It seems that over the years several Caponord and other bike/car related websites have ported themselves over to Facebook – such that I eventually capitulated and joined, albeit in a totally locked down way. And of course over those years I’ve been inundated with zillions of worthless adverts ….. until now. One has proved very worthwhile indeed!
More specifically – JB Fabrications – who were advertising an engine mount adapter specifically for the V990 engine. At £48.45 including postage I was in. Working on a lump like the V990 on a workbench (or the floor!) is a real pain -literally! I’ve spent more time than I care to recollect having to drop tools mid-job simply because my back has tweaked up because of the awkward position I’m working in. This adapter will apparently work with Clarke and Sealy engine mount stands – I chose the Clarke CE340, which can handle engines up to 340Kg (V990 = 65Kg). This stand allows the engine to be rotated 360º and locked off at 45º increments.
The adapter only took a few days to arrive. It was well packaged and the paint finish and welding all appear to be decent quality. The engine stand took a few days longer to arrive, but to be fair it was ordered later! Assembly took about 30 minutes with a crafty tea-break thrown in. This of course, is all well and good …. however the engine has to be lifted about 1.5m into the air to get it into the adapter, and that’s no easy task at nearly 70Kg.
Thank goodness there is an electric workshop hoist to hand – rated at 150Kg/300Kg capacity. This is mounted to a cross-beam in the workshop and is more than capable of lifting the engine nicely into place, especially when using the 300Kg setting as this reduces the raise/lower speed by half – handy when trying to jiggle a bolt into position. Of course It also comes in rather useful for doing other bike related tasks as well!
Further to the last post about accessing the Caponord ECU, I have added a couple of new pages under the ‘Aprilia Caponord Rally-Raid / ECU’ drop-down in the menu. A further page will be written shortly I hope. Apologies if they seem to ramble somewhat, but a terrible week, a stint in hospital and some rather strong pain meds have left me a little tired and woolly-headed. But I needed to get this stuff down before I forgot it all again!
I think it’s reasonable to say that Aprilia got it right when they chose Rotax and the rock-solid V990 motor for their range of bikes in the late 90’s. Bullet-proof doesn’t quite do it justice, especially in the de-tuned Caponord variant. But even this wonderful piece of Bavarian engineering has it’s weak points, and probably the one most obvious from a service-by-service aspect is that damn annoying magnetic plug in the crankcase.
Swapping over only takes a couple of minutes …. 8xM5 bolts and a click clamp to remove. I exchanged the old one for a nice new Zero-Leak low profile Stainless Steel 11.3mm version – very snug! In fact the old one wasn’t really squashing the pipe onto the siggot anymore and could be pulled/pushed/rotated very easily, which makes me think it was no longer vacuum tight ….hmm. Anyway, the new one crimped up lovely and everything is supper-sealed once again.
I’ve just had a fun few hours preparing the Capo for its MOT (annual inspection) and one of the issues I wanted to get around to sorting was the slightly high tick-over.
Just bagged a nice little Aprilia spare off eBay ….. an RST1000 Futura motor! Not the lowest mileage, but complete and still sporting the starter motor. Overall in nice condition with only age related external wear and no corrosion at all, but of course it’s the condition of the internals that count! Either way, use it or break it for spares, I think it’s well worth what I paid for it – can’t wait to pick it up later this week. 😀 
