An LE Story.
This article is in respose to a request for more information on the LE after I posted a short on Facebook. This was first posted in the LE magazine in 2006 and with a little editing for today.
I thought I would dig
out the “old project” that was conceived when I was at school and has undergone
development ever since. The more or less completed project appeared at the
Kempton Park Southern Classic bike show in 1994 and has been exhibited at the
show most years since.
I think around 1968 or 69
that I did this drawing, thinking I may be able to get some extra ground
clearance by having dry sump lubrication. The idea was to chain drive to an
external dual pump from the very front of the crankshaft and an oil tank from a
BSA C15 to hold it all. In the end I settled for a much easier option, but that
is much later on in the story. I spent hours dreaming and designing and not
really getting anywhere. I had no money
only grand designs. I finished school and went to work, earning some money, but
having to work for exams there was still no time to build. Marriage and home
meant changing priorities and not until around 1978 did I get started on the
project. I did take a few photographs at the time and if you care to back
to an OTL’s (LE Club magazine) in 1979 you will find my
story of a rebuild of 1954 MK 2 PHT 271,
very smart in black livery. What has happened to the years? I am now writing
something in 2006! I leave you to work out how long that is and believe it or
not, Colin; our editor has been doing that job for just as long! I first met
Colin on the Severnsider’s club runs in 1968.
In 1980 I moved jobs and
relocated to Colchester. The late Jeff Tooze found me, as I had left him with an engine
to work on. It did not take long to get the engine sorted but the modifications
I wanted done to various bits to get the additional ground clearance required
someone who had the expertise and the equipment to do it. I had a choice,
either to be very radical and build all specialist parts or, use as many
original parts as possible and modify accordingly. I decided in the end to use
the basic LE parts and modify so that anyone who wanted to undertake a similar
project could do most of it in their own garage with limited use of costly
experts. I went to night school and
learned to weld and did an enormous amount myself over the next few years,
until the lack of support for the metalwork course halted my progress. I made
the lower frame cradle from a broken school chair and a couple of feet of
conduit. It fitted together very well but did have its draw backs. The oil pipe
from the pressure release valve casting was too close to the frame and I had to
modify the piping and use a banjo instead! The thread is tapered and needed to
be tightened with care. It had not taken long to sort out the rear suspension
or modify the body and get it welded up. But the front forks kept me puzzling
and it was not until I ran across someone from Cambridge University through the
Harley club that the front fork issues was sorted. By 1985 the body and every thing else needed
to be painted so I did more night school in auto repair and very importantly
had access to professional spray painting equipment including a hot air
chamber. I had a compressor and a very old Bliss spray gun ( before it became
Deville-Bliss) I could get paint and thinners from Brown Brothers and set about
creating my own colours with, I suppose what might now be called a pearl
finish. I used sliver as a base coat and then over coated with different blues
for each finish. The blue was diluted out with clear lacquer so the gloss
silver shone through. You could get a similar finish using metallic paint but
it does not look quite the same. The blues I used were BMC Rivera Blue and
Renault Navy ( all old stuff from my Dad to start with! ) Once everything was painted assembly was
quite quick ( in comparison ) and by
1988 the bike was running but not ready for the road. I had lights, indicators, lots of little bits and
charging to sort out 6 volts or 12. No contest!
More delays as I moved house
and job in 1992 and not until 1994 did the bike get MOT’d , the morning before
it was due at the Kempton Park bike show! It has been on the road ever since.
Let’s finish off the body
work. The rear mudguard had 2 inches taken off the top to level it out and the
fluted end removed. The front and rear mudguards are finished off with
stainless steel bands. The seat is a
home made job and probably looks like it but parts like that were quite
expensive in the late 80’s about £50 which is about what they cost now! The
rear light housing I manufactured from stainless steel as is all the trim. The
headlamp is Bates with a sealed beam unit ( the advantages of going 12
volt) and the brackets were off the
shelf, as are the mirrors and levers (M&P I think). Indicators off a Suzuki.
The handlebar brackets were from a Yamaha (with home made spacers) as is the
twist grip, ignition switch and switch gear. The gauges are TIM with binnacle.
These are the bits you can see. In the tool box is a cigarette lighter, fuse
box and solid state indicator relay. The horn sits in the middle of the radiator.
A Citroen 2CV HT coil is under the tool
box. Full wave rectification is supplied
by one from a Yamaha 250 with no voltage regulator to protect the battery. It’s
hidden away near the battery. Run with a
60watt headlamp from an 80 watt generator and why then do you need to drain any
power away from the battery? Its only 5 amp hour! The bike was completely rewired with extra
earths. It needed them, there was so much paint on the body work no current was
going to go through that. The horn is fitted in the space between the radiator
cooling sections and I recently fitted a couple of computer fans to help keep
the temperature down. They do stop over heating when ticking over in traffic
for long periods. This was done by just threading through the fins of the
radiator with some 3mm studding and just to make sure when you tighten the nuts
it does not pull through some little square of aluminium as washers.
There are more bits you can’t
see, like the lightened flywheel, which is about a pound lighter, the camshaft is
advanced one tooth and the ports have
been enlarged and polished also the valve guides have been shortened to give an
open a port as possible. The heads have been polished, but if you took them off
you would never know and just a tip to help seal the head gasket the stud holes
have been drilled out to 7mm. This means the heads will not corrode on the
studs and will remain easily removable but also if you happen to over tighten
the head nuts and pull the metal of the barrel up in the area of the stud, the
metal has somewhere to go and a good seal on the head remains. A Del’Orto
carburettor had been fitted in the last few years and has made a big difference
to the performance. I have fitted 2CV
points and a cheapo condenser. The charging circuit has been modified so that
each charging coil has an individual feed to the rectifier to squeeze as much
power out as possible. There is a wiring diagram about somewhere for those who
want to give it a go.
A few more interesting bits
like the heal and toe gear change that had to be fitted inwards instead of
outwards because of my positioning of the engine cradle and consequently the
exhaust box had a big chunk carved out of it. You make one change and that sets
a whole load of thought processes going to get around the problem created by an
idea! The heal and toe gear change started as original and I added a suitable
toe pad to a 10mm bar, that was the easy
part, making up the loop that went under the frame cradle required a bit of
trial and error before getting it right. On the exhaust side I added in a big
tail pipe to have a distinctive exhaust note. The rear brake pedal is original
LE but modified quite a lot to get in the right position. In the end I decided
not to have a centre stand and elected for a side stand only. This curly-wurley
thing was all I could get at the time off the shelf. Choosing a side stand only
does have its draw backs and I think I should have stuck with a centre stand.
Wait for the next special for that one! A folding kick start started life as a
standard one and a folding pedal part was welded on.
Back to the fork legs, as I think
most people know, much is soldered on the LE and the fork lugs are no exception.
Adding 2 inches more length by just moving all the lugs down as far as possible
needs a little extra support. The diagram gives the basic idea. I have tried
this 2 ways, the first time by welding it all together and doesn’t leave a
smooth surface and the second time ( current project ) using silver solder that
will have run into all the gaps. It is not difficult to reposition the brake
back plate lug and to be similarly silver soldered. The rear suspension is
extended by using simple spacers. The handling is as you would expect from an
LE, rock stable and very manoeuvrable. In the standard format it is very easy
to ground the foot boards. The increased ground clearance and high position
foot pegs mean you can really test the cornering ability. I have not found the
limit yet!
I have tried a number of
things on this special some have worked really well, others are passable, but
overall the package does work and has provided me with an interesting
motorcycle that always is a talking point.
