The original panels....a bit tatty....
The Lightning Rocket still sported its original Ewarts fuel taps although they would not open as someone had used gasket sealer to stop them from leaking. They were glued shut and wouldn't budge. WTF?? A short soak in the ultrasonic cleaner broke them loose. They were disassembled, cleaned and reassembled with new corks. Good quality corks work well if setup correctly although I have had issues with them leaking as I drain the gas each season. After several years of drying out and re-swelling the dripping starts. Have extras and buy good ones!
Two sets of badges ordered from England. The top set was advertised as "Made in England" and will be used on the LR. The lower set has a very poor finish quality molded inside of them. The country of manufacture was not specified on these. I assumed "Made in England" but most likely not.
It appears someone filled the plungers with gasket sealer to stop leaks. Really?!!??
Fuel taps cleaned up and ready for new corks & lines.
The ultrasonic cleaner does wonders on these bits.
Pieced together fuel lines. Not good enough to use "as is" but a pattern to follow.
The fuel cap was in decent shape although a screw had replaced the rivet in the hinge and the seal was dried out. I machined off the swage on the inside of the cap and pressed the assembly apart. Hindsight being 20/20 this can probably be pressed apart without milling. I made a new gasket from cork, installed a felt ring from the rear axle of a '70 BSA to keep fuel from sloshing out of the vent and put it back together with a screw in place of the swage. The handle was re-chromed and a stainless rived was used to make a new hinge pin.
The starting point...
Disassembled and ready for reconditioning.
Swage milled off and the T handle tapped for a screw.
Making the new gasket
A hinge pin was made from a stainless rivet.
It was drilled and tapped to accept a tiny screw.
The cap finished and ready for petrol.
The Lightning Rocket used some parts in common with its older brother the A10. The tank badges are one example. Don't look for them in the spares manual as they are not shown for this model. The badges are held in place with a clip that is fastened with small screws. Nothing difficult here it was just problematic finding a nice set of reproductions. I assumed NOS would be as brittle as my originals and opted to not hunt them down. I purchased two sets of reproductions to get a good set. The good one still needed some clean up. Both sets of original badges were worn beyond use.
New "Made in England" badges with fasteners mounted.
Even the "Made in England" badges had issues. A gate used to make the plastic part was top center and looked like Fido's ass. Tool design 101....hide the freakin' gate! Why not put it on the bottom?!!?
Molding boogers being polished off. They came out well.
Looking fine to me.....Time to put it on the shelf until the rest of the build catches up.
The side panels were pretty straightforward. A set of badges were purchased from the UK and I was told they were the last set that would be available for a long time. Although they doubled the price at checkout I was still happy to get them. The new emblems were aluminum and flat. They were bent to fit an old panel so my new paint would not get buggered up. The same small screws specified for the tank badges are used on the side panel.
The side panel badges formed and fit. Nice design BSA!
BSA used Oddie studs to fasten the side panels to the frame and they work quite well. There are variations throughout the years using different length studs and supporting grommets. The part manual was not to clear on the grommets to use so trial and error was needed to get it fit. I have an abundance of the variations available so this was not an issue.
After a bit of adjustment to the mounts the panels are fit and looking fine.
Time to build wheels.
