Saturday April 26th 2025

Saturday April 26th 2025

 KZ550 Limited

At today’s session efforts were made to get the bike running, but the bike was having none of it, despite the use of a battery pack to keep the starter turning over enthusiastically. At low revs a nasty little clacking noise was causing Graham concern.  There was fuel and there was a spark but something was very definitely not right.  Had the cam chain tensioner not done its job and had it allowed the cam chain to jump a few teeth on the camshaft sprockets.  The rocker cover really needed to come back off just to be on the safe side.

Suzuki GSF1200 Bandit

Today began by attaching the dummy fuel tank to see if the carburettors would leak again or not.  Unfortunately it soon became apparent that No 4. Carb was leaking and No 2 was leaking big time.   Guy and Don set about removing the carbs from the bike to try and determine what was wrong.  The float heights are difficult to measure on this particular bike because the floats attach to plastic assemblies that aren’t clamped tightly in the carburettor until the float bowl is fully tightened up. Carefully tipping the upturned carbs so the floats weren’t depressing the springs in the need valves and then holding the float assembly in place allowed the float heights to be checked with a fair degree of accuracy.  After a little tinkering all were found to be  close to the 14.6mm specification found in our Clymer workshop manual.  The carbs were then re-assembled and taken outside to be filled with fuel to see if this had cured the overflowing fuel. Sure enough carbs two and four continued to leak.  As Graham examined the carbs he noticed that the rubber gaskets that were supposed to seal the gap between the float bowl and the bottom surface of the carburettor bodies of those carbs were in fact poking out the side and were not in their correct place and were causing the leakage.  Guy and Don set about getting them correctly fitted. A further test using the dummy fuel tank to fill the carbs with fuel was conducted and this time there was no leakage to be seen.   Graham then offered to help attach the throttle cables to  mounting points on the throttle linkage. Then the team now including Don, Guy and Steve wrestled the carburettors back into place. It was now that they kindly showed huge restraint by not giving Graham huge dollops of verbal abuse when it became apparent that the opening and closing cables were attached in the wrong places and needed to be reversed in order for the throttle to work in the correct direction.  Swapping them over meant removing the carbs once more, switching the cables at the carburetor end and then putting the carbs back on once more.  The team had become quite adept at re-nstalling the carburettors and graciously got on with refitting them. After a bit of struggle everything came together and the carbs were safely refitted.  In addition to this Steve W had fitted the replacement ignition switch Graham had obtained as part of a kit also comprising a replacement fuel tank cap and a new seat lock as well as the new ignition lock. This meant that one key would still fit all the bike’s locks.  Stainless steel exhaust studs and nuts had been obtained and when last seen were laying with the bike in a clear plastic bag under the bike waiting to be installed.

Ducati 250cc Single Racer.

Jon worked to get the bike mechanically ready whilst Andy worked on polishing its lovely red fuel tank. Jon spent time making initial designs for a battery mounting and found a home for the ignition unit under the front of the seat.  The timing would have to be set when the bike was eventually fired up but things were going well and moving to a conclusion.  A couple of other issues would also need to be attended to.  A fuel tap would have to be found and a clutch cable installed, this would most likely have to be made up, which didn’t look too difficult as a solderless nipple would fit nicely in the clutch actuating arm. 

Honda Deauville

Carl, the bike’s new owner and Keiran spent time fettling the bike.  A new rear disc would have to be found but Keiran had kindly offered to donate a few parts from his own Deaville so this wasn’t going to present a problem. The swinging arm and final drive case were cleaned up till they shone .  Carl worked hard removing corrosion from parts using the blasting cabinet under Keiran’s watchful eye.  A replacement battery would be coming from Keiran’s donor bike to.

Z250 Scorpion.

Keiran continued to work on the Z250 painting a bit here, painting a bit there (The black painted cylinders look superb!)  and was then busy installed the new aftermarket one size fits all headlight, which actually does a very good impression of the original item. Would further painting and refinishing be required - watch this space.

Mash 400 Dirtstar

Maybe the Mash isn’t as mashed up as we first thought.  When Graham took four valve inspection caps off he found that three of the valves had gaps that felt right.  However the forth valve (The right hand exhaust valve) had a whopping great gap of about a quarter of an inch.  It quickly became apparent that its adjuster nut wasn’t done up tight and the adjuster had been slowly unscrewing itself. Once the valve adjuster was roughly reset a battery was attached to the bike with jump leads, but again it failed to turn the engine over at sufficient speed for it to have a hope of starting. A suitable spark plug socket could not be found.  Nothing in the workshop would fit through the tiny hole around the spark plug, so it could be removed and checked.  A socket would have to be tracked down.   In the blink of an eye both wheels were removed from the bike and Rory set about cleaning up the spokes, making sure the wheels ran true and identifying  the new parts that would be required to keep the wheels turning.