Gearbox.
I suspected that the kick-starter pawl needed some attention as on a few occasions the lever had 'missed' so to speak, resulting in me doing a dance around the garage holding a bruised and sore ankle!
Now was the perfect time to put it right as the gearbox was separated from the engine. Gearboxes of all kinds, Jaguar especially, are not merely engineering masterpieces, no, they are indeed mystical boxes full of Demons, springs and magic. Even this relatively simple1950's design era Albion box could well have been a mystery to even Harry Potter.
First some background information for anyone not familiar with how to change gears on a motorcycle. Unlike a car where a gear stick can be moved right, left, up or down. On a motorbike, you use your foot, mostly these days the left one (The right being the back brake), but on an Enfield following older British practice the gear is on the right with the rear brake being on the left. Interesting when approaching a junction if you have forgotten which is which!
I digress, it's a sequential box and you use your foot. Lift up for 1st. Press down for 2nd, 3rd and 4th. Up again to reverse the process. Oh, and neutral is between 1st and 2nd! Who said bike riding was easy. (Especially as some bikes are 1 down and 4 up). Making sure you are in neutral or first gear when stopped at a junction takes some skill, some more modern bikes have a neutral light or indicator on the dash to help. This Albion box has a handy device, a small metal pedal called a neutral finder, which when pressed with the heel of your foot moves the gear train into neutral. Of course, your other foot may be on the rear brake pedal at the same time, which can make balancing somewhat of a challenge.
Where was I... Oh yes, the kick start pawl. This is made from sintered iron, which can be thought of a powdered iron, pressed into shape and heated until it becomes solid. Now there are engineers reading this who will know far more then me, but I guess that it is cheaper to replace the pawl rather then the gear wheel it engages when wear occurs and that any debris is less harming then shards of steel floating about in the gearbox. The picture below shows the old and new pawl. You can see why it needed renewal. The new one cost 99 Rupees from India (£1).
The old lubricant in the gearbox was a nasty black colour. Quite likely only ground up pawl dust but while I was in it this far it seemed right that I cleaned it all out and started with fresh.
Because Royal Enfields never had oil seals there, the gearbox is filled with a gloopy grease . Not any old grease mind you, Oh no! That would be too easy. Luckily at Stoneleigh Jaguar Spares day I found a tub of Castrol Spherol 00 which was correct. But first, I had to remove the old grease. There is an old Army saying about grease that sticks like $hit to a blanket. This must be that grease, but at least those old Albion engineers knew a thing or two about how to keep those gears lubed!
Much scraping, scooping out and washing in white spirit later and things were looking better. The photo below shows the main and lay-shaft with the cleaned housing, and to the right the un-cleaned outer cover to show the difference.
Just how these two shafts can provide 4 gears, of the correct ratio, and a neutral, is quite simply a marvel to be honest. To explain how this is achieved, the link below is to a graphic that shows what happens. The mechanism that transfers the up and down foot movement to shaft positioning is quite complicated and setting it all up takes some time.
http://www.hitchcocksmotorcycles.com/pi ... earbox.pdf
Fast forward now.. All re-assembled, filled with new grease and fingers crossed, the gearbox is now bolted to the back of the engine and just about ready for installing back into the frame as the picture below shows.
I doubt many of you have made it this far into this story, but for those who have you may have noticed that the cylinder head is so far missing. More epic ramblings will follow in time, to explain the problem.
