Old Boar's blog (Old Boars blog)

I have about 30 minutes before I have to set off to catch the flight to Cork. In these few minutes I thought I'd share the progress on the TS250 (MZ Motorbike) with you.

You may remember that last weekend I fitted the front forks properly and fitted the drive chain and chain gaiters. Yesterday evening I continued with the assembly work; fitted the rear wheel and adjusted the chain tension (I have still to check the wheel alignment but it should be right). I also fitted the exhaust and fuel tank and then went to the pub. By-the-way, fitting the exhaust to an MZ can be more of a struggle than you might expect.

When I got in from the pub I decided that I'd have a further "tinker". The wiser ones amoung you might caution against "tinkering" when "inspired" and might also point out that attempting to start a motorcycle at midnight may not be a sociable thing to do. In reply, all I can say is that I'm not that wise and that my garage is situated so that I am unlikely to cause much disturbance to anything remotely human!

I fitted the hot-wire, filled the tank and gave the bike a couple of prods. Needless to say it didn't start. Once again the problem is fuel. Although the inside of the tank is now as clean as a high pressure water-jet can make it the crud that used to be there had still managed to clog up the fuel tap. If any of you have a similar experience, the passageways through an MZ fuel tap can be cleaned by careful use of a 3mm (1/8 inch) drill held between finger and thumb.

Once the fuel starvation had been corrected, a couple more prods and the beast stuttered into life. Once again there were dense clouds of oily smoke. Most of it was coming from round the exhaust ring. Obviously I haven't got it bedded down properly, and I think I may have got the ring cross threaded. Despite the fact that the hot-wire is putting 12 volts into a 6 volt coil, I decided to let it run for a few minutes. It was then I noticed that there was smoke coming from the exposed, righthand (dynamo) end of the crankshaft!

• My first thought was: "Oh, no. Not a leaky oil seal."
• My second thought was: "It can't be an oil seal. The engine is running far too well."
• My third thought was: "Oh sh1t! The smoke is coming from that little coil thingy on the dynamo! It must be overheating (in a big way)!
• My next action was to lurch for the kill switch (advice: Never hotwire something without an easy-to-hit kill switch)

Now, I don't think that it was the 12 volts that was the problem with the "coil thingy". I think the problem was that it was receiving the full, unregulated output of the dynamo. When I get back from Cork, I'm going to have to check whether I've don't any permanent damage. But even if I have , what the heck. It was a thoroughly satisfactory end to the evening, even if I did wake a few werewolves!

I think it's high time I fitted the proper electrics, gave it some brakes and took it for a little spin! Watch this space!