bit emotional tonight, this time last week it was a hopless case, tonight, the bike is in the van and this princess is going to the ball, the shed is usually my sanctuary, my escape fom everyday life, this week? i'm fucking sick of the sight of it, thank you in no specific order to barson, steve marsh, ben  'fucking' jones [for the offer of funding the rebuild, 'can't spanner mate but i can throw you some dollar' deep.....] whitey and jan for the love, bless you, even down to the wire, trying to book a hire van, last minute, my brother's at atwal's, representing the sikh nation dug in deep and came up with some racer transport to get us to mallory, i'm blessed me..........

they stopped people dancing in field's?

tumbledown

stunning set of photo's showing the death of a boxer at the recent snetterton british historic racing meeting, the rider, stubbzy, [who i've posted pic's of before on the blog and who has sent me load's of link's for boxer stuff] was perfectly ok, the bike? well, one can only assume it's very second hand after an end-over like that, check out lee hollick's brilliant photo's at the bhr website http://pchweb.co.uk/v_forum/index.php

boxer racer project

sorry for lack of post's this week. basically we are trying to get the engine re-built in time for this weekend's 'festival of a 1000 bike's' at mallory park, we have found a lot of neglect and clumsy practice that has set us back a lot of time, haven't got time now to detail all the bad stuff that we have found, ancient filter and gritty shagged oil not-withstanding, but, let's just say, i don't think i have got value for money for my 'carefully assembled blueprinted engine, new valves, guides, ring's, head's gasflowed and ported, new valve seals and every bearing, seal and gasket replaced' fuck off, hopefully better new's tomorrow, got to get back in the shed now and get some more hours in, stay tuned..........

c.r.m.c, test day, mallory park.

managed to get a chat with tony dunnell the manx norton tuner at mallory, he build's probably the most exquisite manx nortons in the world, this is his latest bike, he is using work's racing bottom end's coupled with summerfield heads, they aren't compatible and tony say's they need a lot of machining to work, what's fascinating to me is that this bike produces almost 70 bhp, [the original manxes around 50 bhp], he get's a lot of stick in the classic racing world for his unorthodox  approach to tuning, especially his use of modern material's like titanium in the machines, but, you know what? fair play, people have alway's pushed the boundary's and if it wasn't for people like tony their wouldn't be any classic bike racing............

c.r.m.c. test day, mallory park

ken inwood, legend, road racing 1957, [that's two year's before i was born!] to 1989, 15 silver, 6 bronze, tt and  manx grand prix replicas, check out the phone number on the world's oldest van, walton-on-thames, 229547, no web site, no www. com. this van is like dr. who's tardis, as long as iv'e been going to racing mr inwood has been in attendance, friday i needed some baffling to pass the noise test at mallory, ken had it, six quid, job done......

boxer racer project

 a thousand pound's, that's two week's wages for me, or to break it down ninety hour's of collar, it's a lot of money, a lot of hard earned cash, early get-up's, no dinner's and a lot of soul searching, we need a new fridge/freezer, i need to decorate the house, we need a family holiday, instead, i pay it out, [with my family's blessing, they know how much it mean's to me] to get my boxer engine blueprinted so that it's reliable and safe to shake down the racebike before i go for it properly next season, no point in beating around the bush, me and dangerous strip the motor this afternoon and what i've found has dissapointed me to the core, my 'carefully assembled and blueprinted engine, three angled valve job, ported and gas flowed engine, new valves, spring's seals and gasket's, push button, bullet-proof engine' turn's out to be nothing like, it's a crock of shit, hastily thrown together with no care or attention to detail, no new valves, the valve spring's on one cylinder fitted upside down, [they are marked with paint to indicate which end is seated against the inside of the cylinder head], no porting or gas flowing, pushrod seal's pressed in on the piss, crankshaft seal hammered in, valves leaking when filled with petrol, no fancy valve seat cutting here, not even a half arsed attempt at cleaning up the original item's, i'm gutted, dangerous sum's it up, 'you're not riding it to the pub youth, you're giving it the berry's round a racetrack, if it ain't built proper you or someone else is going to get hurt..............'

punk rock shovelhead

 barson and the punk rock shovel, 74 cubic inches of nastiness, [the point's cover is one i made out of alloy chequer plate year's ago, look closely for the japanese wedding kimono motif], rude, loud, oily and anti-social and as for the motorcycle? well, there lies another tale.......................................................

c.r.m.c. test day, mallory park.

 although our day was cut short prematurely on friday as a result of a serious oil leak it gave me and dangerous the chance to have a stroll around the pit's and have a gander at some of the tasty machines in attendance, one bike really caught my eye, a little 750cc ducati, the bike seemed familiar for some reason but i couldn't quite put my finger on it, the owner turned out to be the legendary ducati racer and tuner, paul klatkiewicz, what a lovely bloke, he patiently answered my questions and explained in lay-man term's the engineering that had gone into the bike, it's a genuine ducati factory racer, one of only six built, a genuine 80 plus honest bhp in a skinny-little-puppy-lightweight chassis, the last photo is why i thought it was familiar, [excuse the poor quality, i took a photo of alan cathcart's book, 'ducati. the untold story' from 1987, page 72, '... the factory's 750 f1 racer seen here at imola in a november test session for walter villa and tony rutter. chunky but effective'] we, really are not worthy.........

boxer racer project

 i'm awake at 0430hrs, i try and get another half hour but it's no good, 0450hrs, in the shower, tea, final check to make sure we have everything in the van, pick up dangerous at 0600hrs and off we go, grab a coffee from macceedee's on the way, heavy shower's and just as a contrast, squally shower's, not much conversation, we are parked up in the mallory park paddock at 0745hrs, sign on, brief at 0815 hrs, i'm out for the first session at 0920 hrs, bike won't start, i borrow a pair of jump leads and get the bike started, down to noise testing, 'sorry mate, your 108 decibel's, 105 decibel limit, you'll have to baffle it down a bit' fucking fuck, i make my way back to the paddock, dangerous drop's the megga's and i sprint over to ken's van to get some baffling material, we pack the pipes and i miss the first session, i go for the re-test, 'sorry mate, your

106 decibel's', ' mate, i've been working on this bastard since last october, you really aren't going to fail me for 1 decibel?' ,ok, i'll give you a sticker, but it's more than my jobsworth.....' at last, i'm in the pit-lane waiting for my session, a couple of the travelling marshall's have a look at the bike and give it the thumb's up, i ask one of them to drop in behind and just make sure nothing comes adrift, out onto the track, two steady lap's, keeping the rev's back to 5000rpm, warm up the tyres, feel's good, step it up a bit, 6500rpm, motor feel's a lot better, a tz 350 tries to outbrake me into edwina's and end's up going straight on, 5,6,7 lap's, confidence growing, the front brake is shite, the front fork's diving too much under heavy braking, no-problem and easily fixed, i peel off into gerrard's, the never ending right hander, there's a squirm from the back end, as it drift's around to the left, oh shit, here we go, i get ready for slip, slide, sky, earth, the bike straighten's up but the clutch slips as i try to select fourth, the marshall zip's past on his 'blade and indicates for me to follow him through the barriers at edwinas rather than going through the chicane, we pull off and he show's me the oil pissing out all over my rear tyre, i kill the motor and push it back through the pit's, quick diagnosis reveal's a blown crank seal, game over, could have been a lot worse if i'd tipped it into the left-hander at edwina's as my rear tyre was slipperier than a very slippy thing with extra added slippy stuff,  we are home for 1400hrs, i'm not dissapointed, i've learnt a lot today, never had any faith in the engine that my 'mate' had built, the chassis, bar a couple of tweek's is good, i'm in this for the long haul, if i have to sell my sporty to fund the racer then so be it, i'm hooked me, i've had another glimpse today of what life's all about, it's not standing about in pub car park's looking at road bikes, it's not being 'cool' it's not about getting your bike in 'dice' it's about racing, that's what it's all about, all of a sudden it hit's me, we won't make the festival of a thousand bikes next week, gutted..........

boxer racer project

what a strange day, two day's annual leave booked off, lie in 'til 0700 hour's, [lazy bastard], i set off with the boy's, humid, short's, vest but i'm not stupid, north face pac-lite around my waist, baseball cap stuffed into my cargo pocket, we are five miles out, the sky darken's, i mean darken's, spooky, it feel's like the end of the world, lightning is flashing all around, deep, deep, rumbling thunder and then?, and then, it start's to rain, and i mean rain, think biblical, think cat's and dog's  think full-bore fire hose wetness, the corn in the field's fold's flat under the onslaught, i'm struggling to even take in oxygen, yep, it's that wet, home, towel the boy's off and they settle down in front of the tumble drier, stretching out in the warm air stream, yawning and sighing, gently stretching and grooming each other, i shower, change into dry clothes and head out to the shed, tea and dark chocolate biscuits, doe's it get any better than this, no work on a thursday, the weekend stretching forth, phone ring's, it's dangerous, 'ey up wanker, what you doing?', 'i'm in the shed youth, day off', 'get the kettle on, i'm on my way...' the next four hour's pass, fettling the racer, swapping jet's, dicking around with the ignition timing, the boxer run's, [rough] the boxer stop's, around 1600hr's i call it, the classic racing motorcycle club have a meeting this weekend, there's a practice day friday, quick phone call, there's places free, i phone lee at the van hire place to see if he's got anything free, yep, book it, pick it up, bike won't even start now, fuck it, too late now, van's loaded, too tired to bother now, sort it out tomorrow, night, night everybody........