Oh, fork it!!!!!

Today I became the pround new owner, courtesy of eBay, a set of forks for "Vicky". For that honor, I get a set of forks that just need a little TLC instead of major surgery....and this is always a good thing.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=130552349335&viewitem=&sspagename=STRK%3AMEWNX%3AIT


The chase parts still continues though........






*That was a pretty catchy title ya gotta admit........what....noooo? Jeez, not even a courtesy chuckle....

Nothing to do with motorcycles, bodging or ale

Bit of a disappointment I know, but it's true.....

For the past few days, Bodger has not been doing the usual routine at the Postal salt mines, but instead, has been in a three day class being taught and certified....no....not that type of certified....on how to be a "Facilitator" which is just a posh name for instructor or teacher.

Me myself along with two other mailmen types, a window clerk (the one in the Post Office you buy stamps from) and a office supervisor are being trained on how to teach/instruct classes. Those latter two for office type jobs, and us other three to be.....wait for it......Driver Safety Instructors!!!!!!!!

Yes, yes, we will instruct new people on the proper, Postal, way of driving Postal vehicles in the delivery of the mail which must get through no matter what.

The first day was spent covering basic things such as setting up a classroom, class materials, effective use of time. The next two were spent doing more of the same along with speechifying or actually giving a short presentation to the class on an aspect of the job.

Needless to say, it's easier to spout drivel and gibberish on a blog or a forum than it is to stand in front of people and do it all day long AND keep them awake as well as informed.

But did it I did and I am happy to say that I was certified (and about time too I hear from some of you) as a "Facilitator."  What's next????

Spending spree....sort of

The past couple of days Bodger went bonkers and spent some hard earned coins on some new toys for the shed.

I still may get the old workbench at a later date, but in the meantime a necessity was needed in the form of one of those stands that bolts onto the bench and a motor is secured into it.

Told it might be a good idea to have that for taking "Vicky's" motor apart. Sure it can be sat on the bench and flop around like a bit of Icelandic cod on the deck of a fishing boat.....or.........it could be held nice and secure so meaningful work can be done to it.

Option #2 seemed logical to me.

Also got one of those fork sealer holder tool things used to tighten and untighten fork seals in the forks. Would be a lot easier to do an assembly of the forks with that than to use the always popular lump hammer/long, skinny bar approach favored by most hamfisted oiks of years gone by.

Also got the wee cover that goes onto "Vicky's" head to check the tappets, not to forget one of Roy Bacon's works on BSAs. And lastly, for those many hours spent in the shed, a BSA cup to have a cuppa tea in or even an adult type drink providing there's any in the bottle.

So, it's been a productive and destructive past few days; productive: getting these trinkets. destructive: having to empty the coffers to pay for it all!

And now for something completely different

Over on Kawa's blog he featured two sprint or drag bikes, Nero and Super Nero, both run by the late George Brown. If memory serves me, these were both Vincent Comet singles that had some serious tuning work done on them. I'm not sure of the details, but I just recently read an article on them and there's info in a link via the title on Kawa's blog. See them at the bottom of the page.

Here are a couple of others that are living in the National Motorcycle Museum in Solihull, Birminham, UK.

. This one is the Hogslayer run by TC Christianson. It's a twin engined Norton drag bike.

Texas Ceegar, a Triumph powered streamliner that was run at Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah. This set a speed record and the folks in charge at Triumph at the time were so impressed that they named this model....wait for it....Bonneville...... This was heavily damaged during the fire at the NMM a few years back and fully restored by Big D Cycles in Dallas. 

This one I didn't get the info on while at the NMM, but it's interesting as hell. There's something about it being thrust powered is all I know so far. 

These two are the ones described at the beginning of the blog, Nero and Super Nero.

For more info on any of these, I'm sure Google has something there to read or even more pictures.