RICKMAN MÉTISSE
If the challenge of renovating a 50 year old classic motorcycle isn’t enough, you could always take on a basketcase of disassembled bits. To make life even more interesting, Ian Copcutt’s project started life as a special, fitted with an entirely differen
If the challenge of renovating a 50 year old classic motorcycle isn’t enough, you could always take on a basketcase of disassembled bits. To make life even more interesting, Ian Copcutt’s project started life as a special, fitted with an entirely different engine…
Once upon a time… a friend had a petite Métisse rolling chassis which never quite got built. After 20 years he sold it to me. I had a spare BSA WD B40 motor tuned to SS90 specification which I fancied would fit. Then it occurred to me that a Triumph unit T100A motor would also fit – and then a new motorcycling acquaintance mentioned that a mate of his also had a Rickman Métisse, this one with a Triumph engine already fitted. It was in bits and he’d lost interest. You have to go and have a look, don’t you? Inevitably I parted with cash and had me a basketcase Métisse.
It’s funny really; I never liked jigsaw puzzles and I dislike artificial problem solving, but a real problem is another matter. On inspection the bike was pretty well all there. There was no petrol tank. The engine had been stored in a leaky shed and water had got into one of the cylinders. The motor had been stripped and the only real damage was a corroded bore. There were new +0.060” pistons, but the bore had not cleaned up at that size so the project had been shelved. I figured there must be a barrel out there somewhere. There were quite a few new parts: new valves; the head had been vapour blasted, new valve springs and some more bits including a gasket set.
Whoever took the motor apart had been quite systematic and most of it had been bagged up and stored in some sensible order. Everything seemed to be there.
While assessing what I had bought, I boxed everything up in their various subassemblies. I located a NOS barrel and pistons at Supreme Motorcycles (now part of Draganfly Motorcycles) at a sensible price. I carried on shopping and carefully boxed and stored the expanding piles of bits. With a project like this – purchased in pieces – establishing what you have actually got is a good place to start.
The frame had been fitted with an oil tank – it’s not an oil in frame model – and started life as a two-stroke. Reading about the Bultaco Métisse in ‘ The Rickman Story’ it would seem, from the number I found on the headstock, that this frame started life in 1967 with the late Ray Baker. I had the frame shotblasted, which revealed the way the frame had previously been modified to take the Triumph twin engine. There is evidence, from braze on the frame, of engine mounts being moved.
The gusset plates around the headstock also tell a tale. The front downtubes have been repaired just below the headstock (a potential weakness, I understand) hence the need for the gusseting. The original bronze welding around the headstock has evidence of having been nickel-plated originally but the new bronze welding does not. So I am confident that the frame is a genuine Rickman original but intended for a Bultaco engine, not a Triumph. This means it is a métisse Métisse! (Métisse being French for mongrel which makes mine a mongrelmongrel!).
The oil tank fitted when I purchased the project was not a pretty one and only held about 2½ pints. I modified a 4½ pint AJS/ Matchless oil tank instead and added an inline oil filter to increase the capacity.
The bottom rails of the frame show evidence of it having clouted rocks in its past life, but I resisted the temptation to fill and cover them up, because these are part of its history and patina. I have added tube bushes to the frame where holes have been drilled through for brackets to avoid crushing the frame tubes when tightening up the throughbolts. The oil tank mountings received a similar hole-bushing treatment. I removed the somewhat clumsy coil bracket from the upper frame tube and replaced it with a smaller bracket to take a modern twin coil using the wasted spark principle.
I started going through the various subassemblies to see what could be re-used and what needed to be replaced. One of the rocker boxes showed signs of a welded repair which looked horrible on the inside; eventually a NOS casing was located and purchased from Mark at Triumph Twin Spares, a very helpful company.
The primary chaincase had some welded repairs, and really needed more, so I searched around for a later cover with the timing window. These now seem to be in the hen’s teeth category. Eventually Reg Allen came up with an NOS item – their last one. In fact, I suspect that it may have been the last newold-stock one available. Thank you, Reg Allen and company.
I re-cut the valve seats to suit the already fitted new valve guides. The valves were ground in and the head and valves thoroughly cleaned of grinding paste – so that was one sub-assembly boxed up, ready for refitting to the engine. The head was useable but the inlet valve seats were a bit recessed and would benefit by being replaced. At an autojumble I stumbled across another cylinder head. Although it needed a good clean and new valve guides the valve seats looked redeemable. When the stallholder asked for a tenner (because everyone wants Daytona heads now) I found my wallet very quickly and paid up. This head now has new valve guides and re-cut valve seats and is better than the original. Seeger Engineering supplied some 0.010” oversize threaded exhaust stubs which fit snugly and overcame the potential problem with slack threads.
Next up were the rockerboxes for cleaning, polishing and reassembling. I thought some new valve adjusters were called for and Thunderbird Spares came up with some mushroom head replacements. The surface plate with a sheet of emery cloth enabled me to ensure that the faces are flat and give some hope of avoiding oil leaks from that joint. I used copper rockerbox gaskets to avoid the paper ones being squeezed out by the torque on the through-head bolts to assist in sealing the joint.
I had a pair of wheels from another project. A QD rear one with alloy rim and Road Rider tyre came from a BSA, and a conical front hub came from a Triumph/BSA c1972, with alloy rim and Road Rider tyre. These would require some adjustments to their spindles.
The front forks were Marzocchi, and the bike came with a 6” 2ls Husqvarna hub in a 21” alloy rim. The end of one of the fork legs had a piece broken off (and lost). Early attempts to build up the metal with my faithful MIG welder and aluminium wire failed, due I suspect to the fact that the sliders are magnesium alloy. I originally intended to make up some end caps for the forks, but then established that the 1971/72 conical hub Triumph/BSA front forks would fit the Rickman frame. So I obtained a pair of good secondhand ones from Triumph Twin Spares and these will take the conical hub and fit without modification. I purchased a Rickman Mk3/Mk4 build manual from the United States (good old internet) and found the additional info invaluable. You can never have too much information!
The rear chain adjustment is peculiar to Rickman motorcycles in that it uses discs with offset holes. You have a set of these to move the wheel back about a tenth of an inch each time you change the paired discs. The swinging arm pivot spindle was loathe to move. It did have a robust thread so, with the use of washers and spacers, I was able to jack it out. I made a new one using stainless steel and some 5/8” UNF nuts from a combine harvester obtained from the local farm machinery factors.
The lack of a petrol tank was not a problem as I had a steel one from the petite Métisse rolling chassis previously mentioned. However, it only holds just over
a single gallon, so I sourced a two-gallon desert racer alloy tank from Terry Weedy which looks very pretty and will be resistant to ethanol fuel.
From the engine number, the motor started life in late 1961 as a 5TA Speed Twin. Harry Woolridge’s ‘ The Triumph Speed Twin and Thunderbird Bible’ has been a valuable source of detailed information. The distributor hole has been plugged and a later cover for side points fitted; one intended for the later, end-fed crank, post 1969. The crank is a post-1965 item with the timing notch in its periphery. The cams are later T100SS profile with the points cam attached to the end of the exhaust camshaft.
The clutch mechanism is the later ‘spoke’ cable extension which facilitates cable changes, and has the three ball ramp mechanism rather than the spiral one. The spoke mechanism allows cable change without needing to remove the gearbox end cover. The end cover has been trimmed to make access to the oil feed union easier – a standard trials modification. I hope to find an unmodified cover but these seem thin on the ground. Apparently the split pins retaining the gearchange plungers are prone to wear and can release the plungers, thus jamming the mechanism and making the cover impossible to remove. So some covers have been cut up to remove them following the problem, hence the shortage of covers.
The gearbox internals all looked good – the ball races would be replaced as a matter of course. The selector forks all looked good. The selector pawls were a bit sticky so would need freeing off, but that was not a surprise on something that was last taxed in July 1998. The split pins would be renewed.
The clutch all seemed to be in good condition with no burrs on the clutch plate ‘ears’. It is the early, four-spring clutch but apart from a slightly harsher transmission that is no great problem. There was a new primary chain and tensioner rod in the parts tray. I would fit a new shock absorber rubber. As I intended to fit 12V lighting and ignition, I would uprate the alternator to the 16 Amp version to allow daylight riding on full lights. The carburettor was an old Monobloc and in need of some refurbishment – a new Premier Concentric fit the bill.
The crankshaft looked to be in good condition and on careful measuring didn’t seem to need of a regrind. It is 0.010” undersize and within 0.0001” with no scoring – so new shells should be OK. The main bearing is at 0.020” undersize and also looks good, so just a new bearing in the crankcase for that. The sludge trap was removed and a new one fitted after a thorough clean of the crank’s internals. Fitting a modern inline filter will improve engine life so there are a good few miles left in the bottom end. I replaced the ball race main bearing as a matter of course.
The camshafts are good with no evidence of wear on the lobes so just needed cleaning and refitting. By measuring the base diameter and lift I established that they are T100A / T100SS cams.
The oil pressure release valve was replaced as it looked in doubtful condition, likewise the oil pump. It is foolish to put an engine together with old suspect parts when new items are available. This of course assumes the pattern parts are up to specification – these ones were made by LF Harris so should be good.
I painted the frame, starting with a coat of zinc rich primer followed by a coat of red oxide primer and finally a coat of synthetic black enamel. And no, I have not filled in the battle scars in the bottom rails so there is some patina and history still in evidence.
The swinging arm fitted in without too much of a struggle. Naturally the paint got chipped, I suspect the first of many such nicks and dints. Parallel Engineering checked out the frame for squareness of the swinging arm spindle to the headstock, and also marked up a centre line to assist in centralising the rear wheel to ensure accurate wheel alignment on final assembly. This helped me to determine what spacers were needed to centralise the wheel.
So now it was time to make a new rear wheel spindle. The principle difference was in the spindle diameter to fit the swinging arm spindle holes. I sort of replicated the standard BSA parts, modifying the diameters and stub lengths as necessary to suit the frame. I had to mill a small amount from the brake plate to get the wheel on the frame centre line, but apart from that it all went according to plan – which was a bit of a surprise.
The next step was fitting the front forks. The Triumph headstock spindle and the Rickman frame naturally do not match up, so some adapter sleeves had to be made. With these adapters the forks fitted OK, but then of course the lock stops wouldn’t match up, which meant more parts had to be fabricated. The forks take the conical hub without any modification – so I now had a rolling chassis, ready for its engine.