Manky's Pop.

[Manky Monkey]

  In an ideal World I'd have all the necessary parts to do that lot & could do it in a couple of days.
In reality, I'll probably spend the first 3 days hacksawing & filing a couple of brackets, then re-doing them until they fit, then something will break, then there'll be some domestic errand or other to run that'll take up a few days
-before I know it, it'll be time to go back to work. Whole weeks & months have gone by like that so far.

[ByzMax]

I'm suffering the same sort of problems at the moment. Every time I get in the workshop something comes up that I've got to deal with.


Had a very bad couple of weeks. Still positive though but taking a weekend off as it will help me cler my head. 

Get stuck in and you will get more done than you expect.

[terry t]

Hi Mankey.what can we cross of the job list then

[Manky Monkey]

Nothing yet. First day of my 2 weeks holiday today so I'm off to the workshop mid morning -it's a 45 minute commute away down the M3 & I've got some jobs to do at home first. Hope to get the back axle sorted today.
Maybe.

[Manky Monkey]

Of course, things didn't go quite according to plan. They never do.
Tinkered in the shed at home for a while this morning, welding the exhaust for my trike, then meandered over to Loony's workshop in Basingstoke. I'd rung Bernie the sheet metal worker, who's making light housings for the indicators on the front mudgards. He works in Newbury, Berkshire, a half hour drive from Loony's place, so we drove over there to take a look at the lights as Bernie wanted my O.K on them before he went further.
Turns out his workshop was broken into over the weekend. The second time it's happened. He lost over 13 thousand quid's worth of sheet steel, aluminum & stainless. The gits had tried to break in at the back of the workshop by peeling the metal cladding off the wall. When that failed they tried to lever the fire escape door frame out of the brickwork. Then they had a go at the door itself. Not deterred, they then took an axe & cut a person sized hole through the front roller shutter door & opened the back door from inside. Then they opened a set of gates at the back of the building, ripped down a fence & drove a truck up to the door. They took an entire rack of welding rods, part made customers' jobs, all the off-cut metal that was laying around, even a stack of aluminium frames that belonged to Bernie's brother who runs an aluminium window & door frame business from the same workshop. The paint on the frames alone cost 2 1/2 grand. Most expensive loss was 2 sheets of bronze, specially ordered for a customer's job, at a thousand pounds a sheet. Bernie told us they even trashed the office where his Dad does all the company paperwork. He said it was heart breaking to see his 71 year old Dad on his hands & knees, picking up all the ripped up paperwork. Bastards.
And yet, my 2 little aluminium Pop front mudguards were left untouched, as was the computer in Bernie's office & the cash in his desk drawer. I felt a bit selfish asking him how he was getting on with them after that, but he was happy to show us.

[Manky Monkey]

He's made 2 aluminium "Cornetto cones". He's pie-cut them along their length & pulled the cones round to follow the curve of the mudguards, then welded up the cuts -I think they look like big wiggly worms.

[Manky Monkey]

Taz thinks we should leave the ribs cos they look quirky, but they'll be smoothed off & a flat base plate welded in. The bulb holders sit inside the cones & will bolt down through the guards to hold the whole assembly in place. The bulbs are orange cos they're indicators, but the lenses are frosted white glass, so they'll look like vintage side lights. The real side lights are incorporated in the headlights. The lenses are held with a small grub, (wiggly worm?), screw.
The whole lot will eventually be painted black. A lot of hotrodders try to hide the mudguards cos they'd rather not fit any at all, but I thought if we're going to fit them we might as well make a feature of them & have something with a bit of shape to it, rather than just a flat trailer guard.

[Manky Monkey]

After hearing of Bernie's break in, I decided against asking him for any off-cuts of steel plate, so we went around the corner to BKI Welding, another very useful company I've blagged stuff from bought materials from a lot over the years.
We want to add some strengthening gussets to the 4 bar linkage mounts on the back axle. As well as making the brackets stronger, they'll also add some detailing to the underside of the pick-up. We only needed a couple of 6 inch off-cuts of 5mm plate. These are the templates we came up with.

[Manky Monkey]

And this is the 10 feet of steel we bought! Well, it was cheap. 14 quid for 2, 5 feet long lengths. I'm sure we'll find a use for it somewhere.

[Manky Monkey]

Loony then remembered that he's got the electricity board guys at his workshop tomorrow, repairing a supply fault, so he'll be without power most of the day.
So my task for tomorrow is to cut all the gussets in my shed at home & maybe drill some holes in them to make them more interesting, then get on with my trike exhaust.
Oh, the blurry thing in the back of the last pic is Taz's trike by the way.

[tbone]

Bad news about the break in. You just know all its all gonna end up at the scrap yard 

[Manky Monkey]

Yeah. If the scrapyards didn't turn a blind eye to where the stuff came from, it'd be a lot harder for these people to get rid of it, making it less attractive to them. Bernie's workshop's in the industrial estate -I think there's only one in Newbury, & although it's busy during the day, it's deserted at night -no security patrols or anything.
An interesting snippet of info from Bernie- he thought about fitting an infra-red alarm system. You can buy them now that are triggered by motion sensors to switch on a hidden infra-red camera when there's movement in the building. The alarm then texts your mobile phone to tell you & you can check the film on your PC or even your phone. Brilliant, though not much use if you're 50 miles away at the time. But he discovered through the wonders of the web, that burglars use mobile phone cameras or digital cameras to check for infra red signals. Apparently if you pan a digital camera around the room, then play it back, the beams show up.

[BikerGran]

Still might get pics before they disabled it!

What a bugger.  Is there no alarm on the building at all?

[Manky Monkey]

Didn't ask Bobbi.

[Manky Monkey]

Pile of little strengthening gussets for the suspension mounts on the rear axle now made.
They're actually slightly thicker than the mounts themselves but can't complain when the steel was cheap. I drilled a few holes in them just to make them more interesting. Loony has a bit of a thing for the holey look -a traditional 50s racing mod to save those all important few ounces of weight. If he had his way the entire car would be peppered with holes. When the axle's painted shiney black I might touch in the insides of the holes in red to tie in with the red detailing on the rest of the car when it's finished.
I've now decided the bodywork will be gloss black, rather than satin, cos it has a more vintage look to it. Most of the running gear will be powder-coated gloss black but the powder will have a different sheen to it than the painted body, giving a little contrast. Maybe.