Atlas rear wheel bearing – no seals!
Slow week in the garage. Routine maintenance on the Atlas threw up shot rear wheel bearings. I’d felt uneasy on the bike since Bristol when I just didn’t feel comfortable pushing it on through the corners – unusual on the Atlas which is a fine handling bike. Anyways the wheel wobbles despite being held tight. I had a look at the bearings in my spare wheels and could knock these out and re-use. I might do this if cleaning them up brings them to life but at the moment I am more inclined to get a new set. The original bearings have no seals just grease. Not sure why Laverda specified this as the outboard oil seals are prone to wear and unlikely to keep out the muck and grit for long. The only thing that might make me use the old bearings is that it’ll save money – and why not recycle something that ultimately either gets used or thrown away when the time comes to recommission a wheel. I need a 10mm rawl bolt to get the old ones out.
The Honda has rather let me down in that I went to start it at the beginning of the week and nothing. I suspected the immobiliser fob but now find the new battery had gone flat (it’s currently [sic] being recharged). I wanted to press the Honda back in to service so give me a chance to go through the Atlas properly – both for the forthcoming Welsh National Rally but also the LCF rally at the end of May. My ideal is to have the Honda take the load on the run up to events so I can relax and not have to worry about last minute problems…
The paperwork for the Welsh National Rally arrived so I spent a couple of evenings planning the route. Last year Mrs A and I were aboard the RGS and had a hell of a time because my planning was poor, the weather awful and the RGS threw it’s dummy out with a broken ignition wire and starter motor failure (it came loose). Still this time I have a route planned out for a Gold Award along with the supplementary Dragon. The challenge is to get round all the manned stops by 18.00. It’s this requirement that gives the Welsh an edge – Garmin suggests it is easily possible but my calculations suggest it might be tight.
My dating letter from the VMCC arrived this week – 421 has been declared an 87/8 machine even though I know it is a 1989 motorcycle. Still not to worry that it’ll get an ‘E’ registration as opposed to the proper ‘F’ or ‘G’ – and of course it means it’s a year older so at some stage it will become less expensive to insure!
I’m worried that the work toward recommissioning the triples has slowed over the past three weeks – it’s too easy for the weeks to go by and all of a sudden another year has gone by…
Nick 🙂
Bent screwdrivers, big hammers and old Laverdas 