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RE: Windy City Weapons - 4thcoast - 12-18-2011 08:08 AM
From the AMA hall of fame.
Born in 1891, Arthur “Connie” Constantine was one of the most preeminent motorcycle engineers of the 1920s. A lifelong motorcyclist and engineer, he was initially employed by the Buick Division of General Motors until 1920, when he was offered the position of assistant chief engineer at The Harley-Davidson Motor Company. His resume included work on many chassis and engine development projects, including Harley-Davidson’s potent eight-valve racing engine.
While in Harley-Davidson’s employ, Constantine worked on an unauthorized design project for a new mid-sized V-twin engine that could compete against rival Indian’s famous Scout. However, his design was condemned by Harley leadership in 1924 as a “waste of valuable company time.” As a result, Constantine left Harley-Davidson shortly thereafter.
With his design work in hand, Constantine approached Excelsior with his concept for a unit-construction motor, one in which the engine and transmission shared the same crankcase. Unveiled in 1925 as the 45-cubic-inch Excelsior Super-X, the new motorcycle became an astounding success both in the showroom and on the track.
Constantine’s best work would result in one of the finest four-cylinder motorcycles ever to grace the roads. Excelsior also owned Henderson, and Constantine reviewed the famous Henderson DeLuxe motorcycle. He came to the conclusion that a radical redesign was the only course of action that would improve the machine. His masterpiece, the Streamline Henderson KJ, was unveiled in March 1929. The motorcycle boasted 57 new features and developed 40 horsepower at 4,000 rpm. The motor design reverted back to the overhead intake valve arrangement, but incorporated a five-bearing crankshaft, improved pressurized oiling and a down-draft intake manifold. The chassis positioned the saddle lower, and used streamlined saddle tanks. The motorcycle was guaranteed to hit 100 mph.
In the late 1940s, Indian Motorcycle Company retained Constantine as a consultant on the development of the new Indian Arrow and Warrior models. He was subsequently hired as chief engineer and vice president of Indian.
Constantine died in 1973. He was inducted into the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame in 1998.
RE: Windy City Weapons - gww - 12-18-2011 08:18 AM
I would like to think that Schwinn's shop foremen are smiling somewhere.
if thats how it works, i m sure they are.. lots of time in just the set up.. thanks for sharing.
RE: Windy City Weapons - 4thcoast - 12-19-2011 11:06 PM
Hey, Westfall, better get to your sewing machine - this is not going to be cheap. New caps 6061- T6 aircraft stuff. Franco, nothing but the best for you man. The new caps are in place and being shot down the center with an over bore that is going to increase the main bearing area to help with shedding the heat and sealing the oil pressure. The kid took over; homework and hockey are done. You can sweep up, Dad, I got it through to the last one. Cut it on the #’s, Loring, this one is headed for Fisherman’s Warf. If you look close at the picture you will see that the #3 main bearing cap (large one at the end of the case) will show a ghost of where it did not clean up. The clutch drive hub rides on the tail of the crank shaft and needs to be in the same axis as the crankshaft. I always correct this misalignment. In Constantine’s letters, he mentions when things are as they should be. Connie, they are now, and it is going to get better. One of the most vexing issues with restoring four cylinders is making sure the complex gear relationships that exist throughout the motor are correct. This is none more critical than in the back of the engine where the crankshaft turns all that under square long rod torque 90 degrees to the transmission main shaft. Hendersons, since day one, have always employed a threaded transmission main shaft bearing system. This is great in theory and excellent in practice if you have a set of nice original matched cases that have not been broken. Guess what folks, those days are over and those bikes are locked up in private collections collecting dust never to do anything except to ease some dude’s ego and compliment his portfolio. We are now working with the scraps of what’s left for Henderson parts and that’s fine by me. Hey, I heard the Packer’s lost… Hmm….. I did not see the game.
This one beat me up for a while and for a while I fumbled around on how I was going to perform this repair to multiple engine cases with a high degree of accuracy. The Cannonball forced me to sit down and design a system, and work with some great tool and die people to solve the hardest part of the broken Henderson case scenario. These engines will be better than when they were set up at the factory. I wonder how many Hen’s are out there waiting for this fix. I took my sweet time indicating in this one guys, you know it took 30 hours to get the cases to this point of repair and if you screw this up, you wreck it all. I was nervous. I should build “Twins.” I think you need a hone or something. Yes, people have welded and rethreaded the transmission main shaft area before, but to turn the corner and bore and thread the main shaft 90 degrees and in co-axiality to the crankshaft? The system we came up with insures that I have perfect geometry throughout the engine. I get to perform this little Trist three more times for the Wolfpack bikes. That’s what is great about the Cannonball - those broken Henderson cases would have sat for another 30 years with guys at swap meets saying, all you have to do is…… DONE !
WOLF PACK RISING
[attachment=528]
(12-19-2011 11:06 PM)4thcoast Wrote: Hey, Westfall, better get to your sewing machine - this is not going to be cheap. New caps 6061- T6 aircraft stuff. Franco, nothing but the best for you man. The new caps are in place and being shot down the center with an over bore that is going to increase the main bearing area to help with shedding the heat and sealing the oil pressure. The kid took over; homework and hockey are done. You can sweep up, Dad, I got it through to the last one. Cut it on the #’s, Loring, this one is headed for Fisherman’s Warf. If you look close at the picture you will see that the #3 main bearing cap (large one at the end of the case) will show a ghost of where it did not clean up. The clutch drive hub rides on the tail of the crank shaft and needs to be in the same axis as the crankshaft. I always correct this misalignment. In Constantine’s letters, he mentions when things are as they should be. Connie, they are now, and it is going to get better. One of the most vexing issues with restoring four cylinders is making sure the complex gear relationships that exist throughout the motor are correct. This is none more critical than in the back of the engine where the crankshaft turns all that under square long rod torque 90 degrees to the transmission main shaft. Hendersons, since day one, have always employed a threaded transmission main shaft bearing system. This is great in theory and excellent in practice if you have a set of nice original matched cases that have not been broken. Guess what folks, those days are over and those bikes are locked up in private collections collecting dust never to do anything except to ease some dude’s ego and compliment his portfolio. We are now working with the scraps of what’s left for Henderson parts and that’s fine by me. Hey, I heard the Packer’s lost… Hmm….. I did not see the game.
This one beat me up for a while and for a while I fumbled around on how I was going to perform this repair to multiple engine cases with a high degree of accuracy. The Cannonball forced me to sit down and design a system, and work with some great tool and die people to solve the hardest part of the broken Henderson case scenario. These engines will be better than when they were set up at the factory. I wonder how many Hen’s are out there waiting for this fix. I took my sweet time indicating in this one guys, you know it took 30 hours to get the cases to this point of repair and if you screw this up, you wreck it all. I was nervous. I should build “Twins.” I think you need a hone or something. Yes, people have welded and rethreaded the transmission main shaft area before, but to turn the corner and bore and thread the main shaft 90 degrees and in co-axiality to the crankshaft? The system we came up with insures that I have perfect geometry throughout the engine. I get to perform this little Trist three more times for the Wolfpack bikes. That’s what is great about the Cannonball - those broken Henderson cases would have sat for another 30 years with guys at swap meets saying, all you have to do is…… DONE !
WOLF PACK RISING
More shots of the madness.
Last shot of Line-Tap system. I am stoked.
RE: Windy City Weapons - cory - 12-20-2011 01:00 AM
Man, this is one great thread!!! Thanks for taking us along through this procedure. There's some awesome work being done there!!! I'd watch out everyone, Hendersons might be the ones to beat!!!
RE: Windy City Weapons - Tom Lovejoy - 12-21-2011 12:19 AM
Very impressive stuff, wish you all the best in your efforts. I hope to ride out and watch you guys roar by again and if I git to see the Wolf pack roar by, that will make the trip worth it right there, right on Henderson!
RE: Windy City Weapons - 4thcoast - 12-21-2011 07:41 AM
(12-21-2011 12:19 AM)Tom Lovejoy Wrote: Very impressive stuff, wish you all the best in your efforts. I hope to ride out and watch you guys roar by again and if I git to see the Wolf pack roar by, that will make the trip worth it right there, right on Henderson!
Thanks Tom
You Henderon boys keep me going. It a crazy stunt we are trying to pull off here. All those Henderson's running down the road together. Odds are we will never see this again. It is so cool it is taking place in 2012 year of the Henderson. You can see Indians and HDs but this will be very special. Pick your spots on the route folks the Schwinns are coming. Lonnie's cannonball is bringing out the chicago iron. I wish there were more Excelsiors on the ride these are great bikes also. Not one Super X on the run that's a shame.
RE: Windy City Weapons - 4thcoast - 12-25-2011 03:24 PM
Merry-Christmas everyone from the Wolf Pack. It is snow globe perfect here in then Saint Lawrence River valley. I am going to post some pics of the Bramwell ( # 31) KJ engines. That’s right, two of them. This was not by choice, though. When Lonnie got the Cannonball rolling again, we thought all Hendersons would be allowed in to the fray, even the bikes made after 29. Records indicate that there were only 18 months of Henderson KJ (streamliner) production. The Cannonball has got people revved up from all over the globe. Some of the Milwaukee boys heard about the Hen exemption and began to ask if VLs cast in 29 could make the show. Then there was some “Buzz” whether or not 30 and 31 101 Indian scouts could go, then Decker signed on to do the trophy. Cannonball 2012 was picking up speed and people wanted in. I am sure this put Lonnie in a hell of a spot. He would draw a line - 1929 would be the cut date for all Cannonball bikes, even though 2012 was the 100th anniversary of Henderson and it would knock out potentially 2/3rds of the KJ candidates. Harley enthusiast #1 Joe Gardella would email me and though he did not come out and say it, he came about as close as a HD man could in saying the Pack had gotten the shaft by way of the sheer enthusiasm of the event .
This would not be the first time a cruel twist of fate would sideline the streamliners. In 1929, the stock market crash and the resulting Great Depression caused motorcycle sales to plummet. The summer of 1931 saw Schwinn call his department heads together for a meeting at Excelsior Henderson. He bluntly told them, with no prior indication, “Gentlemen, today we stop.” Schwinn felt that the Depression could easily continue for eight years, and even worsen. Despite a full order book, he had chosen to pare back his business commitments to the core business of bicycle manufacture. All motorcycle operations at Excelsior ended by September 1931 (Wikipedia).
This knocked the Bramwell entry out after all the work we had put in to get it going. Check out the pictures. The crankcase has to be 29 Lonnie bluntly told me. For a couple of days I didn’t know what we were going to do. Most people would have rolled over. Then I got the phone call. I don’t care how you do it, find 29 engine cases and transfer the guts of everything from the 31 to the 29, said Byrne. I started looking and ringing phones. Then I remembered fellow Cannonballer and Wolfpack member Doug Feinsod. He had said he had a blitzed KJ upper a few years back. I called the West Coast and explained Byrne’s situation. Doug said the case was burried in his parts stash and he would dig it out. An hour and a half later, Doug called. “May 22, 1929. It’s got some carnage but I think you guys can save it.” Now I needed an oil pan. I remembered one that had come to me in a large parts stash I had picked up. I hadn’t thought about that pan for a couple of years. Up to the barn attic I went for the 3/15/29 pan. There is an upper in California and a pan in my hand. KJ stuff never comes up, but we have our foundation. Then a gift. Doing the typical ebay thing, a gorgeous front section upper case appeared located in Minnesota. The seller was rounding up money for the Leroy Hartung auction and had decided to let this beautiful upper cut off go. We secured the case and all the pieces were in place. My buddy Matt laid down the sweet welds you are about to see. He cares for Milwaukee stuff about as much as I do especially VLs right about now. My welding oven and Tig welder have been on overdrive as of late that and the rhythmic hum of the three phase machine shop tools. Wolf pack Rising.
# 31 wont be riding a 31 it will be a 29. The non painted case is the perfect 31 that cant be used. All the better not Vl in sight.
Its all 29 now the first shot is of the 31 we will not use. You can always find a way to make it work when you are involved with the Cannonball.
Now we are almost back to where we were. I think Byrne is the lone Canadian on the run. Lonnie how many countries do we have now ?
RE: Windy City Weapons - jurassic - 12-25-2011 07:58 PM
thanks mark, i'm really loving this thread. i hadn't realized bryne was so serious. the pack endures.
not sure how many countries are in, lets see
france is in on a KJ
sweden is sending over that sweet husqy, and possibly a JD
canada
germany
south africa
ireland has one possibly two
england has four riders
australia brings a JAP powered harley
poland on an indian four is on the waiting list and anxiously waiting
holland is on the fence, but on the list
italy hasn't gotten back to me
RE: Windy City Weapons - 4thcoast - 12-31-2011 10:10 PM
2012 Year of the Henderson.[/i]
RE: Windy City Weapons - jurassic - 02-20-2012 07:27 PM