Teen Tom Dunhill’s bedroom carpet is more cluttered than most – with a BSA B44
Teenagers eh? They leave dirty clothes all over the floor. Dried out pizzas under the bed. But not this lad. He’s gone a step further, with a B44 restoration on his bedroom carpet
IT’S AUGUST 2018 and an email arrives from Nick Dunhill, a CB reader. Nick says: ‘Hi Gary, I bought your August edition to read on the beach and it got me thinking. My son Tom (he’s 15) and I are restoring a repatriated 1969 BSA B44 Victor Special. We’re doing as much of the work as possible, but due to our lack of workshop facilities we’re using a local classic bike restorer’s expertise too.
Tom’s very enthusiastic, quickly learning the art of restoration, and the finished elements of the bike reside in his bedroom. We’ve carefully documented the rebuild so far with lots of pictures and wondered if you’d be interested in using it for a future article?’
Fast forward to the present day and the project is nearly there – they had hoped to nail it in time to get the finished bike in this ‘young guns’ issue, but, as if often the case, unforeseen issues have delayed the completion date.
Tom has written up the entire experience in his own words, starting over the page...
I’ve had an interest in bikes for most of my life. This is probably because my dad and grandad have always had bikes, plus my uncle and cousin are keen motorcyclists, too. I was also taken to a number of bike shows and shops from an early age.
Me and my dad had wanted to restore a bike between us for a long time. When my dad was working at university, he restored a BSA C15 as an everyday rider. He followed that up with an A65T and a T150V Triumph Trident to high standards. This background, combined with the fact that we had a garage large enough to carry out a restoration, meant the only thing we were missing was a bike to restore.
So when my dad saw a BSA Victor Special for sale, he bought it as a joint present for my fifteenth birthday. We haggled with the dealer and he threw in a few spare parts as well. We thought a Victor would be a good choice, as my dad had already restored a unit single and knew a bit about them. Also, having matching numbers and being quite rare, the finished bike would be worth something like the cost of the restoration.
We wanted a BSA because they’re British and once dominated the world market. My family also has a long history with BSA bikes; it’s my grandad’s preferred brand, as well as the last bike he owned before giving them up. And as I previously mentioned, my dad had restored BSAS before. They are also famously few of parts and easy to assemble, so my dad thought it would be the perfect bike for a beginner like me to start on. Not only that, lots of the parts are still available through the network of specialists in the UK, and of course the world via the internet.
About a week after my fifteenth birthday, the bike arrived at our garage. After taking several photographs of me sitting on it, we began to strip it down. The process was much simpler than we had anticipated; the bike came apart with very few problems – and those problems could be solved with a hammer and easing oil! However, during the process we noticed that the frame had cracked near the footrests and one of the fork sliders had split (presumably due to water ingress and subsequent freezing). Other than that, many of the parts were original and salvageable.
To remove the oil tank we needed to drain the oil, but we found it empty except for small pebbles and with a split filter gauze. When we took the sump plate and gauze off the engine, we found a gudgeon pin circlip and a bit of broken piston ring, but very little oil. The petrol
‘WHEN MY DAD SAW A BSA VICTOR SPECIAL FOR SALE, HE BOUGHT IT AS A JOINT PRESENT FOR MY 15TH BIRTHDAY’
Some of the issues Tom and his dad Nick faced in the process of restoring the bike, including repairing the cracked frame (above) and a broken piston ring in the oil (below)
A lot of time was spent hunting parts and waiting for others to come back from refurbishment. The chainguard (right) was a lucky find – it’s a repro for an Enduro model
tank was original, but had plenty of dents and scrapes. It had been repainted an odd green colour, but the original yellow BSA paint was underneath. The seat base was a bit rusty and had a couple of splits, but was salvageable (and my dad said that new pattern ones seldom fitted, anyway). The seat cover and foam were original, although they were very tired and worn.
The original wiring loom, headlight and switchgear was long gone, and the electrical components were connected with a minimal amount of wires – all of the same colour. The battery tray was missing and the battery had been replaced by a factory capacitor, suggesting the bike may have been used as a competition bike. The exhaust pipe was original – it had a BSA B44 stamp on the outside and a mouse nest on the inside, but it was in suitable condition for rechroming. The silencer, however, had disappeared.
The front mudguard was original but beyond repair, and the rear was from another bike. The front wheel rim was rusted through and the rear was an original Jones rim in good condition but off a Victor Roadster (we sold it on ebay to raise money for a replacement.) Both brake hubs were correct and salvageable.
We stripped everything off the frame and sent it away for repairs and powder coating. The rest of the parts were separated into scrap and bits to be reconditioned. We don’t have a workshop, so the plan was to do as much as we could at home and farm out the parts for repair, reconditioning and refinishing, then reassemble the bike in our attic, which is also my bedroom – it seemed like a good idea at the time!
We found a local mechanic and British bike specialist in Rotherham to help us along the way. He’s called Mick Goddard, he trades as RM Services and has been really helpful, offering assistance and advice, and carrying out work we couldn’t do at home.
Most of the time that’s elapsed on the restoration has been spent waiting for parts to be repaired, delivered or painted. This was largely due to some of the parts being almost impossible to find (and the fact that most of the parts we found needed to be repaired, modified or painted). Despite this, my bedroom soon became full of stuff for the bike, which meant that I couldn’t leave my room without standing on something both expensive and sharp [makes a change from standing on Lego bricks, Tom – dad].
Burton Bike bits had a rare side panel for a ’69-’70 model and an appropriate headlamp shell. The burst fork slider was a goner, but the internet came up trumps – we managed to find an NOS fork slider and a pair of headlamp brackets/ears at Mike’s Classic Cycle Spares in Australia. The rest of the internal fork parts are all service parts and came mainly from Draganfly Motorcycles or Feked Classic Bike Parts here in the UK.
The forks were reconditioned by Mick, and the finished forks, headlamp and brackets, side panel and oil tank were all sent off to the Accident Repair Centre paint shop in Sheffield for black paint. We wanted a bit of contrast between the black of the powder-coated frame and that of the forks, etc, and we figured the factory finish would be like that. The Accident Repair Centre also applied some transfers to the bike where appropriate and lacquered over them.
We drilled the rear mudguard, which came from Autocycle Engineering, and sent it to Prestige plating in Mexborough. The front ’guard is a repro from Burton Bike Bits. The wheels were rebuilt using parts from Central Wheel Components, Feked and Draganfly. We tried to re-use as many of the original fasteners as possible – not just on the wheels, but also throughout the whole bike. Lots of them were replated at a company in Sheffield called Northern Blackening, although many were also replaced with stainless items from CPC Engineering and Middletons.
The other parts that proved tricky to find were the silencer and chainguard. We chanced upon a silencer on Armour Motor Products’ website, listed under the wrong model. As for the chainguard, we could have bought a rusty, split original from the USA via ebay, but the fact that it would have ended up costing almost £350 (including shipping, tax, repairs, etc) that put us off. A chance meeting with Dave Smith (aka Rupert Ratio) at the Stafford show revealed that the Victor Enduro guard was the same pressing as the Victor Special item. Ripe
‘MY BEDROOM WAS FULL OF THINGS FOR THE BIKE. I WAS ALWAYS STANDING ON STUFF’
Motorcycles were selling repros for an Enduro for £130, so we bought one and Mick reconfigured the brackets for us. The speedometer was another problem that needed to be addressed, namely the bike didn’t have one. We found an original, reconditioned unit at Classic Speedometers in Worksop.
The tank went to Dent Removal Services in Pickering, where it was stripped and a big hole was discovered in the tunnel for the mounting bolt. The tunnel was cut out, the hole welded up and then it was reattached, making a great job of it. When it had been repainted by ARC, it looked a million dollars. Stephen Smethurst is a magician in Salford who makes alloy castings look brand new – he did our brake plates, rear light casting and primary drive cover.
The seat was recovered for us by Leightons in Birmingham. Martrim in Crewe sell some charcoal grey perforated material that we used – it’s very close to the unobtainable original seat cover. My mum bought my dad a wiring harness for Christmas 2018 and by then we had pretty much everything we need.
We started reassembly on a hot summer’s day on the garden table, pretty much as soon as the frame came back from the powder coaters. The first part that we attached were the Oddie clips with a pop-rivet gun – not that exciting, but you have to start somewhere. We then attached the battery tray, the brake pedal and the footrests as well as a number of mounting bolts that we left in their correct brackets for safe keeping. Next we installed the swingarm. Mick had replaced the
Silentbloc bearings, and reamed them to fit. This was one of the harder parts to attach to the frame, because we had to tighten the bolt through the swingarm very tight indeed. Mick lent us a very long spanner to do it! We proudly carried the completed basic frame with the swingarm up the stairs to my bedroom without putting a hole in the wall or tearing any wallpaper.
Mick also pressed the steering head bearings in place and the top and bottom yokes were fitted with plenty of greasy balls. The next obvious parts to fit was the forks. This wasn’t particularly difficult, but we had to do it twice because we had forgot to put a spacer in between the yoke and the fork springs. I watched my dad struggle
‘WE WANTED TO RESTORE A CLASSIC BIKE TOGETHER. IT WAS A FUN, EDUCATING EXPERIENCE FOR ME’
to get the forks through both yokes against the external fork springs. I read the BSA manual and realised that there was a service tool available to help with this task – after we got one, the job became very simple.
We spent a couple of days connecting up the wiring. It is very simple, but it’s important that everything is positioned properly so no strain is put on the connectors. There seemed to be an awful lot of wiring in the headlamp! Maybe at some time in the future we’ll fit indicators – I think it’d make the bike more suitable for riding in a big city.
Mick cleaned up the body of the Amal Concentric carb for us in his ultrasonic bath. It looked very new, and my dad bought a lot of new jets and sliders for it. I reassembled it myself and reset the float heights using a simple tool Mick made for me.
The rest of the cycle parts went on without much problem. The mudguards and wheels were easy to fit, and the original seat base fitted first time, too. The side panel was more difficult – we had to do a fair bit of work with a knocking stick on the frame brackets! The oil tank went on and we were just about there.
All that’s left now is to get the engine finished – it’s been dismantled and examined, but the guy who will be reassembling it has been taken ill, so there’s been a delay. The cylinder head is completely worn out and everything needs replacing, but the cylinder had been bored out to +0.0060in with a brand new piston and barely used since – you could still see the honing marks. The crank has been sent off for regrinding and the big-end bearings will need replacing. The covers have been sent to another specialist for reconditioning and polishing.
All the contents of the primary chaincase have seen better days – my dad reckons the primary chain had broken at some point and the hole in the primary cover had been its escape route.
As regards how we’re going to get the bike out of my bedroom when it’s finished, my dad has a choice of two plans: a) we take the roof off the house (he hasn’t run that one past my mum yet) or b) the engine turns up on a glorious spring day, we partly dismantle the bike, carry it downstairs (with the wallpaper remaining undamaged) and reassemble it outside in the sunshine. He admits that both of them sound like fantasies, but he did manage to carry out a plan b) in the 2000s with a BSA A65T, which descended from the attic to behind our sofa in the sitting room for a week or so.
I’m really looking forward to having my fillings shaken out riding such a brilliant example of our British motorcycling past. I definitely plan to ride the bike, but because its 440cc I’m not old enough to do it legally on the road yet, so I might suggest selling it and buy something that I can ride. My dad, however, says he might sell his modern Triumph and use the money to buy a bike for me. My mum is totally against me owning a bike at all, whether it’s a classic from the ’60s or not; until recently, she assumed that we planned to sell it once we knew that it worked.
The thing to remember is that me and my dad did this because we wanted to restore a classic bike together, what we restored didn’t matter too much. It was a really fun, educating experience for someone of my age. It also helped me in my sixth-form BTEC Engineering course, because I’m now familiar with lots of the tools and machinery we use in the workshop. I’d love to do another project once we’ve finished this one.’
The build progresses from a frame on the garden table to a nearly finished machine in Tom’s bedroom, via help from the workshop manual and plenty of spannering.