On Any Sunday

The peace in an otherwise non-descript industrial estate was shattered today with the harsh bark from the cut-down "silencers"; the bike running under its own power for the first time. Finally. About a year later than hoped!

I didn't realise that my hairline was receeding quite so much....

However, Ash described himself as "looking like the man-mountain on that".

We spent the morning fitting crash bungs, here: Also captive nuts to the seat unit, sorting the tank cover and making exhaust brackets. They sit much betrer now. We also fitted a guard to stop small children being sucked into the carbs :

You can see the white plastic guard here, as well as Ash who obviously thinks that he'd be a great bouncer. Looking less thuggish than usual here, he is almost smiling. Despite the hideous exterior, he is a great guy to have onside. I am massively looking forward to the imminent 2009 season.

So, out findings from the initial run: the pipes need brackets underneath, and the silencers re-packing. The battery terminals need to be better secured, and more importantly we need to consider getting some time on a dyno to sort out the ignition timing and the fuelling. There's also an oil weep from the crankshaft where it passes through the CNC ally engine cover, so that will be next. Its getting there, the first race meeting is on the 16th of May. We will be on the grid at Cadwell Park!

A few hours more...

...and we’re very nearly there!

The weekend was very fruitful, and now with a little bit of faff (oil, fuel, tyres, lockwire, and check fasteners) its testing time.

This is how it was on Saturday morning:



We needed to push a new stem into the yokes, and buy some new bearings. It then became apparent that we had 2 different cups in the steering head- one metric, one imperial! So another favour was pulled in and DBR machined out the lower one to size.

Back to the shed to put it together. On its own 2 wheels, we did those little all-important jobs :

Front and rear brakes, engine and tank breathers, (with a non-return valve in the tank breather). We decided that for the present, we’d use the 5litre tank under the cover, with the under-seat tank and on-going project. Fuel lines, positioning of bars, controls, steering damper and fairing, rearset link rod and rose joints. We fitted the Scitsu tacho, and then decided about placement of the (few) electrical components.

Sunday morning saw a trip to Maplins to buy a small (1.3Ah) battery. You can see it’s a good bit smaller and lighter than the 3Ah one I had planned on. I will just have to keep an eye on charge etc. I think a spare would be a good idea for a race weekend!

We put the Silent Hektic ignition unit under the battery at the front fairing stay, and the coil beside this.

It was decided that it was (reasonably) out of harm’s way, and would be kept quite cool. The problem with carrying the oil in the frame is that it quite quickly gets rather warm…!

Ash stuck on a toe-guard

while I made the tea!

The blue seat unit weighs about 2 elephants, so we decided to recycle Ash’s old red one. We’ll need some captive nuts for this to enable speedy strips and mounting, but that’s not a problem. it’s a lot lighter and looks a bit more modern too- I’m guessing this seat unit is a later development of the Tigcraft chassis

And that was the state of play on Sunday night
Looking good eh?? I can’t wait to just do the few little things, then hopefully, around the end of Feb, we can get back on track. Cadwell’s the first round on the 16th of May!

Happy New Fuel Tank

I’ve been thinking about fuel tanks of late. The original tank, holding 5 litres sits under this cover, but may be just a little too small.

A phone call to Dave Pearce at the Tigcraft Technology Centre was very fruitful. He let me have not one but 2 tanks, for an absolute steal. Thanks for that Dave, very much appreciated.

Option one is 7 litre plastic job, which could live under the existing (or my spare) seat unit.

This was originally on a Derbi GP50, but could potentially solve our problem.

Secondly, he also gave me (for a song), a manx tank, which looks like it holds about 18 litres! As he said, we’d probably only have to fill it up at the start of the season…”. Dave also observed that it did appear to have fallen out of the ugly tree, but maby it could be judiciously modified by someone who knows what they’re doing. there’s certainly enough sheet ally to work with there!

I think it was made for flying Scotsman Denis Gallagher for the '99 Singles TT, and then passed thru the hands of Andrew McCombe before coming back to Dave.

Next to it is the carbon fibre cover.

The bike is still out at Ash’s, I’ll report more after we get the front end together next weekend. And there may be another seat option too...

Finally, provisional dates have been published for the upcoming season:

Cadwell May 16-17

Snetterton June 19-20 BSB Combined UK & Euro-round

Brands GP July 25-26 (Possible UK/Euro-round)

Snetterton September 5-6

Brands Indi September 26-27

Plus probably one more weekend in either April or August to give a championship of 6 weekends. I'm getting excited!

Carry on Racing!

Now then!


Here’s a little insight into what has been going on over the last few weeks. The bike’s been at Ash’s place out in Manningtree, home of the beautiful Robert Adam-designed Mistley Towers...

However, I digress, for I did not go out there to admire the fine architecture.




Oooooh No! Missus!




I went out there (on the coldest day of the year) to help young Mr. Norrington put up his new shed. It was a fabulous erection; although I do owe him heavily for his help with the 640 Tigcraft.

It became apparent that our steering stem (previously using a 12mm bolt...!) wasn’t up to snuff, so we knocked out a stem from Ash’s old (crumpled) frame, and with a bit of engineering work, this can be reused. We had to play about with the steering head cups a bit, and I’ll need some bearings but these are not major problems.

Despite the lever being attached to the cheapest nastiest clip-ons in existence, the front brake seems to be working, now it’s been bled.

We’ve also re-sited the pipes, and now they appear to sit a bit better.

The heavy and rather large...

...one-piece seat unit may be ditched in favour of an ally subframe and lightweight race seat unit..., ...but as it is, it works, so maybe we will start the season with the original.

However, there is more important news than mere motorcycles! In an effort to play to combined strengths, we have decided to consolidate our (your?!) own Team Thumper with Ash’s Moto450Supermono. So now that we have become a happy threesome (can a threesome be anything else?!), and, given the grave world financial situation its 2 for 1.

2 bikes, 2 vans (neither warrant a photo), 2 riders, and Boyd Brooks- the 2Bs!

Ash's CRF450-derived racer is full of the trick bling, nice wheels, and looks the business. A welcome addition to the usual rag-tag which has so far defined Team Thumper!

Derby’s finest has been sorting out a remanufacured front fairing stay/tacho mount. Soon this will also be down in Manningtree and we can get a bit more progress once she is back on her own 2 wheels.


The only other thing we need is a name...

TeamThumperMoto?

TeamThumperSMR (as in SingleMindedRacing)?

Answers on a postcard plase to the usual address. Any suggestions welcome...

Bling Bling!

Well, here’s the rather lovely R6 radial caliper mount. I’ve not seen it in the flesh, but Ash sent this from his mobile. Technology eh??

The bike’s at his place now, thank you matey. And to Mark at DBR for the beautiful looking chunk of ally on my forks! And if you need any more convincing of his prowess, I hadn’t realised, but it turns out that he also made the blanking plate for where the water pump used to be. He recognised it when we turned up with the bike. Small world, eh? I wonder if the nice swirl which has finished it off will make it any faster….?


And given the press fanfare of the recently re-anglified Norton Motorcycle Company, a name forever associated with single cylinder race bikes, we can hardly not wish them the very best of luck… Ok, so we’ve been here before, and the great name has had a rough time over the last decade or so (Norton Nemesis, anyone?) but if they can turn up beautifully engineered bits of kit as quickly as DBR then they’re half way there. Will the Crighton and Garner partnership result in new Nortons on the road in the next few years? Lets hope so. Now, could a single-rotor rotary motor ever be considered eligible for Supermono…?!

What News, Sire?

Well, this week has been relatively fruitful. Long, dark, cold nights are no better spent in the closed season than in a short, dark, cold garage.

The sloppy swingarm has been cured by using the correct spacers, and the bike now sports a single 320mm disk upfront. After a long day at work Wednesday, I got home, loaded up the van and completed a 200 mile round trip to deepest darkest Essex. After a couple of hours driving I met Ash Norrington at a layby off the A120, with him as ever grinning like a loon! I think he had been dogging, actually…

He took us (me and the bike) out to see Mark, who runs D.B. Racing in Thorpe-Le-Soken, specialising in CNC-machined bits and pieces for racers and roadbikes alike. His workshop was more like a lab (fastidiously clean, spacious, well lit, no sh*t lying around- clearly not MY lab!!), and I was impressed by both his facilities and his attitude. Nothing was too much of a problem, “Yes, we can do that”. Great!

Ash is still concerned about our rear shock keeping the back end rather low, but he may be able to help us out (again!) with something.

Will post some piccies of the bling-bling brakes when I pick up the bike.

***STOP PRESS!*** I just got a call from Ash. Its done! Will try to pick up asap and post a coupla photos.

A bit of video...

This is a bit old, but shows the first time running.

And how stupid we can be, trying to bump it in neutral!

I couldn't figure out how to flip it, so one of the videos is on its side. Just tilt your minitor to enjoy the buffoonery! :)