Session 9: Mudguard

At the bottom of the picture, the protrusion
from the frame is what the bolt bolts into.

I have removed the rear mudguard for some attention. It is very simple to do, as there are only 4/5 bolts holding it on, one of which I have removed already with the oil tank. There is a bolt on the left hand side holding it onto the frame, which should be removed. Be careful that the spacer doesn't get lost.






Then remove the two bolts under the seat holding it onto the frame. I didn't have any more bolts to undo, but check to see just in case. Lift the mudguard up to see the wire. There are two wires running from the main loom into the mudguard, one brown and one black. There should be a bullet plug in each at the bike end, which should be disconnected. The mudguard then  lifts out.

 On the underside, I noticed that the screw heads have red paint on them. This might be another indication of the mudguard having been resprayed.






Undo the 4 screws holding the light/number plate unit on, and remove the whole assembly.






 Carefully, peel the rubber on the reflector back from the silver ring, and remove the silver piece and reflector. there should be a small bolt behind, holding it onto the mudguard. Undo this and remove the reflector.

I spent 2 hours cleaning all the muck off it, and discovered an interesting fact. Where the paint was peeling, what looks to be chroming is showing through. This solves a long standing question of why the bike had a painted rear mudguard, and whether that was just an option when new, as it must have been chrome in its past life.

Chrome peeking through

 I have sent an enquiry to a local chroming place to see roughly how much it will cost to get this rechromed, so hopefully that will give me some idea, but before then, I want to try and get it shaped as well as I can.



I have used paint stripper to get all the paint off, revealing the chrome. I can now work on knocking out dents and reshaping without worrying about forcing specks of paint into the metal.

Session 7: Primer Etching

The inside finished.

I used coarse grit (about 80) wet and dry to sand away the inside of the cover, which was a lot harder to do than the outside. Not only was there more rust, but the shape of it meant that it was more difficult to sand, but I eventually finished.

The outside finished.

I finished the outside in the previous session.

Using a carefully constructed jig, consisting of some bent wire and an old lawnmower cable, and a guttering, I hung the cover outside. 

The outside sprayed.

I then used spray on primer etcher to coat the whole cover in a thin layer. Due to the slightly addictive nature of spray painting, I may have done it a bit thick.







On the inside, the metal loop caused me some trouble, as I couldn't see underneath it to check it was painted, so I put slightly too much on in that area. There is a small run, but it is on the inside, and can easily be sanded off.



All in all, this has been a successful exercise, and I now know what to do for the other parts that need painting. In September, I will finish this cover, and start on the oil tank.

On a completely unrelated note, I have found a parts supplier. Draganfly Motorcycles appear to sell most of the parts we need, and will probably be our source of parts. they sell a repair kit that exactly suits the gear selector shaft for this bike, which will make life easier.

Session 6: Sanding

It's been some time since my last post, i've been sidetracked with other things. I'm going on holiday next week, but will try and keep doing a bit when I can.

I wrote to the BSA owners club a few weeks ago, but managed to send them the front lug casting number instead of the frame number, which was a bit of a rookie error. I corrected the problem, and they have replied with the following information:

"I can confirm that a machine with this frame number was despatched as a 250cc C15 Sports Star 80 to W L Lewis and Sons Ltd, Weybridge, Surrey on the 5th December 1961. It was finished in Black.

It still retains its original motor."

This begs the question as to why the colour was changed from black to red, but that is a question for another day.

Black paint peeking through the red

I have started sanding the battery cover as a test piece, to repaint it. I am using 240 and 320 grit wet and dry paper, wet, to remove any traces of rust and to smooth the outside. While sanding, I got another indication that it used to be black, as the original paint started to show through. There are small pockmarks of rust all over the cover, so I have been scraping around them, to ensure all the rust is visible, before sanding it off.

My setup: cover, paper and water.

Inside

Outside

These pictures show the battery cover before I started sanding, for reference. The inside is very rusted, and will probably all need sanding off. The outside has lots of small pockmarks, but is largely fine.






This is an intermediate step, where I have started to expose and sand off the rust.






I have finished sanding the outside, and will start on the inside tomorrow. I have smoothed it all out, and got rid of any trace of rust. The picture below shows the finished product, and confirms that the bike was originally black.

The outside finished.