boxer racer project
have you ever seen that old film 'the plank' it stars all the classic british comedy stars of the '60's, eric sykes, tommy cooper, stratford john's, hattie jacques, jim dale, john junkin and a host of other people from the sixties that you would know if you saw them but never knew their name, it's a comic, slapstick masterpiece, almost a 'silent' movie , like the great film's of the '30's, brilliant, i mention it because it reminded me of the loveless shed tonight, funny how such simple job's soon turn into a fucking nightmare, decided to make up the throttle cables, the throttle slides in the spanish amal's needing a little 'dressing' with a riffler to allow the nipple's to fit, [ooh er matron'] that done it was a simple task to fit the carb top, tension spring cable and brass retaining disc, not, the disc fired itself across the shed like a frigging excocet narrowly missing the oblivious dangerous turning up a spacer on the lathe, next two hours, choice language, hand's and knee's searching through the swarf and aluminium turnings on the floor, eventually it get's dark and i tell dangerous i'm going to turn out the shed lights and search by maglite beam, he reckon's i'm a twat and goes home, i've seen this done on c.s.i and it alway's turn's up the evidence, ten minutes in to my search and i find it, jammed between the hog-hoist runner and the bench, i phone dangerous triumphant, he reckon's i'm still a twat, cables fitted, throttle to splitter cable trimmed, shortened and soldered, i set fire to some rag on the bench, fuck, i blow on it to put it out, it set's fire to my roll of shop paper, i throw it out of the back-door, straight into the cardboard re-cycling bin, fucking fuck, the bin's on fire now, i'm trying to stamp it out wearing a pair of flip-flop's, my feet are now on fire, bollock's, i eventually bring the fire carnage under control, damp everything down and my neighbour appear's, are you having a barbeque mate?' 'er, sort of', regain composure, right, breather on to the flapper valve, [still need some sort of catch bottle but good enough for a trackday shakedown run], run breather to back of seat, i need a glass of wine and some new flip-flop's............
Bloody hilarious mate, was in tears by the time of the barbie comment, the Curse of the Buzz Bomb continues . . . The Plank, what a cracker flick, not seen it for years, the amount of time we used spend looking for a bloody jet, a circlip, a friggin motor, at Classic Bike Tune, what a laugh, three blokes getting nothing done on hands and knees, we were of the messy shop paradigm . . . anyway, the bike is looking the total tits my sweet lad, really execellent, enjoy the TT mate, look out for seagulls !!
ReplyDeleteCollets were my favourite.... "just a little tap on the top to make sure they have gone in right" followed by firing valve spring retainer, springs and collets across the workshop!.Was in tears here too! Looking forward to the "Loveless Engineering" film, coming to a cimema near you soon
ReplyDeleteIn the metal shop in the school district maintenance department I work in, I'm always catching hell for sweeping the floors up. My usual answer is, 'you know it's time to sweep when the floor catches fire'... and for some reason it's usually when I'm in there trying to weld something up. Your bike is looking quite nice. I need to show your blog to a BMW owning friend of mine who has had his up on a stand, that belongs to me...for some years now. Maybe he'll be inspired to get back to it.
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