Baker in Gear, Organ Donor-part two - the old site

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Contents
MAY/JUNE 2013
10
ON THE COVER
Volume 23 • Number 4 • Our 192nd Issue
It's true, IronWorks doesn't run many studio-shot feature bikes and
that's essentially because photo studios don't accurately represent
the natural habitat of motorcycles. But Jack McIntyre's images of
Rick Bray's Shovel showed the glittery details so well, it seemed appropriate this time—much the same way Black Smith Motoring's Softail Custom looks artful photographed in the garage where it was
built, and Carl Morrow's Bad Dog belongs at the beach near his shop
in Daytona. But as you'll find out when you read more about all of
these bikes, each one is built to be ridden, intended for the street.
And singular good looks aside, that's why we like them.
FEATURE BIKES
DEPARTMENTS
Rick Bray’s Pala Duro ............................10
Letters ................................................16
Hard-edged Shovel
Readers write in
An Iron Worker’s Retro Pan ...................18
Great Rides ..........................................48
Built on island time
Hitting the high roads
Shadley Bros. Sportster.........................24
Made in the USA ...................................50
What’s old is cool again
Thomson Superchargers
Bagger Nation Road Glide ......................32
Bobber and Chopper Buyer’s Guide ..........68
Built to burn up the miles
Getting the look and feel just right
Carl Morrow’s Bad Dog..........................36
Seasoned Citizens .................................76
Snapping the leash
1938 Indian Chief
El Puro Vato .........................................44
Pure Motoring, man
IW GARAGE
FEATURE STORIES
Putting power where it matters
Garage Talk with Dan Pike ......................54
Ultimate Builder US Champs...................22
Lincoln Electric Welding Series................56
Bringing home the goods
Making what you can’t buy
Moon Eyes Japan 2012 .........................28
Shop Time with Mike Witt ......................58
Harleys in the far east
Performance Pan, part I
Mid-America Motorcycle Auction .............40
Legend Suspension Series ......................66
Vegas via two wheels
Part 1: Rider identity
Bert Baker’s Organ Donor Dragster ........62
S&S Flathead Power ..............................72
Heart of the beast
From boxes to brilliant
REGULARS
32
Marilyn Stemp ........................................6
Time enough
Snakebit Sam Kanish ...............................8
Sale tales
Rick Fairless .........................................14
The great beyond
Ed Youngblood ......................................74
Legend of the lost Vindian
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Bert Baker’s Organ Donor: Part 2
Scratch built mean green speed machine
Story by Bert Baker • Photos compliments of Baker Drivetrain
Last issue in Part 1, Bert outlined the foundation for his drag
race build project, a bike he calls Organ Donor. It’s his first
scratch built bike in 17 years and we get to follow along—from
the Kendall Johnson 139” motor and Rolling Thunder frame to
the finished street smokin’ asphalt burner. Part 2 in this issue details the engine and drivetrain, and part 3 will cover final assembly. As a bonus (or a challenge), he’ll write a fourth installment reporting his results at the racetrack. As Bert stated at the outset,
“I have no intention of participating in sanctioned racing… my reward will be measured in my mind and how many giggawumps
per cubic inch of adrenalin my adrenal glands put out.”
Let’s see how it’s going. —ed.
P
art two of the Organ Donor saga is devoted to the engine and
drivetrain. The task of reporting the steps in the build process
of the Organ Donor is very frustrating because there are so
many details and tricks to building a bike, especially one with mechanical purpose and ¼-mile intent. Without seasoned help from James
Simonelli, Scotch-Brite Mark, Andy Friar, and individual component experts, this project would have taken me three years instead of three
months. If I were to chronicle all the details I learned from these seasoned experts to make this article a how-to-build-your-own V-Twin
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rocket, it would fill this whole magazine. Keep in mind this is a Harleybased machine, which means it’s towards the simple end of the technology spectrum. It’s not a space shuttle! Nevertheless, there are
many methods, techniques, and skills that only come with time and
experience; you can’t Google this crap. If there are questions on what
we did, or how we did it, give us a call or look us up at a bike rally.
You won’t see much of me in the photos of this article because
I was, A.) the guy behind the camera playing porn director, B.)
whipping out the 38-odd brackets and gizmos on the 2-axis CNC
Bridgeport, and C.) playing camp counselor and head custodian at
a company that makes transmissions and drivetrain products. But
believe me, I was there.
Serious big displacement engines started showing up about 10
years ago when the custom chopper scene was going bonkers.
Most of these 131+” big block engines found their way into overweight custom choppers that were never really let out of the stable.
With the decline of the custom chopper, the popularity of the big
block motor waned, simply because these big motors don’t fit in a
regular frame without chassis modification. However, use of these
oversized thermodynamic contraptions is on the upswing due to the
fire-and-brimstone preachings of performance freaks like the previously mentioned James, Reverend George Bryce, and Don Vito Reggie Ronzello. George has a big shoehorn down in Georgia and is
stuffing the S&S 145s into “converted” baggers. He can’t build them
IronWorks May/June 2013
IW_0613_ASM_Layout 1 3/5/13 4:56 PM Page 63
fast enough. Reggie up at R&R in New
Hampshire is doing the same with his big,
potent, beautifully constructed “godfather”
motors. Down in Alabama, Viper is making
a 152” big bore short stroke Ilmor-powered
production bike. I like the idea of monster
motors going into bikes that are ridden (instead of parked and washed) even if the
bike is an obese 800-pound behemoth.
For the Organ Donor, we used a 10-yearold Kendall Johnson-built 139” engine with a
43⁄8 bore and 45⁄8” stroke. It had tall deck
S&S cases, Axtell cylinders, aluminum rods,
and S&S B1 heads with stainless steel
valves. Due to the age of the motor and the
unknown condition of its inner workings, we
made the decision to tear it down, inspect
things, and rebuild it with good stuff. One of
the cylinders was scuffed up, so we went
.020” over which put the displacement at a
solid 140”. We relied on the expertise of
Axtell to bore the cylinders and fit new pistons. The new rings were ready to install
and required no end-gap tweaking.
The flywheels that came out of the engine
had 8” aluminum rods, a suspicious early
crank pin with an aluminum expansion plug,
and .012” runout on the pinion shaft—so
we sent them off to Mike Ligenfeld at Silver
Moon Cranks in Wisconsin to get them
right. Mike used a set of Dale Nungesser
steel nitro rods with the rebuild per our re-
quest. He got the shafts on both sides within .001” runout, so I would say he is very
good at his craft. Mike pressed a new crank
pin with a steel expansion plug in the flywheels and welded it into place. Because
the original rods were aluminum, a lot of
Mallory or “heavy metal” (Tungsten) had to
be added to the wheels to re-balance them.
With the flywheels back, the engine
assembly began. Thankfully, James is an
experienced engine builder so he had
the knowledge and all the crazy special
tools necessary to do the job. ScotchBrite Mark got the motor cases prepped
and James pushed the left side case
half onto the crank. The left side bearing
IronWorks May/June 2013
sired squish of .040” was verified with
lead/tin rosin core solder and clay. The
decision was made early on to use 12
point ARP fasteners throughout and this
presented a special challenge because
the flange on the head is much larger
than conventional bolts. In some cases
we turned down the bolt flanges and in
other cases, like the rocker boxes, we
interpolated the fastener pocket.
end play was checked and deemed good
so the right side case half was pushed
on with some Three Bond 1104 in be-
tween the case halves. We selected an
S&S 675 camshaft because of the big
displacement and 12.9:1 compression
ratio. New hydraulic lifters were used
with travel limiters. A new S&S HPHV oil
pump was also installed, because the
pump gears from the old pump were a
little sticky and it would be silly to cut
costs with this much invested in the
motor. The detailed ritual of priming the
oil in the bottom end was performed to
make it easy for the motor in its first
few moments of life. We got base and
head gaskets from Cometic to dial in the
combustion chamber squish. The de-
Below the Mason-Dixon Line there are
tens of thousands of fellas named JimBob, but in Michigan there is only one
and he is the man. JimBob Haines runs
HighOutput Engineering in Clarkston,
Michigan and is considered the Winston
Wolf (movie: Pulp Fiction) of CFMs by
Greg Gates. That referral was good
enough for me! He replaced the stock
2.100” tulip stainless steel intakes with
2.150” nail-head titanium valves and unshrouded the combustion chambers to
make these cylinder heads scream. The
use of titanium allowed JimBob to reduce
the seat pressure from 240 pounds
needed for the stainless steel valves to a
more sane 160 pounds on Moldstar 90
seats, which is a lot less destructive to
the seats, is more durable, and allows
for easier cranking.
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The coil and ignition came from
Accel/Mallory and the lime green plug
wires came from Sumax to match my
Kawasaki green mojo. The Cycle Electric
right side and making it look sanitary was
easier said than done. We used a 36”
runner length for front and rear pipes,
which might be shortened after some
dyno and track time. Notice that the
front and rear pipes don’t appear to be
equal length, but they are.
Our own Function Formed Primary
(FFP) and King Kong Klutch (KKK) were
used for this machine. This primary drive
alternator stator we used was one of
those parts that you hold in your hand and
it screams American-made quality. It also
features robust terminal ends that solve
the problem of arcing between leads on
stock stators.
was specifically designed for big power
applications with the inner and outer primary housings made from a thick-walled
forging. It utilizes an outside bearing
ably be tweaked once I get to the track,
but 3.33 is a good start.
A 6-speed Z-Ratio Right Side Drive
TorqueBox with a 2.61 1st gear was used
to transfer the power from the clutch to
the rear wheel because it can handle up
to 250 ft-lb of torque; The picture shows
the size difference between a stock and a
TorqueBox maindrive gear. It comes standard with a neutral switch, ignition kill
switch, and N1 drum with a N-1-2-3-4-5-6
shift pattern. Tommy Fudge, our production foreman, is shown assembling the
Organ Donor’s TorqueBox.
Andy Friar is the Baker production and
engineering manager by day, but he got
the nod to fab the pipes. Fabricator
support spider that bolts to the KKK
clutch and effectively supports the transmission mainshaft from flexing under big
power. The KKK has 20 one-sided clutch
plates that are 1.15” larger in diameter
than stock and holds up to 250 ft-lbs
The next installment of the Organ Donor
story will cover the final assembly. It may
take 30 minutes to build a bike on TV, but
I assure you that it takes much longer to
do the job in real life! IW
Friar, so named by Fabricator Kevin, is a
talented fabricator and fussy TIG welder,
exactly what this job needed. He used
2.25” OD pipes to plumb the exhaust
gases out of this 2.3 liter engine. Routing two massive 2.25” pipes around the
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with the heavy springs installed. Keep in
mind that it’s torque, not horsepower
that puts drivetrain components to the
test. A 24-tooth non-compensator ½”
offset motor sprocket was used with a
37-tooth clutch sprocket, 19-tooth tranny sprocket and 41-tooth wheel sprocket
to yield a 3.33 ratio. This ratio will prob-
*RESOURCE
Baker Drivetrain • Haslett, MI
877-640-2004 • www.bakerdrivetrain.com
IronWorks May/June 2013