I know exactly what you mean about jobs taking far longer than you expect. I was putting a new battery in my Three Wheeler Morgan today and I was thinking about a15 minute job. It all started to go wrong when I found the courier had dropped the battery on its box type terminals and skewed them both, so that the square captive nut would not go in. After spending ages very gently straightening those as they are made of lead, then I found the cables from the car are too short for this different style of battery terminal. Finally the supplied bolts to go into the square nut to hold the cables on, are obviously designed for slim motorbike cables and not the big heavy ones to start my S&S X-Wedge 131 and I had to fiddle around with a right angle scriber to lift the square nuts so the the bolts would start - 2 hours later and with half my tool chest scattered around the Morgan I am finished and at nearly 78 years old - knackered.
I'd guess that Greeves are rather simple units and only a different type of fiddly than the fiddly we've become used to. I am enjoying this series as I've always looked at Greeves and remember from somewhere that Malcolm Smith, the American Legend, used to ride a Greeves and liked it, before he became the West Coast distributor (or some such) for Husqvarna. If he was riding it and liked it, it must have been OK.
Hello Michael, I just spent some time looking over a greeves on an auction site here in the U.K. the front mudguard runs very close to the frame just like your bike, so there you are! Enjoying the build, cheers.
Trying to find the name of the book series you mentioned, I took to this episode’s transcript. Never did that before. I started noticing a lot of entries marked “applause.” I said? Wait a minute am I on the right video. what’s up? Turns out the truck/lorry noise is interpreted as applause. 👏🏽 Cheers and applause to you Michael. Carry on lad.
I do the opposite - my Whitworth spanners live at home, I don't need them at work these days, but my home metric collection isn't very good. A Whitworth spanner fits those 15mm just fine.
Have you considered bronzing the holed forks, let's face it a nice thin layer of bronze melted all around would really strengthen the tubing and fill the pinpricks.
Very good progress Michael. I'm glad I didn't buy a Greeves, they seem a bit of a bugger. My Francis Barnet had a bolt up frame but it wasn't quite so fiddly. Mind you, it hadn't been hammered around a Motocross track so I'm probably being unfair. Have a great week, Dean.
Great to hear from a fellow FB owner, mine was an impulse buy a good few years ago at an auction '56 Plover, it is the future of transport no tax or MOT and low emission zone exempt 💨☁️☁️🤣😂
@@retromechanicalengineer I must admit the Villiers would struggle to pull the skin off some custard 🤣 it's for day's like today when the sun is out and I'm not in a hurry although it'll mostly catch up with the wife on her RE Bullet. If I actually want to get somewhere quicker then the ZZR 1400 comes out, however rice burners aren't for this channel.
Thanks Michael. It’s going to be a nice bike when finished, but then, all your bikes are nice! Hope those other forks can be repaired, but a Greeves looks good with a pair of Cerianis on! At last got my Innova special legal and on the road this week. Took me a lot longer than it takes you! 17 months, and there’s still little bits to do.. (projects! 🤷♂️) Keep up the good work.. Les in Chester 🇬🇧
I'm convinced motorcycle manufacturers deliberately put in features which are deliberately and unecessarily fiddly to discourage people from fixing their own bikes.
