Well that was an expensive week.
Pair of new Amal carbs
£295New clutch components, (worm drive, pushrod & springs, plus a couple of other bits & pieces while I was ordering from xs650shop.de in Germany),
£115New polished stainless exhaust pipes,
£240My brother recommended a performance exhaust company near Salisbury in Wiltshire that he's used a couple of times. So I visited them this afternoon. "Torque Technique". Very helpful guy. He can't match the radius of the righthand pipe because I made it from sections cut from 2 different pre formed bends, but he can get close by stepping the tube diameter up a size from 1 1/2" outside diameter to 1 5/8". Hopefully I can do something with that. They'll need flanges, (big washers), welding to the ends to fit into the cylinder head ports. Didn't occur to me till I was on my way home that the finned exhaust collars might not fit the bigger pipes, but if not, I'm sure they can be modified. Once I've got the pipes to play with I can see just how much room I have for silencers, but will try them first without, just in case they're actually quieter than the old baffled ones. Should be ready next week.
Also visited the welding shop in Berkshire who have the fuel tank. They're welding a breather pipe to the underside to replace the one I stupidly trimmed back flush, (the fuel fumes blistered the paint around the breather hole so it needs a pipe that I can fit a rubber hose to). They didn't have any suitable steel pipe so I picked up a length from B & Q, rolled a 90 degree bend in it & took it over to them. The old breather pipe is brazed into the bottom of the tank, so they can't weld to it. They said they'd try soldering instead.
I reckon the total cost of this build, including the original donor bike, is now somewhere around 2 grand, plus a grand's worth of engraving. So I need to keep it for about 10 years before it becomes a sensible investment!
