise known among the Uralisti cognoscenti as the Russian Hand Grenade.  As I mentioned before, I'd been using it only as a cover to keep oil from splashing out from the front portion of the engine.  The idea was to take off it's 7lb+ worth of dead weight and replace it with a metal cover.

To that end, I ended using the "top hat" metal plate that came with an old Ural air box I'd obtained from another fellow sovietsteeds.com owner.  A little drilling, a little filing and I got the existing holes on the plate to fit the mounting bolts that used to secure the failed alternator.  I used gasket making material to hopefully create an oil-tight/airtight seal on the opening.  If it doesn't work, you'll see the alternator placed back in on future pics!

Things look quite "roomy" here now with the failed alternator out of the picture!

I did some final cleanup, replaced the gas tank and hooked back up all the gas lines that go to it.  Now Natasha's ready for the Ducati-specific seal plate and installing the remaining components of the Ducati Ignition system should be a breeze.

 Update: Later on today.

The missing seal plate came in the afternoon mail!  I put it on with no issues, put some gas into Natasha's tank, and she fired right up!  I next hooked up my timing light, shone it into the opening and saw that the timing mark was almost dead center already.  A little fiddling with the rotor pickup and it was dead center.  I got her buttoned up, got geared up and went for a quick test ride.

She rode beautifully.  Engine was nice and smooth, well as smooth as a Ural can be anyway.    I'd adjusted the clutch before due to a piece of it breaking off at the handle but I think I'll get used to new "friction zone" soon enough.  I came home to put the front fender back on.  The elated feeling was only slightly dulled by seeing that my metal cover replacement for the alternator's mounting point had failed miserably though.  There was evidence of an oil leak down the right side of the engine.  Oh well.  (note, there's a minimum width requirement for whatever is used as a cover, otherwise you end up pulling out the mounting bolts!)

About an hour later, there was more gas spilled on the driveway as I had to remove the tank, remove the cover plate, put back the failed alternator and replace the gas tank.  I really have to get quick disconnects for that crossover tube between the two halves of the gas tank!  (Stupid design)

Another test ride, no oil leaks this time, I need to buy a new mounting bolt for the front fender but its fine now with a temporary replacement.  Natasha is back among the "living" and will be my ride to work tomorrow.