Bultaco

I can officially scratch rearsets off my punch list. Words cannot express what relief and satisfaction I am feeling right now. I would call these the “beauty shots,” but associating the word … Rearsets finished!Read more

After letting this shift shaft cause me bunch of unnecessary headaches — playing around with all sorts of solutions such as split bushings, pinned joints, and the like — I finally decided … Welded cross-shaftRead more

This morning before work, I made up the clevis for the right-side shift linkage out of 6061-T6511 alloy 3/4″ square bar stock. The upper end is attached to the Bultaco shift lever … Shift clevis fabricationRead more

My crossover shifter dilemma is not unique. Back in 1975, when new Federal regs required left-side shifting, a lot of small foreign manufacturers had to scramble to adapt their existing bikes to … Other crossover gearshiftsRead more

It turns out my bolted-up cross-shaft design was fundamentally flawed. My father-in-law was a research chemist, and one of his favorite aphorisms was, “In theory, there’s no difference between theory and practice. … Cross-shaft goes kaputRead more

I used an old, scrap brake rod to mock-up the linkage between the lower arm and the stub of an original Bultaco shifter. This is just a quickie proof-of-concept. The real component … Shift linkage progressRead more

Playing around with the shift linkage some more, I’ve decided to go back to how I had configured it originally—with the bearing mounted to the inside surface of the plate and the … Foot pedal tweaksRead more

For my crossover linkage, I needed to create a rotating shaft with splined ends. This is not as easy as it seems, because cutting splines is obviously beyond my abilities. I’d purchased … Gearshift cross-shaft fabricationRead more

I’m working on the shift linkage, which is (of course) way more complicated than you’d expect—because Bultakenstein. A late Bultaco engine’s shift shaft has spined ends exiting both sides of the crankcase, … Rivnuts are my new favorite thing.Read more

In keeping with my “do a little something every day” approach, I went down to the basement before work and made up a couple of little brackets to mount the front fender. … Fender bracketsRead more