Mini-lathe - front stay spacers

 The mini lathe proved its worth again today and gave me two useful parts from some scrap.

These are 3/4-in diameter by 3/16-in thick spacers for the Model A and the W/NG, with 6.5 mm holes to clear quarter inch screws.

Here is where they fit - what they do is give you a little bit more room between the fork leg and the mudguard stay to stop the brake rod rubbing.

They will be chemically blacked in the next batch.

Model A - front forks dry build

 You might remember from the recent girder fork investigation post that we had a lot of movement in the forks - in fact a 3/8 inch variation in wheelbase. It was obvious that a lot of this was down to wear in the links and wear in the spindles.

I contemplated reworking the original links for a while but while chatting to the AOMCC Black Ariel spares specialist I discovered that reproduction links were available from the club at a good price, so bought a set. They're not perfect - for example the middle links are smaller in diameter than the originals so I will keep the originals and repair them at some point.

For some reason the top links on the 1929 and 1930 bikes are not fully threaded:

The club spares officer also recommended I bought a new spring. It's certainly true that old fork springs I've used in the past have been very soft and looking at the old spring previously it was clearly a bit stretched. Again new ones are available at a reasonable price:

Putting these bits together with the old spindles revealed a significant reduction in play.

A few days later, the new spindles arrived from Acme Stainless - and very nice they are too. On bikes of this era, you don't need the knurled washers - these arrived in 1934. I bought a pair of headstock nuts as well since I was one missing and pulled up the steering head bearings a bit more. 

Putting all these in place removed all of the play in the forks. I now cannot detect any variation in wheelbase.

Stuck in the steering column there is the beginning of the blanking plug that is used on the Model A which was not supplied with a steering damper.

That plug will be chrome plated eventually. I'll finish it machining it long before that happens!

Model A - girder fork investigation

 I guess that I have been shying away from looking at the girder forks for a while - it occurred to me that I have never dismantled a set of forks like these but having dived straight into it, it's dead easy.

The first job was to make sure the back of the bike was strapped tightly to the lift table and then use the scissor lift to raise the engine a bit. Then I gingerly loosened the front wheel in its clamp and confirmed that everything was stable. 

Pulling the forks about revealed a lot of movement and I made a little video:

There you go - clearly a number of problems there. 

Removing the spindles and replacing them with scrap round bar allowed me to have a look at the links. The part you would call the bottom yoke in a conventional telescopic fork is called the fork crown by Ariel, and the links attached to the crown at the bottom are pretty worn:

Both sides, as you can see. This means the links will need bushing or replacement; the top ones are worse.

Fortunately removing the crown and steering column revealed that indeed there were no balls in the steering head bearings, so that will account for a lot of the movement.

I will probably clean up this area and leave it in factory paint as it is in quite good condition.

The steering head races had two balls left in them. We will clean them up and see how worn they are.

Ariel call this bit the ball head clip - it carries the handlebars and the spindle for the top links. Said spindle was absolutely solid in the clip and I had to resort to the splendid Rothenberger Surefire 2 to warm the grease up and get it to move.

The spindle came out eventually - but look at the state of it. The bike has also been used with the spindles loose which has worn most of the thread away and part of the link too.

The main girder assembly looks pretty good:.

I'll repair these worn areas though - it looks like the mudguard has been loose and has fretted the fork leg. These will build up with weld.

Whilst the girder fork assembly is still a bit contaminated with old grease, I'm quite confident that the spindle bores are good enough.

I spent a while getting all cleaned off the next afternoon. The two races that fit into the frame are chipped but with new balls seem to work ok.

I'm going to replace the spring while I can. You remove these by tapping the end with a hammer and a punch to unwind them from their fixing spiral:

This is the lower fixing - the upper one is part of the main girder.

You can see that the spring has opened up - it must be quite soft.

I rebuilt the forks with the new balls in the steering head to determine how much play I had solely coming from wear in the links and spindles. With these old parts in place, the wheelbase varied 3/8".

I've been in discussion with the Black Ariel spares man for the AOMCC and have some new parts on the way.

Model A - repairing threads

It's a wet day here in Norfolk, and I have some domestic stuff to do in the workshop so while I'm at it I might get distracted...

I'm looking at the workshop layout with a view to getting a bike lift in there, so I have shuffled them around and the Model A happens to be accessible, so we will have a look at a couple of loose ends. The front mudguard has been hanging off for a while (and still is) because there are a couple of dubious threads in the forks - one, a broken bolt, and then two other threads that are just fouled.

Here's the broken one - I have put a 1/8" hole through this broken 1/4" bolt, to see if it will come out with an Easy-Out. They never do, but I have to drill the hole anyway!

Of course, it didn't come out and I moved through the drills until I was one size under tapping size for 1/4" CEI. I then applied the 1/4" CEI taper tap and used it to clear the thread - it moved the remains of the bolt:

Next stop, same problem at the back. I made the mudguard & rack fasteners a while ago and could only fit one side, because I found someone had broken one of the 3/8" bolts in the frame lug, drilled and tapped it something like 5/16" and put a new bolt in. Today, I removed the broken 3/8" stump using a diamond burr in the Dremel and chasing out with a 3/8" CEI taper tap, so this shot shows it all back together with the stand spring fitted at last:

I also took the opportunity to chase out the chain adjuster threads. Grovelling about on the floor makes me realise that a hydraulic lift would be a nice addition to the workshop!

Back at the front, I now have both sides of the mudguard stay fitted - to cut the mudguard, I need the centre bracket and the front stand fitting - unfortunately I have run out of 5/16" screws, so that's the next job.

Comparing the next picture with my picture above, you can see I have the mudguard stay too far forward:

A few little updates

So, a two weeks is a long time with no blog posts, but I have been out and about and done some of the little jobs. As you will have seen, I've updated the regulator and all is working fine now. Unfortunately a 20 mile road test a few days ago revealed that all was not well with the old Italian dip switch that came with the bike, in that it appears to have several extra positions, most of which give no light at all. More on that later.

Still, the bike is going well. I have several old, original grease nipples courtesy of that nice Mr. John Mitchell of the AOMCC, and these have allowed the girders to be greased properly:

The girders are now bobbing up and down with every little ripple in the road. Secondly I've cut a screwdriver slot in the brake torque arm anchor to help me tighten it up:

This modification was inspired by the W/NG that lives at the Norfolk Motorcycle Museum, in North Walsham:

I've also had a look at the primary chain, which I found was tight at certain positions. I've backed that off a little and added some SAE 50 to the chaincase - everything sounds happier in that direction now.

Girder Fork Damper 'Wing Nut'

Since I've had the W/NG, the 'wing nut' used to adjust the fork dampers has been missing a wing. Unable to find a new one, and not afraid of trying anything new (especially when challenged by other AOMCC members) I decided to repair the old one.

One thing i don't much like about old bike restoration is the notion that you can buy a new part rather than repair the old - replacing bits is not 'restoration' to me. This is the old nut, removed and cleaned up:

I selected a bit of scrap, the flattened end of a stop cock key:

I chopped a useful bit off and filed it up to shape. Near the end of shaping, I heated the new part and flattened it where I was to weld:

Old part and replacement end:

Set up in the vice for welding:

As usual, I used the TIG to weld it up, set to about 45 Amps with the tungsten ground with a shallow angle to give better penetration:

Next, some more filing. Not looking too bad here, but needs more work; the new end looks distinctly heavier than the original:

And back in place, ready to get some patina:

Tinkering...

With a bit of time to myself this evening, I was able to get the M01 magneto HT circuit back together with a clean, properly terminated HT cable and a new pickup brush out of my magneto spares box:

This works well now - nice fat spark. I need a few bits - a new HT lead boot, a pickup screw - but for now it is good.

I have a stock of fuel taps & bits, which I add to when things come along and I was able to remove the Italian fuel tap, which had a metric outlet (or so I think - nothing I have would fit) and fit an old Ewarts double plunger tap:

It's go two round plungers at the moment (it should have a hexagon one for reserve) which now have new corks. For the moment, I've made a flexible fuel line to use temporarily.

I've adjusted the rear brake & footrests to try to get the rudimentary footrests in a better place and I've added the dummy 'star' to the nearside of the girders:

So having got it all working, I took it outside the garage to fire it up, and two or three kicks in, it thumps into life! I was able to ride it up the road and back before stopping the engine on the exhaust lifter. The clutch is fine, the front brake works after a fashion as well...

Then it started going a bit pear shaped with a few leaks. A bit of wet and smelly investigation later in the evening revealed a hole under the nearside front tank mount:

The float chamber was also leaking. It's 'straight' Amal float chamber with a banjo type bottom feed, so the float bowl is canted over potentially preventing the needle valve operating correctly.

It also uses a banjo fitting at the bottom, which is wrong. Taking a look at the parts lists for early 1942 and early 1943, we see that a top feed Amal 2N float chamber was fitted for engine numbers up to BH6554, which has a copper pipe to a banjo on the float chamber, all illustrated in the parts list. Later bikes have the 1J float chamber which has a bottom feed - no banjo, but with a crank in the copper pipe and a solder nipple & nut. Fortunately, I was able to find one of these on eBay.

Amal 1J float chamber

So with a new float chamber, petrol tap corks and fuel pipe I should be able to solve the fuel leaks.

Apart from the effects of these over-long fuel tank bolts... They are not so much over length, as the fact that four of the rubber tank buffers are missing so that winding them in without paying attention neatly punches a hole in the bottom of the tank...

Villains of the piece

I'll see if a tank liner will do the job.

Meanwhile, I need to get the AOMCC dating certificate going, and get the machine insured.