My Lockdown Projects

ChasF

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Plenty to choose from. There are 8/9 bikes in my shed, 3 work and are on the road, the others are sadly neglected and have been, to different degrees, for many years due to work and other factors. I’ve spent a few weeks doing some work in the house and having a bit of a sort out in the barns but have now decided to concentrate my efforts on three bikes:

SHERCO 450 ENDURO

2005 Sherco which I bought when it was only 8 months old. It’s fair to say that I was a little naive and have never ceased to be amazed at how much the previous owner managed to fuck up in his relatively short ownership. The bike has been incredibly unreliable and I’ve had the engine out and in bits on several occasions. The last time out a few years ago it snapped a valve spring - I could only determine this by taking the engine out to get the cambox off. The other issue with Sherco is getting hold of parts. Eventually, I decided to pull the whole thing to pieces and repaint the frame a couple of years ago and it has just lurked in a corner since then.

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So a couple of hours of focused sorting out and cleaning

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And we end up with a basic rolling chassis

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It may look ready to go but all the linkage bearings and seals need to be replaced so I’ve ordered the parts and put the chassis to one side awaiting parts and space on the bike lift.

Next job was to sort out the ‘simplified’ modified wiring loom.

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This is only part of it and not the worst part. I managed to find a wiring diagram which shows the pinout on the ECU but doesn’t show any wire colours so a couple of hours matching things up, hacking out some of the modifications - the map switch on the throttle had been rewired as a kill switch but I never realised this as the switch is closed in either position! More work to be done and again waiting for some prewired superseal type connectors. Life’s too short to fiddled around with tiny crimps so I use prewired connectors then solder and sleeve them.

Next job is to clean the engine up in preparation for new parts arriving soon, hopefully.

BMW R80G/S

Again, long neglected. I have fitted the DRZ forks and need to finish fitting the extended monolever. I spent yesterday afternoon getting it running as I realised it hasn’t actually fired up for about 4 years. Anyway, after finding a suitable battery and nicking the starter relay from another bike it fired up easily enough.

BSA A10

Destined for a complete refurb at some point but at the moment the idea is to getting the engine running. Photos to follow
 
Have you started yet?

We don’t want another multi year project, I’m bad enough without another one :D
 
Have you started yet?

We don’t want another multi year project, I’m bad enough without another one :D

I thought I was doing alright, the Sherco is progressed as far as poss until the parts arrive, the BM fires up which in itself fixed or reminded me to fix a number of other issues and the BSA is waiting on gaskets and silicon gasket maker stuff.

My problem is staying focussed as these three bikes are the tip of the iceberg that is my outstanding job list. Went out to the barn this morning planning to reassemble the monolever but then noticed a little problem with a bicycle I sorted out last week for sale when the lockdown allows, then my compressor started playing up, then put the battery back in the bike I nicked from on Saturday to start the R80 etc etc - so the shaft didn’t even get a look in.
 
I’m waiting for a reg/rec and throttle cables for the Norton, a mini shot blaster to arrive so I can get rid of the overspray inside the tank of my Montjuic and inspiration to arrive so I can move other bikes out of the garage and fit new chain and sprockets on the outfit :blast

I’m playing a long game with the outfit because if I succeed in getting the Norton charging system to work and the mixture right it’ll be moved from the workshop to the garage where I can illegally road test it before returning it to the workshop to waste at least a year trying to put right any issues the road test throws up and the outfit needs moving to get the Norton through :D

Focus?
 
Well, todays lan went all to cock. Didn’t even look at the BM shaft but once other distractions were dealt with I started on he BSA. Fist job was to strip the oil pump which turned out to be very clean and in good order. Next job was to try to fit the rockerbox

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Gaskets in place with a smear of Blue Hylomar. I’ve never bothered with a ‘comb’ which positions the pushrods so that they line up with the rocker arms, however, this time it proved somewhat more fiddly than I remember, either that or my fat fingers have got even fatter, or more arthritic.

If I don’t find another distraction I’ll be sorting this out in the morning.
 


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