LITTLE THINGS PLEASE…
Modern fuels can do strange things – and no, this is not a rant about fuels. Fuels rush in, as they say, so we can rush around in our turn. They are what they are. Grumbling will not bring back high-test 5-star any more than it will clear the roads of HGVs, vans, 4x4s, Audis … name your favourite. Nope, this is a faintly unexpected discovery. It may be unique to my own bikes, because I’ve not discussed it with anyone else, but it may not. Modern fuels seem to do strange things to old-fashioned push’n’twist filler caps.
A minor oddness of the rebuilder’s life – this rebuilder at any rate – is that I rarely replace filler caps, oil or fuel. Plainly they had decent chrome when new, or were endlessly polished by enthusiastic riders enthusiastically filling up a lot. The filler on The Shed’s resident BSA B25SS, for example, is vaguely rusty and a little scratched, but other than that it’s cosmetically OK. But it is somehow increasingly stiff in operation. It feels tight and is reluctant to seal. Maybe it will get better, easier as the miles mount. If indeed mount they do, which is a moot point here at the moment.
It’s a similar thing over in the 1965 Matchless G80 camp. As well as being similarly stiff and clumsy and vaguely tight in operation, this one is also very rusty. But it is the original cap, and I have a bizarre penchant for retaining a few bits of a bike’s earlier days after it’s been dragged from decades of neglect and rusty ruin, ready to retake its place on the highway … hopefully.
That said, the filler cap is a pretty prominent feature in the rider’s eyeline. The original Matchless filler is a device made with a slight dome, and all the time since its rebuild I’ve been vaguely looking for another. Sadly, so far I’d only found caps with flat tops. And yes, of course I know how absurd it is to waste time looking around at fuel filler caps. If that’s the only thing a chap need worry about then the world is plainly a happy place.
And then… And then… I saw an ad for a domed filler cap. I was amazed. It cost at least twice as much as a flat one and there was a long delivery time. But… it’s made in the UK, in Wolverhampton in fact. I ordered one, in the meantime tolerating the G80s’s increasingly stiff filler. Why would increased use make it get more stiff instead of less? That is, as the modernists say, counter-intuitive.
Finally, after a surprisingly long wait, the cap arrived. It looks brilliant. The dome rounds it off (sorry) perfectly. And it fits perfectly, looks perfect, and is perfectly smooth in operation. And underneath is a little set of stamped letters revealing that it was indeed made in Wolverhampton. Let’s see how well it fares with modern fuels, then. Whether it gets stiff, clumsy and awkward. My bet is that it will outlast the rest of the bike. Little things please…
Enjoy Christmas and ride safely!