How do YOU rake a frame?

My pre-unit frame was even WORSE! The shithead who did it didn't trust his own rake job so he welded angle iron down the duplex down tubes. The guy I bought it from didn't like that so he ground it all off and left the shitty rake job... well of course this left virtually NO wall in the down tubes. No fixiing that junk... so what I did was order the odd size tubing (1.125" O.D. I think) with a heavy wall. I built a jig to hold all the motor points steady. Then the surgery started. I carefully cut the down-tubes completely out of the neck and just above the lower bends (didn't have a bender or access to one). THEN... I used 1.25 O.D. by 1.125 I.D. tubing and cut new lugs to slide over each joint I made. Essentially everything is double walled at each joint. LOTS of work, very scary cutting things out, but in the end it's REALLY strong and looks really good! I didn't have access to a TIG either so everything was migged in place. The frame is straight and true and everything lines up great. This was quite a job and I would go with the molding idea if your frame is strong and straight, but ultimately a new frame by WillyJ or someone would be better. I would have gone with a new frame, but nobody seemed too interested in building me a pre-unit duplex frame including WillyJ

If you want to see pics of the repair job I think I have some. Let me know. I'll try to figure out how the hell to post them or I'll email them to you.

JEB said:

What's the best way to rake a Triumph frame?

Click to expand...

how much rake are you talking about?
same as is but well done, or different stretch/rake

if it was mine, id gooseneck it and lower it
cut neck off
flip it upside down
and do someting like this

id dont have photoshop here, so yea, it looks like shit

but its definately salvageable

oh yea, DO NOT bondo over that crap, cut it out and do it right

Well, it's hard to do this long distance, but here goes.

I'm willing to bet that the OD of the splice tube in the downtube section isn't even close to the ID of the downtube itself, because of the weird "C" shape to it. Also, who knows what they used for that splice tube, it could be gas pipe for all you know. Believe me, there were a lot of drug addicts working on choppers.

If it was me, I'd cut the neck forging off even at the tubing junctions for it. I'd come back about a foot on the top tube, and cut it there. I'd come down the downtube, and cut it about an inch or so above the front mounts.

I'm thinking (again, this is long distance) if you were to make your new replacement top tube section an inch or so longer than it is, you'd be able to get a straight line up the top tube, and a straight line up the downtube to the neck forging. You'd also get rid of that big nasty hole thru your top tube, which you'll need to do anyways. You might have to get inside your forging with a die grinder to clean all the old crap out of there to allow you to slide a "slug" inside the forging for your splice.

Go to the yard and get some 1020/1026 DOM tubing that matches the OD/ID/wall of your existing tube, and a length of DOM that matches the ID/wall of that tubing. Cut your splice "slugs" out of that for your junctions. I don't use solid "slugs" for these area. I was taught to extend my slugs twice the length of the OD of the tubing I'm working with. In other words, if the tube is 1 1/4" OD, I extend the slug 2 1/2" on both sides of my splice junction, or a total length of 5" for the slug.

Give your tubing splice areas a good bevel, and both plug weld your "slugs" first for your alignment, then seam weld it.

All this might seem scarey, but it isn't. What's scarey is the work on there now. If you clamp the frame solid to any good level surface while you work, you'll be able to make your measurements and keep everything reletively square while you work.