Fabricated a new headlight mount that sticks further out than the mount the light came with. The wires and cables are subsequently tidier with less rubbing from the previous tight squeeze. Usual drill, grinded, filed, sanded and painted in satin black. Though the light does angle out to the left a tad, so might straighten it out later on.
Made this nifty indicator mount that attaches to the lower engine mount. It now holds my regulator/rectifier underneath the bike, just out of plain sight but still will get plenty of air to cool it down. Love it.
Made a new speedo mount to sit in front of the top bridge. Not what I originally planned. I wanted a side mount speedo, sitting just above my knee, but my stock tank is too wide for it and it would rub the bars/horn switch when turning. Maybe when the Wassal tank comes I'll play around with it and see what I come up with.
Bought a bunch of stuff lately.
Capacitor 8,000 Uf, 25v from Element 14
I wanted something with higher Uf but I want to tuck everything under the seat, so size was a concern. I'll give this one a go and see if I have any issues before considering an upgrade. The worst I've read about from an under rated cap is the flickering of the head light when the revs are low when idling and when indicators and brake light takes power.
Electrical Connectors from Vintage Connections
Got a heap of different bullet connectors, plugs and some 3M electrical tape. Having enough connectors makes rebuilding the wiring harness less risky - When you stuff something up. A new crimp tool is HIGHLY recommended. Using a crappy tool that was lying around the garage and it sucks ass (I've got bloody hand cramps), might hit up JayCar to grab a better one. The package came in weeks time, not bad. It's all quality stuff so... yeah I recommend Vintage Connections if you're after OEM type connectors. Didn't really buy into the idea of their kits because I had a rough idea of what I needed.
Anyone bought anything from John Turk? Apparently they wholesale electrical stuff. Need to buy some new thin wires and the local JayCar is hopeless.
Wassall Tank
It took me a year and half to track this baby down. I'd seen it before but had no idea it was a vintage after market Triumph part. The whole time I'd assumed it was something completely custom made. Apparently there's a genuine article with made in Britain stamped on the inside of the tank etc. There's similar versions from Hap Jones.
The tank's nice but not in the best shape, rusty, dented etc just from being 40 years old and used I suppose. I might cut the tank in half, hammer out the dents and donate my stock tank's tunnel to it.
After grinding and sanding the paint back, I discovered "MADE IN ENGLAND" stamped inside - Score! Really happy it's the genuine article. At the same time, that explains the numerous dings it has. There was a shitload of filler used on this tank, I'm talking about a 1 cm coating all over. Luckily there weren't any holes in the tank. I probably will load it up with the same amount of filler incase there's hairline cracks that I can't see. All those dents have got to weak points, right?
There's about 3 layers of paint, white, fluorescent yellow, and black which either points to a previous owner that was high on acid with multiple personality disorder OR just dates back the history of these tanks used for board track racing.
Gas Tank Cap
Bought a low profile cap that screws in with a lock. Not sure if it will work with the Wassall, again just wait and see, maybe buy a new bung and weld it on. From memory the cap was 44mm. Scoping out these bungs -
http://www.bitterendchoppers.com/Tanks2.html, http://aaok.com/tank-bung-screw-type-sold-each.html. This cap looks fucking sick, wouldn't mind one of these
Here's more...
http://www.sportslinkup.com/shop/0-Gas-cap-1-bin.html
I asked a few of these bung retailers, they said Harley bungs are usually standard. I screwed the cap into the Wassell tank and it fit! Well, on the inside hole anyway, since the outside flange is for British style caps.
The question now is, do I buy a VENTED or NON-VENTED fuel tank bung. I think the vented ones will allow the cap to screw completely in until it locks, where as the non-vented ones have a stopper that prevents the cap from going in too far so as to 'vent' the fuel? Apparently vented is better but I don't understand why? My stock SR250 tank is just a hole (non-vented) and the Wassall is the same (non-vented). Don't you need the cap to be tight as hell so it creates a vacuum for the fuel to pump through the petcock??
