Rude awakenings part 2

Sometimes you can know too much.  Since joining the Velocette Owners Club, I have used some of their excellent facilities available online.  For example, thanks to their hard work and dedication, I have a better understanding of how the part numbering system worked and most disturbingly (even more disturbing than finding a part numbering system interesting), I have found out when my engine was made - 1958.  Cast your eye to the right and you will see that the basis of this project is to rebuild the bike that was registered on the day I was born in 1961.

I was at first disapointed, to say the least.  How could it be?  Was the market so slow that they didn't sell the bike for three years?  I suppose it's possible.  As I mentioned before, when it came to me my bike was in fact a bitza and not an original thoroughbread.  Could it be that the whole thing is a mish mash of bits from other sources that someone threw together and only one of the wheel spindles is of the original 1961 machine?  This is more likely and the fact that the magneto turns out to be a rare competition type (for which parts are difficult to find) seems to support this.

So what?  My Venom was never going to be museum material (thank goodness), so why should it matter?  I have hung on to this bike all these years because it was important to me and in doing so I have made it into a personal icon.  None of that can be erased and so I suppose it is no less special, in fact quite the opposite now.  I think Terry Pratchet hit the nail on the head when he wrote in his novel The Fifth Elephant:

"This will become in time, the axe of someone's grandfather," said the King "and no doubt over the years it will need a new handle or a new blade and over the centuries the shape will change in line with fashion, but it will always be in every detail and respect the axe I give you today.  And because it'll change with the times it'll always be sharp.  There's a grain of truth in that see."

Shiny, Shiny, Pretty, Pretty

The Solvol Autosol arrived the other day.  That is good stuff.  Slap it on, work it in, then buff away and your aluminium or chrome comes up with a lovely deep shine.  Applied with an old tooth brush into nooks and crannies it works just as well.  Shiny, shiny, my precious…

Good gear.

So where are you with all the rest Andy?  What’s this about polishing stuff? That should be at the beginning or end and since this project started some six months ago or more, is this evidence of slow progress?  Procrastination?  Bang on with all counts.  It is going slow.  I do procrastinate. 

I wanted to finish off the head but I have run into a cleaning problem.  I don’t want to knock out the guides before having the casting cleaned but there are very few firms around here who can do that sort of thing.  Luckily I found Peter Clark in a village nearby.  He featured in an issue of Café Racer magazine:

http://www.cafe-racer.fr/?p=935

…and was mentioned as a very helpful chap who runs a Ducati race preparation workshop in Paulhan.  He gave me the following advice:

1. Don’t be tempted to sandblast because it renders the casings porus and makes life difficult.
2. Vapour bead blast instead  http://www.motalia.com/Html/Blasting/what_is_it.html

Armed with this I’m getting enquiries out. 

It seems like it’s taking an age, but I want this bit done properly.

On other areas, I have checked the gudgeon pin fit in the small end (I couldn’t remember if this had been looked at back in 1993) and it is a lovely smooth play-free fit.  Looking at my planning sheet I inspected the studs and crank casings with a view to a rinse and blow through just to be sure.  That’s when I found the bodged banjo bolt. 

This one’s not mine, but a previous owner.  Evidently someone has stripped the thread out of the oil pump outlet side and reworked it with a 7/16” BSF thread.  The connection is made with a raised flange set screw that has been drilled to serve as an oil union bolt.  The problem with this is that it leaves precious little material after the holes are drilled and this one has sheared.  What I really need is a bolt with just enough shank to provide the extra material needed.  Thinking cap time.

Shear bodgery

Meanwhile I occasionally stray into the workshop as I wait for the kettle to boil in the kitchen and if I do, I usually polish something.  Such lovely shiny things…

Precious...

Rude awakenings part 1

They're funny these projects, you end up going off on all sorts of tangents. I wrote a while back about getting myself organised and how I joined the Velocette club as a means of getting in touch with like minded people and finding technical help.  Well it's become more than that.  It's brought about a coming to terms with something so obvious yet I'd quite missed it until now.  It's the realisation that to own a Velocette as I have is to become part of an endangered species, a dying breed.

I live in southern France.  Normal stuff - I work, my children go to school, my wife works and we have friends and neighbours.  On the other hand, the majority of Brits here - in fact the majority of foreigners I know living here - are "baby boomers".  They are retired or semi-retired and / or have second homes here.  They're another tranch of society to me altogether.  They grew up to live through the sixties and seventies and reap the benefits of that economy.  They own a substantial value of property that youngsters today couldn't even hope to have.  I have no problem with people whose good fortune is the era they were born to, but I'm not one of them.

It comes home to me as I shop in the local supermarkets.  There's often an aisle for foreign food (so French, that) and frequently I look in the British section to see what's there and what I find is like a museum display.  Scotts Porridge oats, Birds instant custard, Fray Bentos steak and kidney pies.  It's there because that's what the French find they can sell most of to the local British expats but to me it's the food of another era.  Old folks food.  Not mine, I'm not old - when I left school the Sex Pistols had a hit with "God save the queen".  I'm a seventeen year old boy who's learned to survive in an ageing body.

What has all this to do with the Velocette club?  Well I've had two issues of the Fishtail (the Velo club Magazine) and the first thing that struck me were the obituaries.  Ok granted, obituaries for people the other side of eighty, but obituaries none the less.  As I read through the rest I learned more about a group of nice people, really nice, decent people who organise regular runs with ale and tea and biscuits.  I read about people thanking each other for help rendered along the runs or for parts loaned to enable each other to go to events.  They are technically very competent engineers and they know more than a thing or two about running and administering a club and a spares business.  They sound like my kind of people and I have a strong suspicion that there's a fair amount of Fray Bentos pies consumed by this demographic.  In fact I wouldn't be supprised if some of them are partial to Birds instant custard and that Scotts Porridge Oats features on more than a few of their breakfast tables. 

This year the BBC ran a thing about the celebrities who died in the last twelve months -
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-12052144
- and I notice that it's started to mean something to me now.  Do you know that Dennis Hopper, Malcolm McLaren and Allan Silitoe all died this year?  That covers motorcycle heroes, rock 'n roll and tales of post war angry young men.

Bloody hell.

Pictures from the Idiot's lantern show

After digging about in old family photos for another project I came across some evidence that there really was a bike called RPR 657 and a boy who had it ingrained into his persona.  First of all here he is on the BSA B25SS mentioned at the beginning:

On the BSA in 1978 with L plate discretely folded away.  My mate Alan is on the 500/4 (replaced his CB200) with my sister Sam on the back.

Here's the Velo in 1979:

My Venom with tangeable evidence of my dedication.  I would take any job to earn a few extra pennies to keep it on the road - how many eighteen year old would be rockers do you know who would baby sit?

This is the Venom post -crash with the Dodkin rolling chassis and re-painted tank.  The mudguards are cheapo ally ones that I'd get through at a rate of two front and four rear a year - worse than tyres!

And the face behind this? 

Dedicated and wearing the badge of faith... needing a haircut!

So there it is. 

Putting the cart behind the horse

I had to get organised.  I was looking at the increasingly messy workbench and thinking that I could see no end to the tunnel into which I have gone, so I had to plan.  Perhaps this yearning is as a result of all those years working in engineering. As a callow youth I would have happily gone into the garage and done the first thing that came to hand or that grabbed my attention.  This would be why my Tribsa, my Hondumph and my Gruch (Greevse/Puch – made from other peoples chuck outs) came out so odd (don’t ask!).

So what have I done?  Firstly I’ve contacted Grove classic motorcycles and got a copy of their excellent catalogue. 

http://www.groveclassicmotorcycles.co.uk/z008-parts-list-illustrated-a4---vmvpmssvmt-1658-p.asp

This has all sorts of exploded diagrams with Velocette part numbers against them and is worth its weight in gold.  Next I joined the (mightily efficient) Velocette Owners Club

http://www.velocetteowners.com/

The club also has a spares scheme that works on the same system and so the same diagrams work.  Incidentally, these are the same as used in the Haynes manual.  Then the long boring bit – I wrote up spreadsheets for the engine internals and casings.   In these I have left columns to organise the work. 

So now I know what areas to work on and where to get the bits.  The final part of the puzzle is in knowing what the priorities are.  Mostly, I’m ok with engines, but there are areas that I need to consult people with knowledge of specific areas of this vintage one.  Luckily, there is a superb technical resource in the Velocette club and its technical forum.

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/david.gibbison/v-tec/

A good example is to decide if I have to change the valve seats in the head in order to run unleaded petrol.  I put up my question and within a day had a host of very practical and well considered answers all with the same consensus of opinion.  Happily, I don’t.   I am changing the valves though since the stems were so badly scored, but I’m holding back until they arrive to check the clearances in the guides before changing them too.  

This has been a definite step in the right direction.  In fact I was so pleased with myself I spent an hour or two cleaning more parts and checking what I’ve got against my new lists.  Just like at work, there’s only so much desk flying that I can stand!

My Forgotten Past Double Life as Dr Bodgeit and Mr Scarper

They say that we store everything we experience in our memories, but that the access to most of it is often only triggered by key sensations.  I believe this is true because as I started cleaning the pressed steel transmission parts my rose tinted spectacles fell off my face and shattered on the floor. 

My alter ego as Dr Bodgeit had been hard at work back in the 1980’s - just look at the backs of the studs on the inside of primary chain case:

 

If you spotted the solder trying to hold those clinch studs in place then give yourself a coconut.  If you missed it, then here they are again:

Lovely monstrous carbuncles and as I recall for the first time in what seems like aeons, bloody hard work as at the time I’d lost my Dad's tin of flux .

The drive sprocket cover also came with a torrent of long forgotten emotion.  Back in 1979 I had to do a quick fix to a cracked mounting bracket or miss the band playing on the old Pier.  Time was short as was my patience (Mr Scarper) …

…yes, that’s a Meccano nut and Screw!  I remember riding along thinking “Well, it’s still holding” in answer to my conscience long after the bodge had been committed.  Incidentally, the gig was cancelled when I got there because the band said the pier was unsafe that it about to fall down, which, with hindsight, was rather ironic.  

Another cringe worthy bodge is the rocker cover.  Back in the day, I read somewhere that it’s a good idea to add a breather to the rocker box as this can prevent leaks, so I drilled a hole in the beautifully shaped rocker cover (why there?  I can’t remember now).   I drilled it too low and it dribbled oil as soon as the engine was started, so I plugged it with any old nut and screw and did it again…

…real class, but I’ve left the best to last.  

Andy’s found the rocker box oil feed pipe.  See the nut.  See the split.  Remember the plonker clamping it up with a jubilee clip hoping it would seal.  It did for a bit and then my right boot became more waterproof than my left.

There are those in education that say we should take care not to stifle creativity in the young as was done in the bad old days.  Looking at these I can’t see that dull lessons, bad food and ritual corporal punishment administered through a twisted system of justice caused me to lack creativity back then.  From what I’m starting to find, I could be resourceful and creative in a sort of shootingfromthehipasthemomentdemandsitand nevermindtheconcequences style.   A true Brit!