Yamaha Genesis 120hp engine

Todd- I am amazed watching machinists at work. You guys work with thousandths and repeatedly, wheras I struggle with 64ths. If I get something within a 64th, I am still 0.015 away! That would be a mile with the tolerances you work with. Question.......what is the toughest tolerance you have had to maintain?? Do you ever have to turn a shaft to within a thousanth,,,or even 1/2 of a thousanth?? I subscribe to the Kitplanes magazine, and my favorite section is the monthly section written by Bob, the machinist. The techniques for finding the exact centers, or edge of your material just amazes me, and that is just the simple stuff you guys go through. To me, machinists are in a league all by themselves. Later on in my Helicycle build thread, I am going to ask you a question I am struggling with on my own. I know you would laugh at the process I am struggling with , btw, its a drilling operation, but I am hardwired to try to figure it out on my own, before crying UNCLE. Anyway, you will be the one I will ask after I figure it out the hard way,,, or if I give up and just ask sooner. Todd, keep up the challenging work that amazes this non-machinist. Stan
 
Todd- I am amazed watching machinists at work. You guys work with thousandths and repeatedly, wheras I struggle with 64ths. If I get something within a 64th, I am still 0.015 away! That would be a mile with the tolerances you work with. Question.......what is the toughest tolerance you have had to maintain?? Do you ever have to turn a shaft to within a thousanth,,,or even 1/2 of a thousanth?? I subscribe to the Kitplanes magazine, and my favorite section is the monthly section written by Bob, the machinist. The techniques for finding the exact centers, or edge of your material just amazes me, and that is just the simple stuff you guys go through. To me, machinists are in a league all by themselves. Later on in my Helicycle build thread, I am going to ask you a question I am struggling with on my own. I know you would laugh at the process I am struggling with , btw, its a drilling operation, but I am hardwired to try to figure it out on my own, before crying UNCLE. Anyway, you will be the one I will ask after I figure it out the hard way,,, or if I give up and just ask sooner. Todd, keep up the challenging work that amazes this non-machinist. Stan

Stan,
With the tooling and lathes and mills to day 1or 2 thou is a very easy tolerance to keep, getting below that is out of my area i play with thou, as most of my work is on bigger stuff, mostly your allowed 1 thou either way.
But you working with wood now that is art, wood and me just dont see eye to eye, you cant weld the darn stuff back together again when you screw it up :first::drum:
 
I agree Dennis
Start a thread and show us what you are doing, we would love to see it.
Good chance I will learn something from you as well.
Todd
you got it... as soon as i get my stuff made i will post some pic's..i would love to use your mounting system but on a trike the mast needs to fold down (without tool's) to remove the wing. so i will need to deal with the thrust in a different fashion ...so you see your plans are about 30% applicable for me..so it is just better for me and my machinist to do my own design ....to save time i was going to buy your hub but in order to do that i needed to know if you countersunk the steel plate into the aluminum backing plate..for me to use your hub i would need to mount my backing plate so the clutch bell would be in the same position relative to your hub so that is why i asked the ????'s i am capable of making my own set up so thats what i am going to do ....but i do appreciate all the help ...and i think you have a really nice set up.....im just like you racer ...im a maker not a buyer....dennis : )
 
Dilly, . You are without any doubt going to spend more than the measley 250$, in wasted material and machining time trying to do what stuff that Todd has the detailed information for in his plans. Good luck.
 
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one hand washes the other and both the face

one hand washes the other and both the face

knock –knock .. scuseme, one would like to think this board is for the exchanges of ideas and help your fellow gyro mates,after all there is no invention as such ,just some adaptations were made,no big deal.

raton
 
Dilly, no offense but sounds like your a cheapskate too. You are without any doubt going to spend more than the measley 250$, in wasted material and machining time trying to do what stuff that Todd has the detailed information for in his plans. Good luck.

Ron, I totally understand where Dennis is coming from here, It sounds like he is very talented, I look forward to seeing his work here soon.
To answer your question Dennis the plate is not recessed in any way, just cut your center hole to 3.420 dia and it will fit around on the bottom side of the rear bearing retainer plate leaving the inner shoulder of the bearing plate to fit snugly inside the hole of your re drive plate. This way it guarantees your re drive mounting holes are lined up exactly centered with your crank output shaft and that way there will be no misalignment at all as long as you machined everything exactly equal to the center of the hole you cut out.

Take special care to make sure everything is concentric to the center hole of your plate. The clutch will only tolerate a misalignment of about .0015 at the most.
 
Well I just did it.
I just went the bank and signed the loan papers for a Bridgeport 3 axis CNC milling machine complete with a flood coolant system and CAD/CAM software.

This will allow me to make all my parts much faster than doing them by hand as well as open up doors and possibilities that were previously impossible for me to do.

I will be adding to my line of products as time goes on but let me make one point clear.

My goal is not to take away any work from the other vendors that now supply different products that we now buy, My goal is to fill the voids where needed things are not yet available elsewhere.

Here is what I will be doing.

1. Yamaha re drive kits (will be designing kits for other Yamaha motors as well)
2. Breakaway shoulder harness clamps
3. Universal mast squeeze clamps
4. Air Command full suspension kits
5. Special order part service
(stock RAF CLT upgrade kits) still deciding if this is something I should do.

It is just amazing to me how this crazy idea I had to put a snowmobile motor on my gyro has expanded into this.

Todd
 
Todd,
I wish you the very best of everything in your new venture. Watching the Yamaha engine conversion grow on this forum is fascinating. you are on to a winner!
Paddy
 
Todd,
I wish you the very best of everything in your new venture. Watching the Yamaha engine conversion grow on this forum is fascinating. you are on to a winner!
Paddy

Thank you Padraic, That means a lot coming from someone with your credentials and your fame (Picture of the week winner)
Seriously though, Thank you very much.

P.S.
I am very excited to see what I am going to be aqble to build once I figure out the software, I cannot wait. There will be some cool stuff coming from Airware Inc. in the near future. I guarantee it.
 
Todd Congrats,I think it is cool that in this economy,you have found a nitch that you can do what you enjoy and have already done well enough to get a bank to give you the Loan.
good luck and I can't wait to see what you turn out with that CNC machine. you know you have to post pics of it when you get it. I always wanted a CNC machine my self,even though I probably could never learn how to program it. lol

at one time I looked at retro fit conversions for my 3-in- 1 machine. but never followed thru with it.

who would have ever thought your sled conversion would lead to this.
 
That is great!
Now how about that engine, harness, and guage dealership from Yamaha.
You may have to take a trip.
 
That is great!
Now how about that engine, harness, and guage dealership from Yamaha.
You may have to take a trip.

I wish that could happen.
I checked into the price of buying new crate motors from Yamaha so that way I could offer a brand new option for people with all new components as well as keep up with demand but to my surprise they have stopped selling crate motors to anybody except their service departments and even then they require a return core.

The reason I was told is that there have been many people buying these engines for many different uses other than sleds and it was draining there stock and they were afraid they would not have any left for replacements to honor there warranty work.

Whether this is true or not I do not know but that is what they are saying and bottom line is I simply cannot get new motors from them.

I always keep my eyes open for low mileage sleds for a decent price and usually snatch them up when they become available. I have bought two so far that have had less than 300 miles on them. Sorry guys but this is the best we can hope for at the moment.

Todd
 
Todd- After seeing your work in person at Bensen Days, I am extremely impressed! Your ideas and execution of getting the Yamaha into Rons machine needs a big round of applause. Having Ron Awad demonstrating this new marriage is just simply the best combo for you both. I cant believe the performance that Ron is demonstrating here . He was hauling some serious payloads yesterday and had everyone amazed. I keep hearing all over chatter about this new engine that you helped adapt. Todd, if you were here at Bensen Days tonight at the banquet, I have no doubt you would get a standing ovation for your creative vision and execution of marrying this engine to a gyro. I hope you get so busy with backed up work that you have to employ people to satisfy the new market you have created. One big thank you from me from me to you , and a big thnk you to Ron for creating such excitement down here at Bensen Days. Stan
 
I heard that it is all the rage ! Thanks for something NEW guys !
 
I agree with Stan. It looks like a great engine.

I was impressed with it's performance with a 210 lb pilot and 310 lb passenger. Ron had a lot of people watching that take off.
 
I am so glad that this engine is working out so well and thank you for all for the kudos but I really think Yamaha should get most of the credit here, all I did was figure out how to bolt a re drive to it and attach it to a machine.

Ron also deserves much credit for putting his $$$ where his mouth is by buying and installing the very first Yamaha motor on a gyro that I still have never even seen. All the plumbing and installing the wiring was all Ron's handy work.

I promise there will be even better things coming soon, like Stan I love doing this kind of stuff.

I must say that some of the compliments that I have gotten from some of the people I admire most takes my breath away, not sure I am truly deserving of them but thank you anyway.

Stan, about your comment of hiring people to do this work I will state now that it will never happen. I have had employees in the past and they never do the work to the quality that I demand. they can destroy equipment faster than I can fix it and I found in general I just turned into an adult babysitter. I know there are exceptions to this but they are few and far between and even if I found a good one I could not afford to pay them a halfway decent wage to retain them. My profit margin is low on this stuff to keep the final cost down for the buyer. I want everyone to have the opportunity to afford one of these motors and not just the well off.

Is this the best business plan? Probably not, but my intentions with this motor were to give people an affordable alternative to the Rotax 912 without having to mortgage their house to do it. I believe I have accomplished that goal by being able to offer this power plant at approximately one third the cost of a new 912.

How do I increase production without employees? That is why I just purchased a used Bridgeport mill with CNC Controls. This will make me about 10 times faster than doing the machining by hand.

Thanks again,
Todd
 
We could start a whole other thread on centrifugal cltches. I have one on my (hold your fire!) Hirth.... it def has some advantages but unless the design is significantly different that what I have, there are some issues with these that need to be factored in. For example: there is a zone where the cluth is not fully engaged and it will "chatter'. This chattering is destructive to the clutch in the long run. Also, when you prerotate you need to be careful because in order to be out of the chatter rpms, you need to be above 2800 (on mine), thats getting pretty fast to start prerotating, so I have discovered (after burning a clutch up and also a rotator cable) that a deft hand and tweaks is the best way to get up to speed. It seems like there is a balance or trade off between RPM, clutch health and performance that needs to be learned (and decided upon). The other thing is I travel over bumpy ground to taxi out. I need to roll under 2800 or I am going what I consider dangerously fast.... over rough ground, less rpm is sure to increase the clutch chatter.... so I goose it, coast, goose it coast.... but that of course sacrifices some rudder authority....

like I said, unless the design is different than what I have (weights springs and clutch shoes inside a round drum) there are trade offs to be made.

I'd mention a clutch lockup for that very purpose but I'm just thinking :D

Geez, didn't notice the date on this one :Cry:
J.
 
Wow..talk about instant success on a whim!

Wow..talk about instant success on a whim!

Well,
Read the whole thing, and am amazed at the speed things can grow popular.
Seems the whole community caught someone smoking in a temporary no smoke zone! :D

I take my hat off Racer,:yo:

The fact that you wanted to adapt an engine untried yet, and the fact that you had the stones to just go ahead and do it regardless of whatever may come down the tube, proves to me again that Orville and Wilbur were Wright :D
They did the same thing and had to pioneer and start from scratch again when all the excisting information was inadequate or out dated and plain wrong at times (O.V.Lillienthal,) previous attempts world wide fell short of the mark.
The spinoff business and equipment that came from that included some interesting results like the wind tunnel and other measuring devices. The rest is history :D

They were doubted and ridiculed, cut off and refused untill they went to Europe to finally promote their product out of sheer belief that they had a product worth selling.

You have just done the same thing, in a smaller but equally important way and shown that same spirit of the early Century pioneers in the present as a reminder that perseverance and belief in your own ability pays off.

I believe you have set your footprint down firmly in the history of experimental aricraft building and assuredly by that force of will have made a place for a name in it.
And besides that I think you are a nice guy.

The nice thing about freedom :usa2: is that anyone who desires to do that same thing needs only to have a faith in his own knowledge and ability and be willing to push a little harder against the tide and dead weight.

Dammit where's that medal box! :D

Cheers Buddy and many happy successes,

John.
 
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