Paint Dust

If you've ever done any spraying you'll know that paint dust gets absolutely everywhere. It just seems no matter how you cover up the work bench and stuff in the garage......... it will still end up covered in dust.

Saturday ............ the panelwork needs a final coat of primer before applying the top coat.

So Saturday morning was spent creating lots of grey dust everywhere!.


Then Saturday afternoon, I nipped over Newark to see fellow blogster Chris Taylor and laugh at ... sorry ... inspect the damage to his crashed bike. Oulton was an eventful weekend for him ( check out his blog! ) and I'd offered to try and help him straighten out the rear frame, so there we were in his garage, with a Spear & Jackson lawn edger (nothing but the best) wedged between tyre and rear frame.

Chris held it solid whilst I applied some gentle leverage (!) and in a flash it was all more or less straight!..... Will the panels fit though? Well bizarrely the left hand panel now seems to fit a little better, whilst the right hand would fit, except that the exhaust muffler had been bent in and dented the panel right near the clip bracket...... so...... a hammer, and couple of blocks of wood soon sorte dthat out...... although in the process I managed to find a thick chunk of filler on Chris's panels, which cracked, split and fell off.

He was actually not really too bothered as long as his name was still in tact! Theres vanity for you. I think its so the marshall know his name as they pick the bike up.... again.

So.............. Chris's bike straightened then its back home to apply the green top coat....... should really have left to dry a little longer, but patience is not my strongest point at times!











So............. mix up the two pack paint............. dust sheets everywhere, heater on, lights on, compressor on and away we go!

Brakes !!!!!

Well....... brakes were the thing last week....... well lack of brakes anyway!

The front brake had been sticking on..... which of course is not a good thing!. The ScootRS/ Nissin set up was rand new, but had been sat in teh garage for 18 months...... to cut a long week short, I'd tried all sorts, bled, re-bled, stripped teh caliper, all to no avail.


I really needed to get it fixed as it was preventing progress and stressing me out. Trouble was it was Oulton Park........... do I miss Outon to try and fix the brake? Well no.... what I decided to do was get the van from work and take the scooter up to Oulton...... may as well work on it there as at home!?

So Staurday morning came and there I was trundling up to Oulton with the scooter in the back. Jason Frost was taking me a spare caliper to try, and obviously theres a paddock full of brake experts so i felt confident we could get the damn thing sorted.


Plan A - remove the caliper and replace with Jasons spare..... rebleed and see what happens............ guess what ........... no difference!

hhhhhhmmmmmmmm so, a new plan is needed, and up pops young PJ McLaverty.... a brake guru........ after initially much scratching of heads, we decided it simply had to be the master cylinder. So we stripped out the pin and checked the seals, they looked ok - new obviously - so we rebuilt it to what happens...... no change!

The lever just didn't feel right, and then PJ had a light bulb moment - it had to be the seals..... there are two of them, one was working, one wasn't! That just had to be the answer. It was logical to what was happening...... the brake stuck on and then gradully released as the fluid crept back around the seal that was faulty........... had to be the answer!

So back in the van and off to watch the racing............ wow............. just how bloody good was that! Awesome racing all through the field!

Steve Conneely volunteered a loan master cylinder - he uses Gilera Runner ones witha simple modification to allow use on the Lambretta headset. Simply find myself another one to give Steve one back and we'll be sorted!

So, a couple of days later - Gilera cylinder is fitted, brake is bled! PERFECT BRAKES!

So now is time to add the rear set brake and I have a full compliment!

Not too sure I'm going to keep the rear set brake though as I'd also made up a heel operated brake setup..... but was a little unhappy withthe amount of flex, so will probably work on a version 2 in time for Anglesey.

So............................ all ready now for paint!

Brakes ...... too good!?

hhhmmm.... well....... why are things never straight forward in the Lambretta world!?

Front brake is now causing me a right hassle!!

First off, the RS / Nissin master cylinder is not as solid as I'd like on the handlebars, but the main problem is that the bloody brake is sticking on after being applied!  Its very very annoying!

So far we have stripped, cleaned and checked the caliper, yes the pistons were very tight and not moving freely, so we cleaned, soaked the seals and re-assembled - they now move nice and free.... did it cure the problem... well naturally not!   reduced it slightly, but its still there - still sticking on!

so next we check the master cylinder..... all seems ok tehre - pumps and releases fine - theres no kinks in teh hose......

GGGGGGGGRRRRRRRRRRR>>>>>>>>>>>>

Video!

Yes......................... No bodywork................ but it runs!

April

Basically not much happened on the race bike in April!

A number of things got in the way really, first off my road bike had been off the road since November, with Charlie Edmonds having the cylinder, piston and head for a little bit of work on the Mugelo 225!

i picked the barrel up on the first weekend in April, so of course that took a priority!
The newly re-worked barrel was a revelation as soon as I fitted it! As you would expect, Charlie has done a great job - whta he calls a 'fast road' tune, which brings the barrel into well set up TS1 territory. Its very nice to ride, and is very driveable..... not peaky and with a really broad spread of usable power. It brought a smile to my face for sure - and of course ANY opportunity to go out on it was taken!
So a few ride outs with Miles on his Dragster, made for a pleasant month. Miles is a second generation scooterist now! He's happily coming along on his Dragster to ride outs with Grantham Daytrippers Scooter Club!
At a ride out to Gunthorpe Bridge - near Nottingham

April also saw the final snowboarding trip of the year with 5 days in Chamonix. Snow was fantastic for late season! Fresh snow whilst we were there, powder, sun - what more could you ask for!? A somewhat scary moment starting an avalanche off piste and riding off it brought me down to earth though! A VERY scary moment!










Catching an air whilst showing a definite lack of colour co-ordination!









The infamous gully where we had the avalanche moment!










So now we pretty much up to date!

May has seen much more progress - mainly to shut Classic Ed up - his nagging is like being married you know! LOL !

Front Wheel!

So............. here we go with another instalment!

Last post in March was the fitting of new steering brearings ( handily after the frame had been painted!)

Well now finally some GP forks were located, brand new at the bargain price of £50 squid. The damper brackets needed welding on, so mate Dave ( a very handy man to know) sorted out for me, and after some careful measuremts were nicely welded on!

Now............ Hammerite! Not the brush on hammer finish rubbish that Chris Taylor uses ( applied with massive brush) I selected the satin black smoothe finish Hammerite - which kind of seems a contradiction in terms.... but hey.... on withthe plot!

the forks were painted, a set of Taffspeed's finest quality springs were fitted, alongwith all new internals to the forks, all stiffened up with some 12mm stainless steel bushes ( Cheers to Dave - again - a handy bloke to know lol)

the hydraulic outboard disc that was originally due to be fitted to the road bike, has now been diverted to the race bike, and looks mighty fine against the satin black forks!



So now I have a rolling chassis! Which I have to say is quite handy to be able to actually wheel it around the garage! Temporarily the indian welded bent headest is fitted - its destined for the skip once the SX one arrives from a mate who's replacing it with a chrome GP one! Handily he gave the SX one to me!



The side panels are now painted in primer, the petrol tank is painted ( satin black) and fitted with all new rubbers........... then.......... oh bugger........... the petrol tank cap is a crappy locking Indian thing, which doesn't actually fit properly! Oh well............ add it to the list of odds and ends which is building up! ho hum!

So............. now I had some progress I could go play in the snow with a clearer conscience ......... actually I had no conscience about it whatsoever! ...... i was offered an all expenses 4 days in Val D'Isere....... no contest really lol
So off i went.............................................................

Side panels!

Wow....... How time has flown. It's over two months since the last update. It's easy to start these things with every good intention, but theres so many things that have got in the way...... still, as 'er indoors repeatedly tells me I do far too many things!

So........ whats been happening since the last time? Well...... its been slow, but quite a lot actually, so I'll try and bring you a ( roughly) chronological update!

First - some side panels arrived! Carl Neath ( I will not say a word about a 70's pop family!) donated me a slightly worse for wear set!

So sometime in early March the old numbers ( cloth tape) were removed and the tedious process of rubbing down and filling with filler ready for priming started! The panels needed lots of iller, and also several additions of fibreglass and resin underneath to strengthen the weak points - of which there were many! Removal of the white backgrounds revealed a nice '80's fluorescent ref underneath!