beachcomber said:
Here's another shown on a bike. WOW - just spotted the Gold painted front hub - THAT'S the colour !!!!!!!
Anybody know what type of hub is on that old Rickman? I know there was a Rickman drum used before they switched to the single disc front end, but this doesn't look like that one. I thought I had a good eye for big drum hubs but this one escapes me! Most bigger Rickman framed bikes that I'VE seen, use the conical front hub with internal disc. A crazy looking set-up, but all the more cool for it. This one made me look around a bit - Not an Eddie Robinson, it's not a modern Smith-Kanrin in 2LS - it doesn't look like any of the usual stuff from Italian aftermarket suppliers like Grimeca, Ceriani, Fontana etc - what next comes to mind is Oldani who made a great big 2LS but that had circular holes drilled near the circumference - or even Munch yet another enomous 2LS drum....
The really distinctive thing is the ventilation holes, they conflict with the hole patterns of nearly every big 2LS I can think of. Six large triangular vents, which might be a modification, but it's done so well it seems original - It's overall diameter is way too big for a common British front hub which were usually 8" - THIS hub seems like a good 9" or even 10" - all that with a "bacon-slicer" to boot. That IS a cooling ring, ennit? Not a disc? Sure would be sad to take such a beautiful hub and convert it to disc! No - that's nuts! And it still wouldn't answer my question.
I've also recently seen some "reproduction" Grimeca hubs which are in actual fact massive hydraulic systems with a huge fat vented internal disc, and what seems like a full-plate clutch-type "pad" on each side. All full of hydraulic pipes and everything. Pretty neat. Makes one wonder, what with all the conversions being done from CBX550F front comstar wheels - What if Honda, or Campagnolo with it's "hydroconica" system, had made proper wire-spoked hubs instead of comstar or cast-mag wheels? I figure if they had been made adaptable to other purposes, they might have survived in some form. Reproduction CBX550F hubs instead of Grimeca & Fontana....
Either way, THIS hub seems much much older than all that stuff! And yet, the photo seems like a modern digital pic, not a scan from an old film print with the tell-tale discolouration etc - so I'm guessing this just MIGHT be something new and interesting. (Rather than something old and even MORE interesting....)
I've recently seen some reproductions of the 260mm Yamaha 4LS drum which were done-up as a full-width 2LS drum. I wonder how much mass they've saved, not to mention machine time/work - or for that matter, how much structural integrity has been sacrificed in these changes. Gotta be some massive side-to-side torque on your forks from a drum set up this way, but even with that you've got to consider how much extra width it would have in the lining - potentially something like 125% that of the "regular" Yam 4LS system, if nothing else due to the dish side taking up no more width than the original center section, and the right side plate being ditched. With Yam 260mm shoes being already in short supply, and the potential for a much much wider drum lining, the thing's gotta use non-standard shoes. Maybe some type of automotive shoes? The diameter is about right. Far more likely to be able to find wider shoes for a 2LS, than an automotive shoe narrow enough for the 4LS drum. Cheap shoes has got to be about the best argument for a custom hub based around automotive internal bits. Either way - what enormous shoes it must have. And you know what they say about drum-brakes with big shoes....
So there's POTENTIAL for the 2LS version of the Yam 260mm to be more powerful than the original version. Though, in practice that doesn't always work - I mean with 2LS vs 4LS brakes! - I've got a pair of Suzuki hubs, a GT750J 4LS and the T500 Titan 2LS - virtually identical other than the extra plate and shoes etc. But the titan's width works out to something like 80%-90% of the 4LS version. But the T500 drum itself is also narrower overall. As a proportion from the overall width (at circumference, not axially where huge spacers are cast into each side) The 2LS version uses that width more efficiently. Half of the 4LS hub's width is wasted between shrouding the shoe plates and the central structure.
(((Never mind the current price disparity! For which I myself am at least partially to blame - several years ago I low-balled on a GT550J drum which I lost in a fire - after which I got drunk and went on eBay to find it's replacement. I'd hazard a guess that I bid a record amount for the thing, especially considering I asked them to keep the new alloy rim that was on it, to fit it into a smaller shipping container.... Hey, it was the wrong size of rim for my project!)))
((( Oh - hey, a potential dirty trick for GT750J drum users: I'm planning to use these here T500 shoes in the 4LS, filed down appropriately, either for more contact patch OR that plus some off-set to move the side-plates outward and open the gap between hub and side-plates for even more breathing - Just playing around with 'em at this point, and if nothing else the T500 shoes can be found for cheaper! - Incidentally, it's all for my Ex-Daughter's sweet-sixteen project - a KZ440LTD side-car using wide 16" rims, 2 of the 3" Borrani plus a 3.5" Super-Akront, for Maxi-Scooter radial tires in 110/70 & 140/70 plus all NOS belt-drive of the KZ440LTD's own origin - It'll be a proper bike first and foremost, the side-car was an afterthought about what to do with her dog. Damn thing's over-due 'cause of a house-fire last year when the bike was just coming together - replaced all of the important parts, but at this point it would make more sense to use SEVENTEEN-inch rims!)))
ANYWAY yeah this enormous 2LS drum is fascinating, really the most interesting part about this Rickman Norton - I would love to get a peek at the other side! There were a few British factory/works drums, Velocette made some cool looking drums, there were some very obscure and rare bespoke drums made for the GP / TT scene in the '50s and '60s - I've just spent the past hour or more searching through my library of pirated photos (with notes) about drums and modifications etc - I come up empty handed. Which is unusual - this intense of a bike-porn session usually I'm grasping SOMETHING in my non-touchpad hand. Heh-heh.
Seriously though - have you got anymore pics of this bike? Does anybody recognize this hub? I'm sure it's a moot point when I can't HAVE one in any case. But it's still interesting! Unobtainium parts make for the best "Bike-Pron" (work-safe version of Bike-Porn) - and big drum top my list. I'm a little bit wheel obsessed right now, being in the midst of a wire-spoke conversion on a total of FIVE wheels - one in which I've lost the entire collection of hubs and rims in a fire, then replaced them all within a few months - Additionally, I went through several different hubs and rims before I came up with my ideal mix for both projects. Which is to say, it's not just the left-over parts from before the fire, ideas which went nowhere - I'll also have an extra 2 or 3 wheels worth of hubs and rims and shoes etc when I'm done. Never mind the auctions I've lost along the way, on rare Unobtainium parts. Take it from me - THAT'S the stuff that'll really burn you out - when one's reach exceeds one's grasp!
Just yesterday I had a lapse - I was about to pick up a 2nd-hand wheel for the rim, but went to check the identity of the hub, only to come back to eBay and find it was sold. The hub was the Yamaha RD250 disc-braked wire-spoke type rear hub. A total afterthought - whether or not to ask the seller to cut it out and save on shipping - what could have been the ideal rear hub for my DOHC Honda project. Albeit, only fitting WITH a 17mm swingarm. But all the more reason for a custom swingarm. Probably five pounds shaved right off the rear wheel, let's put it THAT way. Ugh.
Hopefully when my hubs and rims all come back ready to lace up, I'll be able to deal with it through hands-on therapy. And I can put my mind towards other thoughts - such as the CB1100R Aluminum gas tanks that have slipped through my fingers due to the excruciatingly slow bank to Pay-Pal transfer process! Argh.
See - if one could just find out exactly what this drum-brake is, one could feel that much more disenchanted with one's own bike! This is just one more way in which BIKE Porn is exactly that - What with the way feminist psychologists blame pornography for lapsed intimacy between older married couples. Just like the way HEmanist psychologists had blamed Harlequin Romance novels for making their wives kinky for civil-war uniforms, lumberjack jackets, kilts, "fluffy pirate shirts" and sundry other anachronistic men's fashion.
Seriously though - You look at too much bike porn and your pride in your own bike withers and dies. Even if you've customized it to the nth degree, there's always the "should'ves" and "could'ves".
Oh, for the day when the bike is finally rolling - I'd like to take this lap-top along for a ride, and watch it slip off the gas tank and smash on the road....
-S.
