A Star is born albeit a bit premature!

[Rusty nuts]

Have spent a thoroughly frustrating day wrestling with new project, leftovers from the plunger & really should have taken the wife's advice & sold it all on ebay but!

The original 1949 plunger, see my avatar pic died in 1965 & the PO spent the next few years going round autojumbles amassing bits for the rebuild which he never got round to.
Fast forward to 2009 & having resurrected that, he was dead chuffed to see it alive again, I find myself with boxes of engine parts, gearboxes, cycle parts you name it, all left over.

To top it all I find that amongst the boxes is a very rusty but complete longstroke Star Twin engine with correct head & carbs, reground (albeit slightly rusty) crank, rods, cases have new t/s bush, offer up, looks good, locally engineering shop confirms 1.8thou clearance to crank, seems was jig bored & left to rot. Barrels very rusty but no lip, dubious engineer agrees to hone, cleans up niceley +60 thou, which matches a pair of new unused +60 hepolite pistons from another box, feel am on a roll here!
Then a rigid frame came along, honestly who could resist!

Trying to figure out how to get a plunger hub rear wheel into a rigid frame with a swinging arm spindle & spacers was a real challenge.
Thanks to Tombeau for pointers on that, I'm no engineer. Quite handy with an angle grinder though!!!

Ill health & myriad delays mean this is months behind schedule but ending up with a very sexy looking rolling chassis made me come over all lovey!
 
Cracked a few beers see last photo & grabbed camera instead of clearing up garage, also see last photo!

This will be very much a special b*****d Bitsa with bits from every incarnation the A7, originality is not a concern but I'm thinking it'll look quite tasty, if somewhat irreverant.

Thinking of a name, "Josh" springs to mind! 

To be continued!

Cheers
Rusty

[Brian]

Hey thats looking really good Rusty. What you are doing is virtually the same as what I am doing with a plunger A10 at the moment, building it out of BSA bits but just from various years.

I was going to say hurry up and drink that beer before it gets warm but then I realised you lot like your beer warm ! Is that because you like the taste of warm beer or you all had Lucas fridges    

[Rusty nuts]

Room temperature (bloody freezing for an Aussie) old chap not warm.
Allows the complex flavours to .......................blah, blah, blah.

You guys' have to freeze yours because you only have one decent amber fluid in the whole country
Coopers sparkling ale.

Now I've done it

[Brian]

How does someone in the UK know about Coopers Sparkling Ale Your right though, it is the best beer ever made and I do my bit to support the brewery. 

[Rusty nuts]

Hi Brian

Lived, worked & travelled in OZ for a few years back in the 80's & 90's.
Passed through Mt Gambier on the way to Melbourne after hitching across the Nullabor from Perth to Port Augusta.
An interesting night spent in St Vincent De Pauls in Adelaide & a hair raising ride to a sheep station just outside Mt Gambier with a mad sheep shearer called Jake
with a huge sack of weed & two shotguns on the rear seat of the Holden, as you do!
Found it quite alarming when somewhere between Policeman Point & Tilley swamp he decided to take potshots at the wildlife as we barrelled along close to 100 mph driving barefoot with a big spliff clenched in his between his lips!!!
Turns out he was quite notorious in the area!

Took the bus for the next leg into Melbourne!

Happy days!

You can now actually buy Coopers in the UK.

Cheers

Rusty

[muskrat]

Josh would be proud. But now he's up there I'd say he drinks XXXX. Jake must be my long lost twin !
Cheers

[terryk]

XXXX now ya talkin real beer

[Rusty nuts]

Progress of sorts, looks fast anyway!

Note top of l/h valve stem 3mm longer than r/h, both original NOS stamped BSA 67-189's!

So it's not just pattern parts

[mike667]

looking great - love the carby setup!

[Rusty nuts]

Cheers

Engine wrestled into frame today, another straightforward job becomes a nightmare
Forks have been off three times now sorting out mismatched yokes/shrouds, finally sorted.
Head is on, rocker boxes tomorrow & sort out gearbox as kickstart ratchet now doesn't return with covers bolted up tight
More photos to follow.

Rusty

[Rusty nuts]

Here she is for your delectation/derision

The chunky 3/4" hallite spacers were necessary in order to utilise the K2FC as otherwise the adv/retard cable fouled the l/h carb.
As you'll see in the last pic of carbs this pushed everything way back resulting in the rear of the taps fouling the carb tops, hence strange petrol tap angle!
It's all very tight with just enough room for the fuel pipes between carb body & float. But was an interesting exercise!

First kick she spat a cloud of black smoke back through carbs, second kick roared into life & the grin on my face stuck for a good hour & several pints of beer

Contrary to what I'd read the twin carb setup was easy to balance, the only problem being you have to slacken off the float chamber union nuts to swing the float chamber away in the meantime squashing the fuel lines to get a spanner on the throttle stop locknuts!

Would have been finished a couple of weeks ago if I'd gone the easy route & chucked an auto mag on ,but where's the fun in that

Erling, sorry if I've exceeded file size allowance, my octagenarian mother is waiting for me to pick her up, and am more scared of her than you!
Will resize tomorrow if you haven't already.

Cheers

Rusty

[tombeau]

Looks absolutely lovely.
Well done.
Cheers,
Iain

[Rusty nuts]

Iain,

Cheers & thanks again for advice & pointers re: stub axle, bearings & spindle etc.

Much appreciated.  Hope you find your mojo again, here's some Karma in the meantime!

For anyone interested, it is possible to use a swinging arm spindle & plunger hub on a rigid frame
You do however have to get a bearing ground & chop a spacer in two very precisely utilising both parts  
 But since rigid spindles are the original Hens' tooth there's not a lot of choice


Rusty

[muskrat]

Rusty go to the top of the class, well done mate.
How do you change gear?
Those shorts  that's why you have rusty nuts. 
Cheers

[Rusty nuts]

Muskrat,
Had a feeling you'd spot that!
Invisible gear lever from Wassel, crap pattern part that falls off splines.
Having an old one rechromed.
"Dumpy's Rusty nuts" is a band I was associated with years ago, the wife has another explanation, but let's not go there

Cheers mate

[mikethebrush]

lovely bike

I remember dumpys rusty nuts

whatever happened to them

[muskrat]

My sort of musik, good one Rusty. http://www.dumpysrustynuts.net/
Cheers

[Brian]

Well done Rusty, it looks fantastic.

Getting the carbies positioned so you can get at the adjusting screws is a bit of a struggle, I fitted a pair of these to mine and that allowed me to swing the bowls far enough back to be able to adjust the mixture and idle screws.

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/90-Degree-Elbow-7-16-Gas-Nut-1-4-pipe-/140333850538?cmd=ViewItem&pt=UK_Motorcycle_Parts&hash=item20ac8c9faa

They are a great bike, you should enjoy riding yours.

[trevinoz]

Rusty,
            I think you will find that a swinging arm and rigid rear spindle and hub are one and the same.
A magnificent job, by the way.
I hope mine looks as good, if I ever get to it!
Trev.

[Rusty nuts]

Thanks Trev

Yes, different part no.s but same length & diameter the only diff being the rigid spindle is slotted.
The distance piece 67-6028 is common to both but needs to be cut so that one flange butts up against the endcover while extending through to meet the spindle sleeve.
The other pieces flange then butts up against the spindle slot in the frame to give a tidy & authentic appearance.
Tried using the distance piece intact but then you cannot use the end cover & the wheel is no longer QD as the distance piece will extend into the hub to meet the spindle sleeve necessitating removal of chain & sliding out the sprocket & hub as one piece.

Cheers

Rusty