Now 3 weeks into my Norton Commando ownership i have had my first Slight disaster (if you don't count the kickstart crippling me for a few days as disater!).
Having pretty much recovered from my kickstart muscle injury, i had got a few miles done last weekend and was getting pretty used to the bike and feeling comfortable on it. Really loving everything about the bike and whilst not like a modern bike was pretty impressed that they do actually handle pretty well and are quite nimble and can really chuck em about quite well.
I did however discover the point at which you run out of ground clearance on lhs of bike hearing a bit of a scrape,didn't really think much more about it and assumed it would be the centre stand.
Today as it had stopped raining i thought i would nip out for a little bimble.Got home got inside gate and put it on side stand and went to shut gate.I turned round to see the bike fall over! Absolutely gutted!! i picked it up to discover the side stand had fallen off, it looks like the nut and bolt had ground down and this was cause.
Is this the first point to hit down when cornering? cant think why else it was chamfered or why stand would fall off
It looks as though i was very lucky(though it was pretty dark so not 100% sure) and very limited damage.bike landed on end of handlebar(which i think is still straight) and footpeg which snapped but cant see any damage anywhere else.
The bolt also needs to be hi…
The bolt also needs to be hi tensile as well as the nut being on top, I use a Hi tensile allen bolt with a nyloc nut, then I can adjust the nut tightness so the sidestand moves freely with the free play at its lowest. Can't remember the grade of bolt, it will be 8.8 or 12.9, stainless bolts are not for this application no matter how pretty they look.
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Been away till today so hadn…
Been away till today so hadn't seen replies. Nyloc seems sensible to make sure it doesn't come loose again. Cheers All
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The nut should be on top....the spring lug on the sidestand is usually more vulnerable if solo.
Laden and with a passenger, it is the centrestand foot tang which scrapes.
Factory production racers had the engine raised slightly at the front and moved to the right as the primary chaincase was the limiting factor.