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[Norm]

We had a bad Club ride today with 2 members crashing only a few ks apart on the same bit of road I busted my leg up on 18 months ago. I think we will give this road a miss in the future.After the first crash we had only just got going again and the second incident happened. One member who hit a dog was hurt fairly badly and is in hospital, the other uninjured, but the reason I mention it is because I fitted a disc brake to this Bullet a few months ago and the fork leg has snapped completely off. Hard to know if the fork snapped and caused him to crash or the fork snapped as a result of the crash. Front wheel looks fine and shows no sign of impact and I looked everywhere around where the bike was laying and I could see no impact site where the wheel may have hit, it looked like the bike had just slid off the road, bent the footpeg and busted the headlight. I asked him if he was using the brake at the time and he said he was but didn't think he grabbed it too hard, he put it down to inexperience and a difficult corner to negotiate and as he had not ridden that road before,it has a lot of nasty corners that will catch you out so easily, trust me I know and I have ridden that road for years and have the scars to prove it. Worst part was the ride was to a small country town for the Blessing of the Bikes ceremony

[simon]

Sad new Norm. I'm disturbed to hear of a snapping fork leg! I've dealt with a couple of front end crash bikes recently. Both bike had their forks bent right under the bike but neither showed any sign of embrittlement or cracking. It make one wonder what materials have been used in manufacture and whether they have made some inappropriate changes to the metallurgy. What year and model was the machine?

[Scalyback]

[center]


Sorry to hear about the road to motorcycle hell, hope the bikes and riders all recover ok!



Maybe worth putting these up mate?

[Norm]

Hi Simon it is a 2000 model Bullet and there was a pic on the internet of one broken in exactly the same place but that one was in India and I assumed that rough roads were the cause. Where this has broken is directly above the stiffening section on the leg and the alloy looks like Swiss cheese in there. On another note another mate hit a car on his 2008 Triumph Scrambler a couple off weeks ago and the front brake lever has bent completely 180 degrees back on itself and the ball is still on the end proving it is a beautiful piece of ally because everything else I have seen snaps the ball off at the slightest sign of a drop. I wonder if MrH could get a decent left lower slider made for Bullets that have been fitted with a disc brake on them. While typing this I just thought about the Carberrys that have been fitted with a disc. A leg with the strengthening rib going up to where the slider cover came down to would be a lot safer

[Adrian]

An independent Enfield specialist I know refuses to do disk brake conversions using the original drum brake fork sliders, only the "proper" disk brake sliders, think Electra-X (sorry Norm, didn't mean to use offensive language!). He reckons the drum brake slider isn't strong enough. QED. If you really want the old-style mudguard stays with a disk brake then a set of **EARLY** C5 or B5 UCE/EFI forks with the 35mm stanchions and external threaded section on top will fit, according to our hosts. They list the Cafe Racer alloy top yoke as fitting these forks as well as the AVL and classic Bullet types. The sliders on there have definitely been beefed up a bit.

[Leon Novello]

Hi Norm: Sorry to hear the bad news. My Bullet is a 2000 classic, this is making me nervous.

[Norm]

Adrian from memory the picture of the broken leg on the wall at Rideaway Triumph is an Electra leg and the front wheel on that one looks unmarked as well. Doubt I will ever ride an Indian Enfield ever again.
Thanks Leon, just got home from the Hospital and for a 75 year old he is doing very well all considered.

[sofiaspin]

As the TLS front brake is so shite I rely on forward planning, gear changes and the back brake. That does not account for the unexpected such as your friends nasty incident and sorry to hear that. Retro fitting a disc to an earlier classic bullet - is that wise? Don't know, just asking. All sorts of things from the road surface to a hairline fracture already in the fork leg........but the 'inexperienced rider' bit stands out for me and perhaps he was caning it a bit, and couple with some or more of the above resulting in an off. Hope they recover and you get to the bottom of it.

[Norm]

Sofia, over the years I have fitted a number of disc brakes to the early legs but on seeing the crap ally used in these legs I won't be riding an Indian Bullet again, just a complete pile of crap.The bloke who crashed is a young cop and there is no way he would even think of caning it, we were all riding along gently, I think there was 12 of us in the group and the max speed we would have been achieving would be about 80kph.Anyway my concern now is the 12 Carberrys that were built with disc front ends

[simon]

I mentioned before the huge blow holes in the timing cover casting on my 91 350 which I filled with filings and super glue. It would appear that the metallurgy isn't up to the standard required so perhaps an opportunity for our hosts?