DIY #26

Fitting spoke wheels on a later Laverda triple- Laverda 1000 3CL, Jota and 1200

(Click on the pictures to enlarge)

by Gerald Dibrell

The whole project is based on my personal soft spot for wire wheel Laverdas, in particular the SFC750 with disc brakes. After I aquired a SF2 front wheel laced to a 2.5" DID rim I began
searching for back wheel options. I had a look at drum brake hubs from the 750 GT/S/SF models and aftermarket hubs like the SFC1000 used. Then I came across a conversion done by
the Laverda specialist in Texas USA Scott Potter. He had used the back wheel from a Suzuki GS750.
Scott was so kind to provide some details and I quickly aquired a complete wheel with brake disc, sprocket carrier, axle and all spacers.

The Suzuki wheel uses a 20mm axle vs. the 17mm axle of the Laverda and the Suzuki axle is longer. As I didn't want to alter the swingarm of my 3CL I looked at the bearings in the hub
of the Suzuki wheel. Suzuki used 6204 bearings that I could easily replace with 6303 bearings reducing the inner diameter to 17mm. That done I looked at the bearing of the sprocket
carrier and the inner sleeve. I opted to have the sleeve copied but with 17mm inner diameter. Then I looked at the OEM 630 sprocket and options to replace the sprocket with a 530 item.
Dennis Kirks online catalog provided an excellent cross reference and I found out that the Suzuki Bandit 1200 made from 1996-2000 had the same sprocket hole pattern as the GS750
sprocket but is a 530 item. An aftermarket sprocket dealer supplied the correct sprocket I needed.

The hub was then laced to a 3" Akront rim with M4.25 stainless Kleeblatt spokes and I could start looking at how the wheel would sit in the swingarm. Right from the first attempt I could
see that the altered Suzuki wheel would fit into the Laverda, the only real alteration that would be necessary was to machine off 5mm from the outside of the brake caliper carrier to gain
enough clearance for the final drive chain alignment. Spacers where turned with the dimensions 16,5x33mm for the right side and 22,5x35mm for the left side of the Suzuki hub, again
with 17mm inner diameter. Shimming the brake caliper was the last step to have a friction free moving wheel.

I am pleased with the result and would like to point out that I am not a professional mechanic.

Gerald Dibrell

Sump-up:

- Machine the outside part of the caliper carrier by 5mm
- Machine a new inner sleeve (between the right hub bearing and the sprocket carrier bearing) with an internal diameter of 17mm, same length and dimensions as the OE Suzuki sleeve.
- Retain inner sleeve (used only to compensate for radial forces between the 2 hub bearings) and insert 2 new 6303 bearings instead of the 6204 ones.
- Replace the OE sprocket with a 1996-2000 Suzuki 1200 Bandit sprocket (530)
- Machine a new LHS spacer: 22.5 X 35 X 17mm
- Machine a new RHS spacer: 16.5 X 33 X 17mm
- Shim the caliper to center it.

The Suzuki inner sleeve and the sleeve coming between the hub and the cush drive	LHS spacer and the modified caliper carrier	The RHS spacer	Caliper in place
The final result, great!