SUZUKI B120P
Pip Higham with trials and tribulations of this rebuild.
Istarted to hanker after a Bloop a few months ago. I’d sold a lot of them back in the 1970s and, apart from one failed main bearing, I had never had a mechanical failure, even on examples that had been hugely abused both on, and off road.
Starting in 1966 the basic format remained for the life of the bike. Why? Because it was tough. The frame and forks are simple but strong, and the beating heart is a pearler, with a weighty flywheel sitting on a substantial crank with ball and roller bearings of a size more usually seen on 500cc bikes. The Bloop can handle incredible amounts of abuse. After a few days I located a low-mileage bike (775 miles to be precise) just up the road in Chorley. But don’t be misled by the minimal mileage, the poor bike was pretty rough with none of the electrics working, it had a dislocated rear mudguard and lots of rust and corrosion. But it was complete,
it ran, if a little noisily, and I could see it had potential. The owner mentioned in passing that there was no V5, but what could possibly go wrong? More on that later.
Taking a B120 to bits is a doddle, and in this respect all went well. I’d run the motor for a few minutes and apart from a blowing exhaust it seemed to run well. I dropped out the gearbox oil and although it was mucky, there was very little debris in there, certainly not enough to raise any concerns. As I went along I tidied up all the nuts, bolts and spacers and popped them in a box ready to be plated. All the sheet metal went into a separate box to be blasted. There were a couple of minor dents and scrapes to repair, but not much of consequence. I removed all the cables and suspended them so that I could run a
bit of WD through them, followed by 3-in-one. I might change them in the future, but they look fair so far. The wiring to the handlebar switches and indicators was pretty well mashed. The fitting of the rear indicators was always suspect. If the mudguard bolts – which doubled up as fixings for the indicators – came loose, the wires would be cut through by the rear mudguard, which had now turned into a guillotine. Of course, the ensuing short circuit would account for the failure of the rest of the electrical system, but an easy fix.
I was also compiling a box of bits to take to John the polisher: engine sidecovers, switch housings and carburettor side covers. Those plus a few bits to be chromed. I was determined to keep the costs down as this bike was destined to be
used, it was never going to be for show. So the chrome list was very short:, exhaust pipe, fork top bolts, fork seal holders and the rear damper covers. I’d clean the rest of the bits wherever possible. At this stage I wasn’t sure what I would do with the silencer. Surely I could find one in good nick: surely!
With the sheet metal blasted I whipped it off to Pete Priest for a dose of paint. I’m no good at that sort of thing and he is, so that was a simple decision. We chatted about the colour for a while and took a decision to keep it fairly standard, but on my way home I saw a lovely bright blue Transit van (I kid you not!), When I told Pete I’d had a change of heart he just went with it, even though we’d just spent an hour and two brews on a totally different finish. He’s a pretty laid back sort of guy.
I had agonised over what to do with the front mudguard. It should be chrome, but I thought it would look pretty good painted. To be honest I’m not a big fan of chrome at the best of times and tend to keep it to the absolute minimum wherever possible. I still had the silencer propped up in the corner of my shed though. I couldn’t paint that rascal!
As the hubs are painted on the 120 and the rims were pretty stuffed I stripped the wheels, chucked the tyres and dispatched the spokes and nipples, along with the rest of the hardware to Karas Plating Ltd. to be zinc plated. Karas have done some lovely work for me over the last few years and I was sad to hear that they had decided to pack in doing bike parts. They had reluctantly made this decision purely based on the length of time spent wiring and collating parts... bother! I’ll have to find somewhere else now. I’m sure that Steve Cooper and Ralph Ferrand will help with that one, I hope.
I collected the plating, polishing and painted bits a couple of weeks later and as usual they were all done to the standard that help to make a little job like this so much easier and very rewarding. I started on the wheels by plonking the hubs to warm up on my trusty Ufesa; not too hot
mind! Just uncomfortable to touch, as I didn’t want to discolour Pete’s lovely paintwork, he’d shoot me! At this temperature the new wheel bearings drop in beautifully and I start to distribute the spokes around the hub in the correct orientation. The critical bit is to fit the spokes with the lesser bend from the outside hub face, and the ones with the more acute angle go in last from the inside face of the hub flange. I had a couple of new 17-inch rims under the bench with the right configuration (stroke of luck!) and I started to lace up the rims as I had done many, many times before.
Almost at once things took a bad turn. The nipples were either loose or too tight or occasionally correct fitting. Had the plating taken its toll on the near 50-yearold spokes? Oh dear I thought, and had a cup of tea and a biscuit.
At that point I picked up my
micrometer and measured the diameter of a few of the spokes. Well, blow me down and call me Baldy, there was a discrepancy. Some were 2.85mm and others were 3.15mm. The penny dropped. The rears were a full 0.3mm greater in diameter than the fronts and, of course, the nipples were similarly different in internal diameter. I stripped down the partly built first wheel and went through all 72 spokes and 72 nipples to arrange them in the right fashion, what a dunce!
I had encountered different gauge spokes previously, but obviously my geriatric eyes missed the spot this time. Lesson learnt, I built up both wheels and had them all trued up before pie o’clock. New tyres, tubes and rim tapes were fitted, ribbed front and block pattern rear as original. I tend to inflate first with no valve, deflate quickly, then install the Schrader valve before the final inflation, as this just helps to organise the tube and eliminate wrinkles.
Pete had painted the bottom yoke, brake pedal and foot-peg bar black for me so after meticulously cleaning the cups, cones and balls, I greased up all three and assembled the yoke into the frame. I’d completely stripped the forks so Pete could shoot the lowers and to enable me to get the seal holders plated. I’d popped out the seals very carefully and polished up the outers of the holders with some emery in my lathe. These were in a right state, but after an hour or so I’d shifted all the pitting and they were spot on for
plating. New ones are Brewsters and after chroming they look just dandy. I even re-used the original seals. I know, I know. But in my defence they were soft and I have to say I love OEM stuff, so in they went, pressed back in very carefully and dead square. Thanks to the full coverage fork shrouds and the minimal mileage, the fork tubes were mint. I polished them up with Scotch Brite and I reckon they’re good for another 50 years!
At this stage the basic chassis was pretty close, but I still had no idea what to do about the silencer. The saga of the V5 was about to unravel in a fairly uncomfortable fashion; choppy waters lay ahead.