Woe is me

So yesterday the third stripdown of the mk3 commando in a short space of time. The photo shows the problem. The top has come off the inlet oil seal. After years and countless engine builds this has never been an issue until the last year. Oh well, today i start
the rebuild.

Busy week

Thursday already and not a minute wasted, recovering the Applecross bikes back into A1 condition and servicing them all. The fastback was first, as well as a service I had to call on Alex to weld the chainguard which was splitting, then replace the fork gaiter (and then I discovered someone in the dark and distant past had a fork seal in the wrong way round! Never seen that before and it wasn’t leaking that badly actually. Anyway its all back ready to go again. A visit to Mr Bloy to offer assistance with his latest Commando rebuild and then he helped me strip the chrome bits from my 88ss (pictured) and send them away for re chroming. The Roadster got my attention next, a service, fix the carb which caused problems at Applecross, a new Camshaft oil seal to stop the annoying oil leak and then because i’d disturbed the pick ups for the ignition one coil in the pick up wen’t open circuit, I replaced it with a spare but not before I renewed the wires as they were hard and brittle from years of living in a hot engine.
Having a small bike collection is nice but if you use them, they wear out, this creates work and profits for the Norton suppliers, sometimes I think I’m keeping them all in business single handed.

The Roadster ready to enjoy once again

Well thats the first week in.

Thats a week now i've been back in wet cold and windy scotland. We have the best roads in the world but crap weather. Just finished a contract so i'm back full time fettling bikes. The fastback is on the bench today , i'm sorting out some problems and servicing it as I intend using it through the winter. I took MVD out on Saturday for a run, the roads are full off shit at the moment as the farmers spread most of their fields over the roads, that combined with the heavy rain meant I had to wash it twice in one day. I think any warmth is behind us now untill next year, best to dig in for a long winter.

Back to the ferry.

Well thats us back in ijmuiden to wait for the ferry. The wind is picking up so maybe a rough crossing? Its been brilliant again. Mostly great weather and dry right on cue the temperature has dropped to remind us we're going home. I wish I could have stayed for the Guzzi meeting in Mandello but you can't do it all, so sorry Italo we'll need to meet for a beer some other time.

Frankfurt to hilversum

Well last night went true to form with a big party at Tomas's house. So a bit of a dull head this morning for the run up to Hilversum. The hotel we're staying in is almost twice as expensive as normal seemingly because of a big golf tournament here so guess who else is on my hate list. Good run today. Plenty sun and warm and dry all the way.

So today we left Italy on the small roads and passed through Switzerland doing a couple of alpine
Passes in the process. The Swiss took 35 euro each for the privilege of doing 100 miles on their crap motorway. The alternative on the small roads would have taken too long, as it was we were in the saddle 6 hours to do just over 200 miles. So now i'm glad to be in germany, on lake constance and we've opted for a hotel.

The Guzzi factory

So this is the very gates this bike rolled out of when it was new. Quite nice to bring one back here to see its birthplace.