Herbert Wagner and Patrick meanderings, 2008

Production K Models

Re: Herbert Wagner and Patrick meanderings, 2008

Postby EKHKHK56 » Sun Mar 19, 2017 5:39 pm

Very interesting Patrick! Thank you very much for sharing this information. Really great :)
User avatar
EKHKHK56
 
Posts: 920
Joined: Fri Apr 18, 2014 5:20 am
Location: Fairbanks, Alaska USA

Re: Herbert Wagner and Patrick meanderings, 2008

Postby sportsterpaul » Sun Mar 19, 2017 8:04 pm

Yes Patrick, fantastic thread, thanks for all the hard work.

As to the trapdoor timing, it would not surprise me that Harley started with a trapdoor on a KL, and when they went into production with the K, they took it out to reduce the cost, only to add it back two years later when everybody complained about having to split the cases to work on the tranny.

Same for the cast-iron head on the Sportster, I am sure it was cheaper than an aluminum head. As to the cast iron head being squatter and fitting under the K frame with a minor modification-- I have to believe an aluminum head could be made to the overall dimensions of the cast iron one. The XL heads are squat in part because of the 90 degrees between the valves. So any modern head would be taller because the valves would be more vertical. Don't forget that a set of Thunderheads fits on an Iron Sportster just fine, and I am pretty sure you can get the heads off without removing the engine from the frame. I even have a set of 900cc thunderheads, and they supposedly fit in a stock XL frame. So I suspect the cast iron heads were due to risk and cost, not structure. This ties into what Hennessy has said about how strapped for cash the Factory was in the 1950s. If they had spent all their money on the KL, then I could see them doing whatever took the least capital expenditure to get the K and the Sportster out.

Also that Herb did not seem aware of the race programs supports what Jerry Branch told me, that the production and race groups didn't have any respect for each other. Its a shame, as you have taught me, the race guys were doing great things.
sportsterpaul
 
Posts: 240
Joined: Mon Jul 06, 2015 2:17 am
Location: Sun City Center, Florida

Re: Herbert Wagner and Patrick meanderings, 2008

Postby sportsterpaul » Mon Mar 20, 2017 7:34 pm

I have been mesmerized looking at the photo in the first post as well as the whole bike on Patrick's site:
http://www.harleykrxlrtt.com/images/0p-1953-kl-exp.jpg

Is it my imagination or is the front cylinder offset to the rider's left? So that would mean no forked rods, but side-by-side, which might also mean offset crankpins like the old 60-degree Buicks had.

I am confident the generator and camshaft were chain drive, it makes sense since cars were doing it I think. I wondered about that big hollow boss between the crank hoke and the cam hole. While the picture on Patrick's site is a little washed out, the picture on page 9 of the Harley Davidson Sportster Performance Handbook by Buzzelli shows a slotted plug in the cam cover. So I am pretty confident that hollow boss is how you see the timing mark.

I am not sure what the square hollow boss is below the generator opening. Maybe its some snazzy version of the camcase vent, but then again, it wouldn't be so low. Maybe drain oil out of the generator?

The oil pump would have to be very similar to a K/Sportster pump, gear-driven off the crank pinion shaft. You could see how it would spray oil on the chains as the timed breather opened. The square recess is obviously supposed to have a screen in it, and then oil drains down to the lower chamber where the pump can scavenge it back to the tank.

The picture in the book sure makes it look like the sprocket cover and camcase cover are one big piece. Patrick's picture has a tiny little line that would make the sprocket cover separate and near identical to a K/Sportster cover.

I wondered where the ignition was. It has to drive off the camshaft, so it is likely on the back side, the left side of the bike. That make me wonder if they tried the infernal cone setup way back in the 1950s, and that was likely another development problem since flyweights don't work right when subject to the acceleration of gravity, that's why Chevy and everyone else stand the distributor upright so the flyweights are horizontal.

Its fun to think the K-frame was really an KL frame that they stuffed the K into after the KL was killed. Thing is, Buzzelli book quotes Harley Chief engineer Spexarth saying he priced out the XL vs the K, and the KL cost "considerably less". So it sounds like the K was planned and a done deal and the KL was intended to be the XL. The book also gives a race justification for introducing a side-valve K. They didn't want to make a 500cc OHV to go against the brits, so a 45CID (737cc) side-valve would differentiate the bikes. After all the VL and W models were highly successful. I have a pal that says the 80CID UL flathead is better than a Panhead. It sounds like Harley wanted to make an OHV (they built an experimental W OHV) and they hoped the KL could replace if the K, if only for a cost reduction. But when the KL faltered, after costing so much money, they slapped iron heads on a K to make an XL. The book notes that Harley had even ordered production tooling for the KL, it was, as we used to call it at GMC, "Prime Program". As to cast iron heads, the book points out all the problems with the early Panheads, and how cast iron ELs were less hassle to develop. So the cast iron was both a cost reduction and a risk reduction.

So now this raises the question if the KL was a 500cc bike that could race flat track. Or maybe they figured to de-stroke it for racing like they do the XL engine. In any event, I sure hope they kept the drawings at the factory, it would be great to see exactly what they were doing.

Back when I had more AutoCAD than sense, I did some studies of stuffing a 60-degree engine into a Sportster frame. One had conventional Sportster valve train but 3-valve heads.
Engine-4_checkplot_sfw.jpg
Engine-4_checkplot_sfw.jpg (76.51 KiB) Viewed 24230 times

Another study put a single cam between the cylinders like the KL.
ENGINE1_sfw.jpg
ENGINE1_sfw.jpg (50.03 KiB) Viewed 24230 times

Yet another study with the cam way high and one rocker box for both cylinders. Plan was to hard-bolt the rocker box to one head, and let it is slide a bit on the other head as thermal expansion made the jugs taller.
1996-01-17_High-cam-check-plot_sfw.jpg
1996-01-17_High-cam-check-plot_sfw.jpg (60.56 KiB) Viewed 24230 times


Speaking of Harley development and 60-degree engines, here is a Discovery Channel documentary about the Birth of the V Rod.
https://youtu.be/GpsGwZWvMf0
sportsterpaul
 
Posts: 240
Joined: Mon Jul 06, 2015 2:17 am
Location: Sun City Center, Florida

Re: Herbert Wagner and Patrick meanderings, 2008

Postby mikeslemmon » Mon Mar 20, 2017 9:12 pm

flyweights work on sprints and BSA. the left side has the twin DC linkerts and primary so maybe the points are on the end of the cam .under the end cover that would not require any extra gears did it have rod beari.ngs like a n English motor ? sportster rods are RPM challenged at about 7200 possibly the KL would turn a bit more speaking of challenged so is my typing ability
mikeslemmon
 
Posts: 144
Joined: Sat May 24, 2014 11:36 am

Re: Herbert Wagner and Patrick meanderings, 2008

Postby sportsterpaul » Wed Mar 22, 2017 7:54 pm

I found the part 2 of the Herbert Wagner article on the Wayback machine:
https://web.archive.org/web/20080514034 ... tster.html

Unfortunately no pictures. Not sure if Herb is still around but will write to the emails on his website:
http://atthecreation.com/

I asked the AMCA where the articles went and apparently they went poof:
http://www.antiquemotorcycle.org/bboard ... post162327
sportsterpaul
 
Posts: 240
Joined: Mon Jul 06, 2015 2:17 am
Location: Sun City Center, Florida

Re: Herbert Wagner and Patrick meanderings, 2008

Postby BreakerJo » Thu Apr 20, 2023 1:25 am

Great stuff! Thanks for sharing.

Fletch
BreakerJo
 
Posts: 6
Joined: Tue Feb 15, 2022 10:09 pm

Previous

Return to K, KK, KH, KHK

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 17 guests

cron