Wednesday 17th Sept
Im
Baack! It been a while since I was last able to do an update - for which I apologise. Things have however been moving
along apace, above is a nice pic of Joe & Mike Rosson's impeccably restored WM20 hailing from 1941. Painted in 8th
Army desert rats colours as it originally was found to have sand coloured paint under the Olive green when it was imported
to the USA from Egypt quite a few years ago. It was restored by the two brothers Joe and Mike from Austin Texas. Unusually
the gearbox features a fron cover with the same deeply embossed stacked rifles logo featured on the rare bits pics page, More
pics please Joe & Mike!
Meanwhile, Our
regular contributor Richard Corcoran has been moving along rapidly with priming and painting of frame and fuel tank and basic
assembly of frame and gearbox, Ill be uploading photos of progress so far tomorrow on Richards own dedicated restoration page.
Another contributor to the Pin up M20 page Colin Smith - is still
having problems with his recently purchased WM20 - has all the syptoms of 8 stroking once the engine warms up, but the finger
of guilt seems to be pointing now toward a worn out carburettor bore. Im trying to organise a loaner carb to see if it eliminates
the problem.
Also weve pinned down a good modern
equivalent for the early war Khaki Brown likened by the War Dept to a good strong cup of Tea in colour. Industry standard
colour RAL 8028 Terra Brown is a very close match to on original New Old Stock Battery carrier frame I have, we can get
these made up as large spray cans that dry Matt for £10 a can a bit steep but spot on. Three cans used carefully will
do one bike.
Anyway Ive wittered on far too
long, but look out for more updates in the next few days.
Cheers!
Tuesday 26th August
The pleasure of working
on the bike has been forfeit this bank holiday weekend due to work going crazy in what is normally a quiet month for engineering
firms.
I stumbled upon a small Lubricant Equivalents
document in the front of a Matchless Maintenance manual, produced by the REME engineers at Chilwell dated 1st April 43, with
a date like that one immediately thinks practical joke - I have retyped it into my worm processor and will post it in the
REME section along with the lubricants chart I posted recently.
I have been trying to find good clip art of BSA WM20's but there aint much around I was sent a very nice
adaption of the Line drawing that appears in the owners handbook, which I thought people could copy then colour in to record
the details of their WM20, and if you care to submit the finished item we will keep a line drawing registry of visitors bikes
all to a common scale. Ive posted that in the REME section too.
Saturday 16th August
Hier, le 15 août
2008 les enthousiastes de motocyclette britanniques en France ont découvert notre site Internet. J'irais comme
dire être bienvenu à tous nos visiteurs de la France et à tout le monde parlant français. J'espère
que vous avez trouvé notre site Internet intéressant.
My apologies if the welcome to our visitors from France above is not quite grammatically perfect,
I used an online translator program. In the past we have had a few hits from France but yesterday it seems France discovered
our little website giving us the highest 1 day hit total since we started the website.
This website is maintained by enthusiasts for all enthusiasts of WWII
British military motorcycles, predominantly BSA WM20's at present but soon to expand into other makes, It thrives on the
contributions from its visitors so feel free to drop us a line or send us a picture of your motorbike or ongoing restoration
project.
We hope our mad project to drive our
restored BSA WM20's from Birmingham to Berlin will give others enthusiasm to have a go at something gloriously eccentric.
Friday 8th August
Well Ive been updating the website continuously over the last 3 days, plenty of new material in the Rare Pics,
Richard C's page has a feature on making a pair of early pattern KM front footrests, more stuff on REME and QMS pages,
Ive almost lost track of the changes, tidying up pages to present better, more links, yadda yadda yadda,
Monday 28th July
No usual weekend entry due to the VMCC founders day meet at Stanford Hall - what a cracker it was too, scorching
hot and more good lumps of rusty metal than you could shake a stick at. I managed to obtain a 3 gallon petrol tank with
both rear tails - so far all I'd been able to get for my projects was two both with one side cut off for the Vokes filter
air hoze. Its ready to paint too! It had a bonus in the form of the early fuel cap with the round tap handle type
opening lugs.
also In todays update I have posted the official lube chart for the BSA
WM20.
Sunday 20th July
An important development
for the website, a good friend of mine of many years standing, Steve Madden who co authored British Forces Motorcycles 1925-1945
and his partner Jenny, who has proven her vast knowledge of all things WWII WD Motorcycycle have most graciously agreed to
act as authenticity consultants for our website. This is a great honour for us, and will increase our knowledge base almost
infinitely. To this end I have given them their own problem page where we will feature the questions and their answers. To
start the ball rolling all you have to do is eMail us with your question via the 'contact us' link on the QMS
page
Friday 18th July
Sadly the guy in France
has not been in touch I can only assume permission is not granted to feature the pics of a very nicely restored
BSA KM20, albeit in civvy trim - who wants to see flashy civvy stuff anyway!! Give me Olive Drab any day.
Been a good week apart from having my one and only lot of BSA M20/21
parts on e Bay yanked because the AA said I was infringing their trademark ergo their intellectual copyright when I described
a petrol tank as AA pattern, they seem oblivious to the fact this pattern of tank was a special made to order contract by
BSA only for the AA - how else should I describe it then? Dunderheads!
My Mag Dyno is finished just awaiting collection - hooray! Also Ive been a BAD Boy! Couldnt resist flexing
my overdraft & buying a 1939 Girder forked Matchless G3WO Kit of parts for restoration, Its missing the early type fuel
tank, chaincase clamping strip and handlebars, its in many tiny pieces and Im just going to hide this away for a
while till the BSA projects are finished, as fate would have it this bike is from the same contract as Richards, theyre
only 150 different on the frame numbers which equals a week and a half apart in construction - considering how many thousands
were made - spooky yet again!!
Thursday 10th July
I have had such positive
reaction about the header pic of the BSA factory I have decided to leave it up for a while.
I deleted the Mainly BSA link as they now no longer sell spares - its good news really as they are now using
their stocks of parts to rebuild complete bikes and anything that puts more WM20's out there cant be all bad. Instead we now have a link to the annual War and Peace show down in Beltring Kent.
Lastly have started a special page for the El Alemein Norton 16H -
Pics courtesy of Ulrich - I someday hope to see this historic beastie in the flesh.
Thursday 3rd July.
Firstly to all our American visitors Happy 4th July for tomorrow.
I have news of a KM20 restoration in France - I am awaiting permission from the owner before I put
anything on the website. Also we have a new Pinup bike of the week from Colin Smith of Derby here in the UK.
Saturday 28th June
Today a WWII British army Log Book 412 - WD WM20 Service log book sold on eBay UK for over £104
- is this a record?
Monday 23rd June
Didnt think I'd be posting again so soon but an interesting eMail from Ulrich this morning gave me new
material to add to his page.
Next I won off
eBay a drivers handbook for a military WM20 when I checked the number range on the booklet it turns out it is for exactly
the batch my bike was in - hows that for spooky!
Lastly
- I have webbing saddle covers up for sale now with Terry maker plates on the reverse. They really do look the business
- well you can see them on richards and my bikes on this front page. I will also be getting pillion covers made too.
