Gino's Travels: Lack of posts

Wednesday 8 July 2020

Lack of posts

Apologies for the distinct lack of posts, the total insanity that has engulfed the world has obviously restricted our ability to travel too far and I don't suppose people want to see the same pictures and stories of the same roads and bikes week in and week out.
News from the workshop, I had some problems with Fiona's Norton which took a bit of figuring out, it seemed we couldn't get beyond Glenalmond without it starting to misfire and lose power, the only major thing I did to it over the previous months was a refurb of the carb and a new inlet rubber (the old one showing signs of cracks) I eventually solved it after a couple more carb checks, it was of course electrical, with the mini heatwave we had the last few weeks (service is back to normal in Scotland, its pissing down again) and the fact the Zener diode (a voltage control device) was at least 50 years old, a breakdown of the Zener meant the bikes voltage was being dropped to Earth by the diode and it had also killed the battery. A change over to the more modern regulator rectifier unit and a new battery thankfully solved the problem.
I dragged the 750 Drum brake roadster out again and its going well, the Mk3 has been getting used a lot also giving me much fun. The V11 Moto Guzzi was taken out of retirement and its great to be back riding that as well, such an underrated bike in my opinion and if you fancy one they are still relatively cheap. The T3 Guzzi has also been ridden regularly as well as the Bonneville, its getting tiring exercising them all regularly ha ha.
I was out on the Bonnie on Monday and to be honest its never felt great in low speed handling (walking pace stuff) So much so I figured there must be something wrong, the steering seemed tighter than it should be and when jacked up I could feel a slight "notch" in the central position so yesterday I stripped the front end off, disappointing to find cheapo ball bearings in the headstock, a set of tapered roller bearings are on their way and I'm sure then it'll be the bike i expected it to be.

T3 in the rain

V11 in the sun

Ball bearings FFS

Top Bearing

Bonneville sans front end!

Last weekend we had our first Tay Valley Norton meeting since the "crisis" a socially distanced meet in a layby near Aberfeldy, Nortons were going great and despite the rain and the lowering of temperatures the run and the meeting were great.
Good to catch up with everyone face to face so to speak rather than via telephonic communication. Four Nortons which wasn't bad and since Bill and Agnes has a fair hike in inclement weather from Aberdeenshire he was forgiven for bringing the Honda Bemoth (which I think Phil took a fancy to)
Good to see Wilson out for a run on the Guzzi, Brother John and Lesley, David doing his Andy Cap impersonation. Thanks to the back up crew of Geoff and Heather who brought the van and the kettle although everybody did seem to come prepared , I suspect a rise in sales for Thermos flasks!