TALES FROMTHE SHED
Rites of Spring indeed. Nothing to do with Stravinsky…
It is indeed a rite of spring (that’s a musical joke; look it up), because for some reason all my bikes get their MoT tests in the spring. Which cannot actually be much of a surprise, as I am a dully unimaginative chap who wants his bikes serviced, set up and certificated ready for the allegedly better weather of the summer. And I have genuinely no idea why this should be so, but I always somehow dread the MoT test. Why? No idea, like I said. I dread it as much as my own bodily check-ups and servicing – and those are actually important!
I was chatting with a pal – yes, yes, an endangered species; I’ve heard all the jokes – about how great it is that several of my machines for this year’s slightly ambitious riding strategy don’t actually need an MoT at all. Two in particular, both of them noble products of the greatest motorcycle factory in Woolwich (discuss) and separated by only a few years – by no time at all in the historical context of the 1940s. Which bikes are these? A 1940 Matchless Model X and a 1948 AJS Model 18. Very different machines, but both of them well away from the cut-off date for obligatory MoT certs.
So this year’s compulsory ordeals were two moderns – both of them controversial Harley-Davidsons – and one not-so modern, a Norton Model 50 dating from 1960. That was the machine under debate with my alleged pal. He was all over excited by the notion that maybe – just maybe – the bike was actually manufactured in 1959 and might – just might – be exempt from the MoT requirement. I pretended enthusiasm for the idea. ‘Oh,’ I said, enthusiastically. It’s always nice to reward … whatever it was he was suggesting. But – and I should probably whisper this – I do in fact think that MoT tests are useful. So even though I could research Norton’s factory records to discover when the grubby old tank was actually assembled, all those years ago in grimy if hallowed Bracebridge Street by worthy Brummagem fitters, and then I could maybe engage in a conversation with a vast government bureaucracy to attempt to … to do what? To save myself the £29.65 fee? How many hours would I spend pursuing this? How much is my free time worth? I’d suggest in a modest way that my free time is worth at least as much as my work time, so maybe … how many years of dodged MoT fees would it take to repay the time spent dodging it?
In any case, going for the test provided a great excuse for a ride. An excuse to get off my backside, check over everything, change the oils and go for a ride. It was a little drizzly, Cornwall in March, but who cares. The Norton’s a scruffy old dear, rusty in all the important places, and entirely unafraid of a little atmospheric moisture. But would it start? First kick. Just like that. I’ve broken the kickstart spring. I consult the etheric parts lists and prepare to order one. Poised, I was.
Then I looked in the place in a drawer in The Shed where I suspected that I might keep springs and things and I discovered that not only do I have kickstart return springs for the Model 50 (I have two) but I also have kickstart return springs for a lightweight Matchless single and for the Better Third’s Triumph TRW.
I am good at collecting such springs … less so at fitting them, plainly. I have no idea how or why this can be. And nor do I care.
Kickstart return spring failure is not an MoT fail. I know this. Neither is a missing gear indicator. How has that dropped off? And why? Could the vanished indicator somehow be related to the failure of the kickstart spring? Great unsolved mysteries of our time.
But never mind. I bet I have a spare gear indicator. I investigate. I find one. It’s very shiny, unlike the rest of the bike. I fit a rusty – ahem; patinated – bolt and washer, which disguise the terrifying shininess of the pointy thing. I am an ace restorer, me, plainly.
A little more worryingly, the headlamp will only light one of the filaments in the headlamp bulb. There are two. And they both need to work for the MoT. Never mind. I know I have spare bulbs, because I am the living embodiment of the Boy Scouts’ motto: I am endlessly prepared, always. I’m rarely prepared for whatever actually happens, but it is the thought that counts. However, I do have a lot of spare headlamp bulbs. I check. I do. Hurrah.
Simplicity itself to remove the headlamp lens and pop out the bulb. As soon as the light is detached from the bowl I am confronted with new! modern! wiring! How did this happen? Instantly I diagnose the fault; not for nothing am I revered globally as a Noted Expert. Consider the way power is fed to the bulb: it passes from wire to filaments via a pair of contacts mounted on a small piece of brown insulator. The last time I suffered a mysteriously non-lighting light the fault was the modern pattern connector, which would tilt when the screw-on holder was screwed on to the rear of the reflector (those three-eared bayonets – remember?). Having tilted, only one of the contacts actually made contact, so only one filament would light. I am a genius. I carefully refitted the contracts and reassembled the light.
No change. Only one light lit. Even Noted Experts have been known to falter on their path to enlightenment. Particularly when the enlightenment is powered by Lucas. Take it apart again and waggle everything. This is engineering instead of science, so it always works. It doesn’t work.
Next, waggle the light switch, the beefy and expensive to replace PRS8 so beloved
of many manufacturers around that time. No wonder they’re referred to as dark days. Waggle. The dead filament blasts to light. Hurrah. Then it goes out again. Boo. No matter how much seismic waggling I inflict upon the poor (original, irreplaceable) switch, there isn’t even a feeble glimmer. This is unhappy-making. It is perfectly possible to dismantle a PRS8 switch – I have done this many times. I have never put one back together in a satisfactory way. Throwing away the entire bike could be less frustrating – especially if the bike’s a BS… I’ll stop there.
It must be the bulb. Of course it must. The waggling of the switch was merely a coincidental wossname. I remove the bulb. And stare. It’s a halogen. Gentle Reader, Norton did many miraculous things with their motorcycles but I have never before found an original unrestored halogen lightbulb in an original unrestored 1960 machine. This is rare. I gaze long and hard at the bulb. It has meaningless lettering on it but no indication concerning its voltage. I have no idea why this might be important, but it might – OK? Good.
In The Shed there is a multimeter with a circuit testing position. There’s a good joke there, but I’ll leave you to make your own. I connect it up and check both filaments: maybe one’s intermittently broken. It’s not. They both work fine. I curse a little, and waggle the PRS8 switch and the dipswitch. No effect. What did you expect? Miracles?
I awoke in the middle of the night. This is true: I did indeed awaken. As I emerged twitching from a dream of dipswitches (would I lie?) I knew that it was the dipswitch. I announced this into the darkness. Someone whacked me in the ribs with a sharp elbow.
The old Norton still wears an original-type dipswitch. You can take these apart and clean them. You can take them completely apart and lose the spring. Then you need a replacement. The replacements are not very good. I take it partially apart and clean the little brass contacts. Then I operate it. Both filaments illuminate as they’re supposed to. I am a genius, plainly. And should sleep more than I do, dreaming of … dipswitches.
The rest of the old Norton is flawless, expertly maintained by its two Scottish previous owners. The steering head bearings are nice and tight, there’s no play in the fork bushes nor the wheel bearings nor the swinging arm. The brakes are excellent. Everything is good to go. I go, off to Ace Mosickles. Drop off the Norton, collect the Harley and ride home on that. More about that in a little while. But not a lot more: I know how sensitive folk can be about American hyphenated motorcycles.
It’s the next day. I arrive, beaming with my most optimistic and friendly smile. I have no idea whether this helps. Max at Ace Mosickles stares at me and enquires after my health. I cease smiling and adopt a
badass bro expression. Helen suggests that I need medication, maybe coffee? Depressed, I enquire whether the Norton’s ready for collection, whether it’s passed its test. It is, it has. Whoopee, so forth.
Ace Kenny appears, looking oddly happy. In a moment of weakness I wonder why? Obvious: he’d taken the Model 50 out for a spin, just to check that everything was working. Of course. I wondered how he’d handled the inevitable wheelies and tyreshredding acceleration. He patted me on the shoulder and remarked, casually, that the brake light didn’t work and that’s an MoT fail. I stared in horror. Kenny grinned back. ‘I kicked the switch,’ he revealed. ‘ The brake light works now. Pass!’
There are time when even Ace coffee seems like a good idea. I fired up and roared … chugged off. Took a long, roundabout and entirely pleasant route back to RCHQ. The old Norton was running brilliantly well. I tooted the horn at a passing sheep, it regarded me with indifference and strolled on, chewing. And back at The Shed, I checked the brake light. It had stopped working again. Let’s not tell anyone, eh?
It’s always somehow excellent when you have a local bike shop to carry out routine ordeals like the MoT. There are always suggestions that how generous, how flexible the MoT regs can be depends on how regular a customer a chap might be. And in the previous comments you could be forgiven for making that mistake. I am a regular at Ace. They service all our modern bikes, after all, and we buy our consumables there – so we’re in and out all the time. I have even borrowed bikes from them (and will again, because they have a very handsome BSA B50 in there at the moment). So I know the guys pretty well. I think. So you – and I – might be excused for expecting that MoT standards might be flexible. Not so.
The reality is that standards need to reflect what the bike’s actually capable of – and what it was capable of when it was new. If that wasn’t the case there would be no old bikes on the road. Even though the impossibly handsome and occasionally green Norton has a halogen light bulb, that light is utterly feeble compared to – say – the lights on the Harley, which is also a halogen but would boil paint at short range and is seriously effective at encouraging approaching cars to dip their own lights.
Likewise with the brakes. The Norton’s stopped by those well-known and justifiably popular Norton stoppers: 8” sls up front and 7” sls at the back. They work well, either together or separately. But the Harley stops much more rapidly. You’d hope it does, not least because it’s a lot faster, a lot heavier and a lot newer. Both bikes’ brakes pass the MoT rolling road test with no worries, which is good. But here’s a thing. Last time my older, heavier Harley was up for its test, it passed, but Stuart – who’d done the deed – suggested that I might like to fit some better tyres, because the sidewalls of the front Avon were cracking. That’s not a fail, unless the tyre’s inner structure is showing through, but as a responsible tester, Stuart was concerned. Rightly so. The bike got a new pair of tyres this time.
The Norton’s rear tyre is pretty old, and its sidewalls are a little cracked. And that’s not a problem. It’s not tubeless, the Norton’s not very heavy and it’s not very powerful. It’s all about common sense.
So… why would anyone, me included, want to avoid the opportunity to have a second opinion on their bike’s on-the-road safety? A professional and disinterested opinion? For less than thirty quid? Left to myself, I doubt I’d have noticed the cracking sidewalls on the heavy Harley; the old Avon boot had plenty of tread after all, and I don’t manage as many miles as I’d like to these days. The chances of its failure were pretty slim. But they were present. Now I have peace of mind.
And another thing. I’d never actually enjoyed the way the heavy Harley handles. I’d owned an identical machine back then and it handled far better. The change in tyres has cured the current machine and it now steers like it should. A largely unexpected bonus, then. All brought about by that annual rite of passage, the MoT test. Well worth the effort, I’d say. Until next time, when I expect I’ll be grumbling again…