A
Valiant Effort.
At
the end of last year my Little Velocette Valiant was being very
incontinent. Oil was dripping from the clutch housing at the back of
the engine.
There are three oil seals in that space where the clutch
is positioned. One on each side of the drive shaft and the other
being the kick start shaft. To get to these required an engine out
job splitting the engine from the clutch housing and then from the
gearbox housing. A great deal of faffing around trying to squeeze the
engine from the frame without taking paint with it.
I had to remove
all the securing studs to make the space. Fortunately I only needed
to replace the two engine seals. The drive one behind the clutch and
the main culprit the kick start shaft seal. This seal was a poor fit
in the casting so some loctite was applied to take up the slack. I
found a very old paper gaskit (over 20 years at a guess) that had
been folded and would not straighten out. It did after I made it damp
with water and spread it out to dry to restore its original shape.
Reassembled with a little gaskit sealant it all went back together
quite well until I found the oil pipe that supplies oil to the drive
shaft bearing was not in the right place and on bending the pipe to
fit it sheared off at the union. I drilled out the remains of the
pipe and re-soldered what was left back in position and continued the
assembly. A minor hiccup. It is now running fine but I have
discovered another drip of oil from the front housing and the oil
seal there will need to be replaced before long as does the one on
the Greenford Police LE engine. That will be done soon. Sorting
through my spares I found another LE silencer box. It looked quite
reasonable until I started to repair the obvious small holes. In the
end I spent half a day welding them up only to blow more holes in it
because the metal was so thin. I think I have filled all of one side
with welding rod. It is now painted and ready for fitting. It looks
OK.
I have not progressed much further with the Police LE other than
to get a 3BA tap and 3BA countersunk screws that are needed to fit
the top leg shield plates that are the platform for the switches and
gauges and then refit the screw fixing brackets after the final coat
of paint has dried. On-line nut and bolt specialists have been a
great asset in this area. I have had some bits from the LE club and
got hold of a second hand radiator cap that has taken ages to clean
up. For some reason these zinc caps acquire a powdery residue from
contact with anti-freeze that is difficult to remove. It just does
not rub off and has to be scraped away especially from the screw
thread on the inside of the cap. I now have a shiny cap.
I
have been contacted my Mortons about the Southern Classic Bike Show
at Kempton Park on May 19th and will having a Velocette LE
Club stand at that venue. As usual things need to set in motion now
for who will be attending and what bikes will be there. I also have
an invite to attend from the BEN Windsor Great Park -Vintage and
Classic Vehicle Tour on Saturday 30th June. I usually take
the Valiant on this one. This year it is my intention to get to the
Chinnor Byke Dayz event the following weekend. Wall to wall live
bands and entertainment all day. 6th, 7th and
8th July Real ales and food too! It was great the last
time I was able to go and something not to be missed.
