FH - number plate

 I like hand painted number plates. I like the idea that in the 1950's someone would appear at the motorcycle shop with a tin of paint and sign-write your number plate, just like his Dad did in the 1930's. No sticky laser cut numbers here!

I think it's important to get the font right too - but what am I saying? I've already blogged this here, so I don't have to write it all again!

Here's the template as a word document:

And again, glued to some card and in the process of being cut out:

It's helpful to draw a horizontal line in pencil, perhaps using the rear lamp fixing holes as a guide so you get your letters level. Draw a vertical line in the centre as well and line that up with the middle of one of the letters.

Stick the template to the number plate with a host of small magnets, and using a dark grey spray paint, mist coat the number plate very lightly:

Remove the template and as if by magic you have something you can use to guide your paint brush. Expert sign-writers can ignore these steps!

I used white Hammerite smooth to fill the letters in:

Sorry about the reflections from the desk lamp:

I use Farecla GU10 to remove any stray spots of the mist coat.

Looking good again!

W/NG - Number Plate and Rear Lamp

 For a while I've felt that I wanted to impart a more traditional English look to the back of the W/NG, which for years has worn its Italian number plate and lamp:

I chose the 5647-35 number plate which I found on eBay. It's designed for the flat 'D' mudguard with no rib, so I have cut a notch in it for the rib.

It's got a replica MT110, which would have been a standard fit for civilian machines in-period:

Model A - Front Mudguard

Since the FH is going to need some floor space pretty soon, I will need to move the Model A. I may even move the A onto the bench - we will see. I have had a front mudguard standing in its place for a while, which falls off every time i move the bike, so I really need to get that fixed.

I've had some black mild steel flat bar knocking about which I bought to make mudguard brackets like this and a dose of bending around various bits of scrap (a 6" length of scaffold pole is very useful in the workshop) had it more or less in shape.

The target shape was defined by various AOMCC members, notably Stan, providing pictures of original brackets.

I fitted the front stay first and let that dictate the mudguard's relationship to the wheel rim. I used an electronic level to establish the correct position of the stay, by measuring the angle from pictures of other bikes

The rolled edge of the guard needs to be flattened where the stay fits, in order to accommodate the width of this original stay:

Once I was convinced the guard was in the right place, I drilled the mounting holes to the forks:

Some time on the linisher had the ends rounded off and looking tidy:

In amongst the pile of bits that came with the Model A were both of the original number plate mounts and the number plate.

I placed these using a couple of reference pictures that I got from members of the AOMCC.

Making a number plate

It's getting around to the time the W/NG magneto should be back from refurbishment, so we might be able to ride it soon. Time to make a number plate.

First, you need to find the right font. For our bikes, we need to print the number in Charles Wright Bold, 64 mm high letters. I used this site

https://www.fonts.com/font/k-type/charles-wright/bold

You can type in your number, and the page will display it in the chosen font:

You want to size it to 96 points and capture it using alt-print screen; you can then paste the picture this creates into MSWord. You'll end up with a picture which you can stretch larger - resize so the letters are 64 mm high

Print it out in light grey, so you don't waste lakes of ink. Stick the print on coated paper; it's going to get wet, and you don't want your stencil falling to pieces. I used a discarded magazine cover.

Cut out the letters with a scalpel.

I made a bridge out of the letters to hold the middle of the '8', using double sided tape:

Apply the stencil to the number plate & retain with magnets. The dark shapes are pieces of broken magnet:

When I do this again, I think I will buy some of that magnetized sheet; then I can cut shapes that hold the stencil in place, or maybe I will cut the stencil from magnetic sheet...

Spray the colour of your choice. I used Ford Ivory White, left over from the Bantam tank panels.

Now, before the paint dries fully, remove the stencil and clean up overspray when the paint is hard. I used wire wool and Farecla G3 cutting compound:

It's almost there, but could do with a bit more cleaning up. What I like about this is that the ivory colour and the slightly uneven lettering fits well with the patina of the bike as a whole.

Updating the rear light

One of the things I really liked about this W/NG was the pseudo Italian styling brought about as a result of its resurrection after the war - the red & black paint, the racy downswept bars, the white grips and the vintage style knee rubbers, and of course the rear light.

The rear light, whilst stylish in my eyes was equipped for two festoon type bulbs, and with a 40 W E3HM dynamo this was going to be a problem. In my experience it is easy to get a bright, low current LED for the back but using an LED in the front is less desirable, so, aiming to use my power budget in the front, we need an LED for the rear.

Now, since the light we have is a bit of a pancake (pork pie? cheese?) shape compared to the 529 on the Square Four or the Wipac 'Sabrina' on the Bantam, we can't use a regular bulb holder. In this case I'm going to use an LED light board which I bought from CDRC recently.

To use this we will need to remove the festoon bulb holders. This is as easy as drilling out the rivets:

I don't want to clean any of this up - I like the patina of the old light and the corrosion will not affect function in any way in this case.

So here's a simple group of components - the lens, case, back plate and LED board:

Since the area the rear light fits in the number plate is quite badly damaged, there is limited opportunity for fixing holes. I am going to use an existing one, but since any fastener in this hole will be inaccessible after the light board goes in, we must make it captive. I'll use a small coach bolt, fitted into a square hole in the light unit and retained with cyanoacrylate.

The LED board sits on two brass posts retained with M3 screws, so we need a couple of holes for them. Use a blanking plug to close the spare hole and a grommet to protect the wires.

The cables need to be restrained somehow, so that an inadvertent tug on the wires does not pull on the solder joint to the LED board. To do this, we'll use a tie-wrap to retain the wires to one of the brass posts supporting the light board:

And that's it. Here are a couple of views of the finished article, terminated with Japanese bullets:

Rear End Styling

To me, it always seems a bit of a shame when someone fits a non-period part to a bike that affects the style of it, but sometimes its unavoidable and its only a matter of taste anyway.

One of the things that really appealed to me about this W/NG is that its a unique bike in that it has I think a very Italian flavour to it, despite being a more of less stock W/NG:

Of course, bringing it from Italy it needs to have a UK number plate adding at some point, and the existing Italian style rear light is in poor shape, as is the number plate:

Having looked at a few Guzzi Falcone rear lights, this definitely looks period Italian

I'm inclined to restore this cheapo aftermarket rear light and keep the rear end as-is, but I could fit a period civilian Ariel number plate with an MT110 or similar. The number plate looks very old, so it would be ashame to change it - though obviously the Italian number plate has to go.

Number Plate

This page is a repository for number plate pictures...

Might be useful!

The rear mudguard is 53 3/4" from end to end.

These are from Brenton Roy's 1951 SQ4:

My 1951 SQ4: