Eldorado - taking out the shift slop

[Canuck750]

My 72 Eldorado has to have had one of the the sloppiest shift mechanisms om the planet. There are five points of wear on the left hand shift mechanism on the floor board equipped model, same for others I am guessing. The bike was restored ten years ago long before I got into paying serious attention to little things like this, worn pivots and pins, worn out bushes etc. This fall the Eldorado has gotten some long overdue attention including finally taking out the shift pedal slop.

The main culprit was the pivot pin on the floor board frame rail onto which the pedal rotates, the bush was worn but the pin had been badly worn when I got the bike and I never attempted to fix it.

I started by making a new pivot pin from steel rod, turning the various diameters and threading the M6 x 1 tip



I then cut off the old pin and bore it out of the floor board frame rail





welded in the replacement pin and gave the floor board frame a fresh blast of black powder coat, I made a new thrust bearing out of brass and made a new brass bush for the pedal



On the pedal I drilled out the hole that the shift rod runs through and fitted a brass bush, reamed to suit the rod diameter



The remaining pivots in the mechanism were badly worn out both the pins which measured 6.37 +/- m in diameter and the oblong holes in the shifter arms

I made new pins out of stainless steel rod, turned to 6.96 mm and reamed out the shifter pieces to 7 mm



I have to say the difference is night and day



There are a ridiculous number of joints, rods, pins and arms to connect one's foot action to the back of the transmission.

If your Loop is feeling like is takes a lot of movement to engage a shift, you may want to consider replacing the pins with new larger diameter pieces at a minimum.

Next the brake pedal pivots and pins .....

[nick949]

Very cool Jim. The slop in my Eldo linkages is getting so bad that even I'm beginning to notice. It's one of the things I'm going to address this winter - although without the level of elegance of your repairs.

Stay well.....and if you have fifteen minutes to waste..... https://youtu.be/1EGYYlvG2yQ (Cabot Trail, NS)

Nick

[cliffrod]

Very cool.   Thanks for posting, guys.

[Tom H]

Very very nice job

If you want to get out the last bit, replace the rods ends with heim joints/rod end ball joints and bolt them to the levers. Makes quite a bit of difference if your lever holes are worn.

Tom

[Antietam Classic Cycle]

Another idea to consider... add grease fittings to the pedal and frame.

[Canuck750]

Good tips with the heim joints and grease fitting on the pedal. I have a couple spare heim
Joints in a box, may try them out.

[jacksonracingcomau]

Good tips with the heim joints and grease fitting on the pedal. I have a couple spare heim
Joints in a box, may try them out.

JFDI Jim
You will wonder why you spent time remaking clevis pins
We may joke that our bikes are tractors but clevis pins truly belong on Massey - Furgessons , no place on a gear linkage, over 40 years in the bin here. Even my 5k miles loopy got rose joints before I rode it !

Only one thing better than rose joints is a left hand thread on one and right hand thread on the other, spin rod to vernier adjust, tighten locknuts, maybe not relevant on this bike but with normal levers, adjusting just so for those new boots is a doddle.
Same applies to tie rod on 2LS brakes, no more settling for 020” (half a turn on clevis), you can adjust micro