Split lip

 When I took the nose off to fit the new throttle cable, I noticed it was in quite a state underneath :

Having seen a FB post of someone who had fitted a splitter (for aesthetic reasons), I realised that a splitter stretching the full size of the nose might look good and prevent further damage. 

Now, the other guy had paid someone to make his splitter but that's not for miserly me. The tricky bit was the rolled edge that a splitter really needed. I'd never done something like that but after watching a YT video, how hard could it be? 

Actually, it wasn't too bad; took me a few hours of gentle hammering using my vice and various metal bits as an anvil and it was done. Don't get me wrong, look closely and it's rubbish but from a distance, perfectly acceptable:

Then a few coats of primer, black paint and lacquer:

Bolted to the nose and it looks ok:

Quite proud of my new blacksmith skills. 

Went out for a drive to test out the new throttle and, as I predicted, at slow speeds, its a bit jerkier BUT the rest of the time, it's awesome - Zedster feels so much faster, I guess because I'm effectively revving harder than before? 

Decided to brave Rykas cafe at Box Hill (I was hungry), a well known biker hangout - don't think anyone noticed me 😏

 

Return of the Loud Pedal

 So GBS delivered the cable and shortened throttle kit in quick time. The new pedal is identical except for the location of the fulcrum:

Fitting the new cable was relatively painless but the throttle kit was annoying. It should have been easy really but little things ruined it. I had to take the damn thing off and on again about 5 times; the hole at the top needed to be drilled out bigger to fit the cleavis GBS supplied (why isn't it the right size?), the throttle stop bolt was impossible for my chunky fingers to get in once the pedal was in; the extra hole needed couldn't be drilled with the pedal in etc, etc. 

However, once it was finally done, it is superb; really solid and a huge improvement on the old one (along with the extra plate I added to the pedal box) :

The one weakness in the supplied throttle cable is the way GBS expect you to just wrap the cable around the square edge of the clasp that goes in the top of the pedal. It was that bad design which caused my first throttle cable to snap after just 4k miles. At some point in the past, I bought a set of metal cable bits, which included a U-shaped channeled piece which allows the cable to loop round in a neat, unstressed way (difficult to explain - hopefully the pics below make it clear) :

I'm so pleased with this job; a massive improvement over previous attempts and hopefully it will last much longer. 

I used the Emerald software to recalibrate the TPS positions (although iit shouldn't have changed) and a quick test start proved it all worked well. 

Strangely, I have had a burst of creative ideas recently. The underneath of the nose is scratched to pieces, so I've bought a new sheet of ally and I'm going to make a small splitter; really just a sheet sticking out the front an inch or 2, sprayed black and with a slightly rolled edge. Apart from looking good, it should prevent any further damage to the underside of the nose.

I've also started planning how to make a glove box in the free space of my dash and I bought this cheap unit which is just stuck on the bulkhead between the seats:

It may fall off in a week but if not, it helps to keep odds and ends rolling around the passenger footwell.

Spring is on its way and Zedster is looking gooood... 

Snap to it

 With another sunny but cold day beckoning, I popped out for a short run with my son in his car. All going well until - PING - there goes my throttle cable again!

Luckily, I was able to roll to a convenient layby where my son then watched some quality Heath Robinson jiggery-pokery to lash up a new cable using a bicycle brake cable I keep for just this sort of emergency. I managed to limp home and I've ordered a new cable from GBS.

I have also decided to buy their short throw throttle conversion kit - basically, a new pedal with the fulcrum a few inches lower than the standard pedal. This means a shorter movement of the pedal for the same effect, which actually doesn't sound great to me because I imagine at slow speeds, that might be quite jerky?

However, the advantage of this kit is that it includes a solid steel bracket with built-in throttle stops in both directions. So the pedal should be firmer (mine has always been a bit wobbly) but, more importantly, I won't be stressing the cable as much when I go for full throttle, which is probably what has contributed to it's short life.

In a way, I'm quite glad this has happened - I've always worried about the strength of my throttle setup; this has given me an excuse to improve it. There is a YT video from GBS showing how to install this kit and I noticed that they have also strengthened the pedal box using an extra plate, which makes a lot of sense. With my existing setup, you can see the walls of the pedal box bending every time the throttle is moved, so I'll be adding that same plate.

Before the cable went, my son caught me on his dashcam attempting some feeble power slide - it felt much more impressive from my point-of-view (and you may well agree with my son's comment on the video):