I removed my windshield and took a look. The bolts at the top have the tabs bent over. With the pulse in the air I can not move the wheel side to side or front to rear everything seems tight , but ! "you knew there had to be one of these", the steering gear box "nothing but a right angle speed reducer" has play in the way of backlash in the gears, between the input ,steering wheel shaft, and the output , the one that moves the wheel. The linkage to the gear box has no play, however the wheel can be moved a few degrees without moving the steering wheel. this movement occurs with very little pressure applied to either side of the front wheel and appears to be about the same amount as the wobble at high speed. I suspect the force of the pulse leaning on one side of the tire causes it to move. This amount of play is normal in most speed reducers of this type. These weren't designed to be steering boxes, and seems to be a problem. Can you move your steering wheel any without feeling resistance from the front wheel? Do anyone have the same type of speed reducer for a steering gear box or was something different used? Maybe it was tight when it was new and is worn out now. Thanks for all the advice.
Tom Caprioli
You have described my steering gear box to a tee. I never thought that the front wheel wobble would be
caused by the slop in the gear box. Can the gears in the box be tightened up or does one have to take
apart the box and replace the worn gears or completely replace that box with something else? I also
suspect that forcing the front wheel to the right or left that the gears might jump a notch and then
the steering wheel is canted. With the possibility of front wheel wobble, I think that I would prefer
a full steering wheel to control the front wheel rather than the butterfly steering wheel that I have now.
David C. Ohmstede
Pulse #152 had a bolt worn in the linkage. I replaced it and the problem went away. My Steering wheel
play is 3/4 of an inch on the outside rim of the steering wheel.
Is the tire that you put on a radial or a bias tire? You might want to experiment with tire pressure. On #152 I only run 20lbs. in the front and 25lbs. in back.
Bob Cervero.......
I just replaced the tires on Pulse #61. It is nearly impossible to find 14-SR-13 tires in a quality tire. I found that a 155-SR-13 tire fits fine. The choices in this size are pretty good. I bought a pair of Michelin XW-4's. Don Muddiman, Pulse #199 bought the same size and brand. They fit fine. If you try to go much bigger the tire will rub on the chain. Don's Pulse had a 165-SR-13 on the rear when he bought it, but it had a spacer under the sprocket to move the chain outboard, away from the tire. I don't think there is much advantage to a wider tire because of the way a Pulse is driven.
Also, try to find a tire with a symetrical tread design. Some tire treads are not the same across the tire or run at an angle to the tire. That's OK on a 4 wheel car where the opposite sides cancel each other. On a Pulse, this could be a problem.
Tom.....I have a Kleber 145 SR 13 on a ENKEI Aeronautics wheel. I don't know how old the tire is or how many potholes it hit. When I took the swing arm assembly apart to replace the rubber grommets in the swing arm hinge I noticed that the bolts holding the hinge together had the bolt head on the outside of the assembly and the thread stem on the inside which brought the stem very close to the tire. In re-assembly I turned the bolt around so that the bolt head was on the inside and the thread stem on the outside. This left more room on the inside of the swing arm area where the tire spun. I measured the swing arm and found that the swing arm outside width to be 11 inches the arms extended 14 inches forward (outside measurement), each arm is 1.5 inches thick giving the inside measurement of 8 inches wide.
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Last Update: 11-20-20......
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