Quote from tvking63 on December 22, 2011, 12:02 pm

@Daryl Martel Unless there is a problem with your existing hub, it doesn't look like need a new one. From what I can see in your pictures, your hub has the welded on collar that has threaded holes. The rotor that DMC can supply bolts to that collar. The caliper is going to be more of a pain. If you read this thread I detail my quest for adding brakes to my CSC.

Here's a quick recap..... It looks like you have mounts for the F04 caliper which is no longer made by Brembo and after extensive searching, I was unable to find anyone making a replacement. You'll probably need to cut off the existing mounts and order a P32F Brembo caliper ,which is used on later CSC's, and universal bracket from DMC and have your TIG welder weld the new bracket on the swing arm in a place that the new caliper will clear the body. I haven't welded mine on yet but it looks like it might be at the 9 o'clock position. If that's the case, I probably wouldn't have needed to remove the original mounts, but it looks clear w/o them.

Quote from jaydmc on December 22, 2011, 12:07 pm

The hub was a standard trailer hub that they welded a ring to the back side of. If a person wanted to go this route the only hissue is finding hubs that are cast steel rather then cast iron. You would still need to make sure that the spacing is correct. The rotor is an obscure at least in the USA Citoren car that was never imported into the USA. We have the rotors as these are the rotors we use. Rather then welding a ring onto a stock hub and then having to machine it to work, we make our own hubs from scratch however I am sure our off sets are different. The early CSC brake calipars were Brembo FO4 calipars, we have not been able to get these in years. The later Brembo calipars we stock. We also stock pads for both early and late. To identify which you have the FO4 brake pads were held in with 2 pins, the current uses a single pin. The manifacture of the acturators has changed hands a couple of times but can still be ordered in. We no longer use these as our design uses a more expensive more reliable acutuator however our supplier can order them in. The steel parts in the electric trim system CSC built in house.
Jay G
DMC sidecars
www.dmcsidecars.com
866-638-1793

Quote from Guest on December 22, 2011, 12:30 pm

Yeah, Jay is definitely the man to know for all things sidecar...(I'm not affiliated with DMC), because he actually takes time to answer questions and get you squared away.

Back to the electric lean...Daryl or Mike, could you give me the length and width and thickness of the steel links attaching the acutator to the top of the frame post? Also, bolt center to bolt center distance would be great. That part looks pretty easy to build...just looks like welded steel and a round threaded rod to attach a Heim joint to. I am a pretty competent DIYer with a lathe/mill/welder and can make that pretty easily. I figure while it's winter and I have my car off the frame for fixing/repainting, I might as well work on the frame and brake system.

I am doing a separate master cylinder with brake pedal for the car. That way there is no splicing into the bike and I won't have to bleed either brake system except once a year during annual maintenance. Looking forward to learning how to make quick right hand turns with the sidecar brake. Should be fun learning how to feather the brakes... 🙂

Quote from SidecarMike on December 22, 2011, 12:39 pm

dwitgoldwing - 12/22/2011 11:30 AM Yeah, Jay is definitely the man to know for all things sidecar...(I'm not affiliated with DMC), because he actually takes time to answer questions and get you squared away. Back to the electric lean...Daryl or Mike, could you give me the length and width and thickness of the steel links attaching the acutator to the top of the frame post? Also, bolt center to bolt center distance would be great. ...:)

I'll defer to Daryl on this, as mine is on the road. His is disassembled and will be much easier to measure.

I concur with your comments on Jay and Barry as well. They have given me a lot of help and great advice in the past. And let's not forget Lonnie (Hack'n) as well.

They all add a lot to our experience here.

Quote from tvking63 on December 22, 2011, 12:44 pm

@dwitgoldwing Make sure that there is enough clearance for the tilt/pivot mechanism. My FS l has the hole in the frame for the actuator mount, but I'm pretty sure there is not enough room between the tub and frame to mount the pivot.

Quote from Guest on December 22, 2011, 3:39 pm

tvking63 & dwitgoldwing - the beauty about the tubs is they are fibreglas, so easily repairable... or relatively easy to modify, if you're handy with working with fibreglas & polyester resin. Shouldn't be too much work to cut away/relieve where the tub contacts (gets in the way) and then lay up a fibreglas bubble to enclose it again.

dwitgoldwing - I just took a bunch of close-up pics of the actuator pivot mechanism for you. The distance bolt centre to centre is 5 1/4". I put a machinists ruler beside so you can scale appropriately. Shoot me an e-mail & I'll send you full resolution pics. The site auto scales the resolution down - my actual pics are much clearer.

I'm attaching a good crisp pic of the back of the wheel hub assembly. I don't see where a rotor would attach - am I missing something? Also, note in the 1 pic I found some hard rubber donuts to use as spacers between the tub & frame - they are 1 3/4" dia rubber cups you use as floor protectors for under furniture legs. They look like they'll be perfect for the purpose. E-mail DarylunderscoreMartel@shaw.ca

Attached files

Quote from Guest on December 22, 2011, 3:55 pm

Just got a reply from Scott Turner at CSC. His answer: "The hub came from FIT BEARING out of California. The brake caliper and the brake rotor came from MOTOR QUALITY out of Italy.(Brembo) Sorry I do not have an address or a phone number to give you."

I'll look back thru the thread and see if we have a good pic of the stock hub/rotor. If not, Mike, did you take a pretty clear pic?

Quote from jaydmc on December 22, 2011, 4:02 pm

The hub came in with out the ring welded to the rear. Brembo will not sell dirrect and they sold the rights to the FO4 calipar several years ago. The company they sold the rights to made the FO4 calipars for a few years and stopped making them.
Jay G
DMC sidecars
866-638-1793

Quote from Guest on December 22, 2011, 4:20 pm

Thnx Jay. Bit of a dead end then, eh. I'm not too keen on messing with welding new caliper mounts on... just yet. That may change after I have a few miles on it.

Quote from jaydmc on December 22, 2011, 4:26 pm

What we can supply, Hub with a brake rotor, the new type of brembo calipar, a CNC cut bracket to weld onto the swing arm, the brake hose with a double banjo bolt. The hub will have either a 4 bolt on 4 inch pattern or a 5 on 4.75 pattern, your choice. $500
What you would do is assemble every thing, apply brake pressure to hold the calipar in place while welding the bracket on.
Jay G
DMC sidecars
www.dmcsidecars.com
866-638-1793

Quote from SidecarMike on December 22, 2011, 4:45 pm

Here is the best I can come up with.

Attached files

Quote from tvking63 on December 22, 2011, 5:10 pm

Daryl Martel - 12/22/2011 3:39 PM

I'm attaching a good crisp pic of the back of the wheel hub assembly. I don't see where a rotor would attach - am I missing something?

No, you're not. Now that I have a better pic of your hub, I can see that you don't have the mounting collar on yours. The only way I know for you to add brakes now, is to buy and new hub ,rotor, caliper and bracket from Jay and weld up a new mount. I guess you could fab the collar and weld it to your hub, but it would have to be machined perfectly true to keep rotor runout to a minimum.

Here's a pic of my hub with the rotor mounting collar and the rotor from DMC.

 

 

Quote from Guest on December 23, 2011, 1:11 pm

Thnx everyone for all the info, and pics. Jay, I will wait to see how it goes before comitting to buying. Having never driven a sidecar (yet), I am concerned about the added weight/mass and emergency braking situations. Am sure looking forward to getting it on the road.

Quote from Guest on December 23, 2011, 1:58 pm

Well, let me chime in and say I've been concerned about what the dynamics are going to be of adding my Friendship III sidecar to my GL1200. It is definitely going to take some getting used to judging from the tons of articles I've read on the subject in the last 2 months.

From what I've read, I am definitely going to wait to install my car until AFTER I get my sidecar brake system worked out and installed on the frame and working properly. I will not even ATTEMPT to drive my rig without a properly functioning sidecar braking system. It just makes sense to me that if you have a couple hundred pounds plus rider/luggage sitting to the right of the bike, you better have some way to stop all that rolling mass. I've gotta believe you will DEFINITELY feel the sidecar pushing when trying to stop. I am fortunate that my sidecar already has the brake/rotor system installed and all I have to do is mount my master cylinder and extra pedal to my sidecar frame.
I chose to have the extra pedal instead of plumbing into my bike brake system. I just see having the sidecar on it's own system making a lot less headaches when riding without the sidecar. I will just have to disconnect my mounts and then off I go; no worrying about bleeding the bike brake system every 3 or 4 rides.

I fully understand the economic concerns of adding the proper brake cylinder/rotor/hub setup, especially since I've been unemployed twice in this last year. Still, through odd jobs and stuff I've been able to get my whole brake system together and am working on mounting right now. I just gotta believe it will be WAY less scary having brakes on my sidecar, than having none at all. I don't even want to try and learn to ride a sidecar setup without brakes.
Best wishes to you... Please let us know how this all works out.

Thanks VERY much for all the pics of the Electric Lean setup. I am working on adding that to my FS III so I will have the best of everything, that way when I go riding with my CSC Friendship III sidecar and my fiance, WE MAY JUST NOT WANT TO COME BACK!!! 🙂

Quote from SidecarMike on December 31, 2011, 10:21 pm

Just in case anyone is wondering what to do with all those wires, I just found the color codes for mine. I can't swear it will be right for all of them, but it is labeled Friendship 2 and 3.

First color is primary, second is a trace or stripe

The white and yellow wires are spares and go to nothing.

Brown/White is the ground wire

Blue/White is the front white light, tail, and marker lights

Purple is the turn signal

Blue/Black is the brake light

Green/White goes to the back up light

Pink is a hot wire to power the radio's clock and memory (sometimes cigar lighter)

Red is a fused accesory line to radio and sometimes cigar lighter.

If your lighter works with the key off, it feeds from the pink. Otherwise it's the red.

Yellow/Black is the UP position on the electric lean

Blue is the DOWN position on the electric lean

Purple is the electric fuel pump.

Hope this is of use to someone.

Quote from Guest on December 31, 2011, 10:26 pm

Jeez Mike - you are one timely guy! Was just looking at my harness this afternoon wondering how I'd figure out what does what. There sure are many more wires than needed, and weird connectors too (think I'm going to cut 'em off). It'll take me some time to get done connecting mine, but when I do, I'll be able to report back whether that colour coding is consistent on mine too.

Quote from OldSchool_IsCool on January 3, 2012, 6:00 pm

Hey Daryl,

I don't know if this will help on your 1500, but here is how I wired my hack to my 1100.

A little explanation;

I used a "flat 4" to wire the lights attached to the frame and a "square 6" to wire the tub. The idea being that I could run the frame without the tub and a car top carrier or other cargo in it's place.
The tub has a dual-intensity red brake/tail light and an amber single-intensity light in the nose for marker/turn.
The tub also has two power circuits for accessories that the Mrs might want (cell phone, fan, hair dryer, heater, waffle iron, etc) 😀
The SPST relay up top is there as a "power relay" tied into the ACC circuit of the bike. It basically allows me to power the tub via it's own fuse block instead of tapping off the bike's block.
the SPDT is there since I'm using a dual-intensity LED fixture for three functions - tail, brake and right turn. When R.MARKER is ON, the relay passes BRAKE, otherwise it passes R.TURN (marker off, turn on).
The two diodes prevent feedback between the R.MARKER and R.TURN supply signals.
I use a couple of LED "Driving Lights" to serve as a headlight on the frame.

Let me know if you need more details!

Quote from Guest on January 3, 2012, 7:36 pm

Hi OldSchool aka Bruce - yeah, could use this info for sure too. I already have a hitch installed on my bike and use an isolator and 5 into 4 pin converter. I bought another one (it appears to be a combined unit) which I'm thinking of wiring in. Definitely will use at least one flat 4 pin plug for the connection, for the lights for sure. All the sidecar lights will be LED, so not too worried really about current draw. For the sidecar height adjust actuator however, I'm thinking there should be relays in the circuit to reduce arcing on the switch... and maybe another "switched" relay for the cigarette lighter. My big fear is having something on the hack drain the bike battery when parked. I like the idea of keeping a spare fully charged battery in the hack as back-up should this ever occur.

Quote from OldSchool_IsCool on January 3, 2012, 8:16 pm

A couple capacitors (aka condensers) could be used to prevent arcing too. That's how it is done on older ignition systems to prevent arcing points. Since I own a couplea Honda CB's, I'm familiar with the technique! 😀