RUMCars Forum
General Category => Microcar Events => Topic started by: Peelpower on May 29, 2013, 12:03:41 AM
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First sun beams, and some test drives.
(http://www.kabinenroller.de/Pictures/Gallery/TJsneHO3Jdhm9reTVyCx3c9OChA4FhY1m23qVkK1sHU.jpg)
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There was me hoping to see a 1950-60s Alpine but there's no pictures. (Sunbeam Alpine) ;D
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Not just me then - no pics
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You must not look directly at the sun. You'll not see much and go blind to see nothing. If you do look at the sun you have to use smoked haddock to protect your eyes. Following those instructions, do you get a picture? I do!
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How do you plaice the haddock? I'm floundering.
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Not sure it was the sun that made you lot blind ;) stop all the codding where are the pics ?
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I keep checking to see if I shant see the pics again or shal I but I will try again later
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my last reply has been on since this morning and no-one commented on my mis-spelling of shall. this was in order to get the name of another FISH into my reply . can anyone spot it . monty python fans may remember john cleese trying to buy a licence for his pet fish - eric .
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Shalfish? Not a real fish, but a crustacean. Why a crustacean? They make good pies, I guess.
No I am not off my chump, or any other local colloquialism you might choose to use.
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al may i suggest you youtube monty python fish licence - you will find out what type of fish eric was
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No thanks, Its a dog licence with the word dog crossed out and fish written in with crayon. I did not like all the others, they were to flat.
I was leaving space for others. Did you now they breed them in the water warmed by the outfall of Calder Hall power station. Something a breakthrough in fisheries, I understand.
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I was driving behind this Sunbeam last Saturday on the Boston run. Same engine as the Ladybird I believe.
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That is lovely!
The weather over here is CRAP! I finally have my moped license, going to sort out insurance tommorow, because sunday there is an old moped meeting :)
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Hey! Joining the legal moped riding set at last. Be careful though. I came off my mobylette on my first day on a wet man hole cover!
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and so of course did renate hele , stalwart with husband mike ,of bondspares - a year or two on and she is still on crutches - poor thing :'(
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Hey! Joining the legal moped riding set at last. Be careful though. I came off my mobylette on my first day on a wet man hole cover!
Hehe well last saturday I actually fell in a ditch on my pride and joy... Luckily hardly any damage, only a bit of the chain cover was bent, ad the 2 brackets/plates that hold the headlamp were squiffy. Straightened it all "by hand" and it's fine. The ditch was quite deep too! I went around a corner too fast, didn;t lean enough around it, and there was a medium sized stone on the road... didn't want to catch it on the tyre, so I steered around it... on the OUTSDE of the bend, and the wheels "caight" the grass, and as you may know it's not easy to steer out, I went straight in! Hurt my wrist too but fine now. I literally pulled it out of the ditch, checked to see the damage, judged it was fine to ride, and continued my trip :D
Luckily I had no side covers on, as it wouod have probably badly dented them! Suprisingly the flywehel was fine, even without the cover! (the flywheel cover has no holes for ventilaton, the condensors burn outr, people reccomend riding without it if the road is dry).
Bob, my proper license should arrive in 2 or 3 weeks. I passed the test though. All I have now is some blue paper that says I passed, but cant ride until I get the license... They won;t stop me ;D I need to sort out insurance and registration though...
I rebuolt the engine on that white moped with new bearings (some of them were gritty, so I put new SKF ones on), new oil seals as the old orignal ones were as hard as plastic (brittle too!), new gaskets all around and new piston rings. Ignition is all original except plug of course, I sanded the "edges" of the coils and inside of flywheel. All seems to work as well as it should! Could do with a bit more power, may need to adjust the timing a tiny bit more. I rebuilt this engine on my own,aswell as my Solex engine, which worked fine. Only problem witht he Solex, was that last time I had a g on it, the "stone" that drives the wheel shattered!
This white mooped should be fine though, I think I will odify the ignition and fit an external modern condensor as they are very reliable and don't burn out. Can't wait for the mopped ride sunday! I have no experience on "long" trips. The start is 45km from our place, then its a 55km ride with the "group", then 45km back home... LEt's hope it makes it!
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That's quite a long run! Ours are usually about 25 miles all in. I did do the coast to coast though which was 140 miles. Have fun!
This Sunday I'm doing the Reservoir Dogs run. Colchester.
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and so of course did renate hele , stalwart with husband mike ,of bondspares - a year or two on and she is still on crutches - poor thing :'(
What! That's terrible. I understood that there had been a incident but I had not realized it was something as 'trivial' as trying to enjoy oneself. Another Micro couple who have not had the best of luck with health or would otherwise be doing all sorts of things, well more things, than they do now.
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Jonners, got to get into the Dutch Solex racing. Dennis is into that I believe. Completely bonkers. I expect the French manage to do something equally as daft like climbing one of the mountains for a packet of Galois fags or something. All good stuff.
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Nice to see the car in question eventually :)mopetta in the sun is now there at the head of this topic
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Al, I have a Solex. I have seen Solex racing on youtube, it looks crazy! I bought parts of a guy who goes 100km/h on one... Obviously top end changed, bigger "stone", etc... but I think a lot is still original!
Otherwise, I got insurance this evening, so ready for sunday!
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I was driving behind this Sunbeam last Saturday on the Boston run. Same engine as the Ladybird I believe.
Anorak rustling but yes I get it. This is a kick start two stroke 175cc single rather than the electric start 250cc four stroke twin. Styling stands out though and I quite like it. Bitch to ride as they through you over the handlebars if you try and corner hard and fast. Apparently the geometry was wrong, well not as good as it could have been, and I am crap on bikes.
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You may need to re-rustle your anorack Al, I was chatting with the owner back at base and its definitely a four stroke twin, I can confirm this as I heard it run. They are a nice shape arnt they. Nice air intakes too.
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I am fairly sure there are two versions. a 250cc four-stroke twin and a 175cc Two-stroke single?
http://motorbike-search-engine.co.uk/classic_bikes/bsa-sunbeam-scooter.php
http://www.bonhams.com/auctions/15622/lot/378/
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Thats interesting, it appears the 175 two stroke versions engine was derived from the Bantam. As a man once said " The day I stop learning is the day I stop living"
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I think I would prefer to have the two-stroke. Just so many things to go wrong in a British four-stroke 250cc twin engine. Reputedly fairly fast though, just too late on the scooter scene to sell in any quantity - and expensive I bet.
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We kind of touched on this before. The 250cc was rather like a double Heinkel engine and was designed by thingy that did the daimlar V8 engine, who's name once again I have forgotten. Like the Hienk its big prob was keeping cool. Thus attention to timing, casings, oil etc etc to give it every chance. Of course some folk did not bother and suffered the consequences for which they blamed the machines. The Triumph unit is a good engine, I feel, and had it been marketed earlier might have made some considerable difference to some of the otherwise Villiers powered machinery, assuming Triumph would supply. A Triumph powered Scootacar would have made mincemeat out of a Schmitt but instead we had to await the MkIII, which is a little thirsty.
The 175 was indeed based on the old Bantam and really not in the same class, not that I am slagging Bantoms off, but just as the Heinkel scooter cruises around like a Guzzi amongst the flat on the tank types so does the Triumph/BSA twin can among the normal fizzing scooters. Chalk and cheese. The kick-start, if fitted, comes out in a different place on the fourstroke as it as completely different engine. If I recall it was a bit of a botch as it had a short chain on the end of it to rotate a shaft. Most were supplied as 12v electric start with two battery chests on the shield rather than one. They tended to be two tone coloured with metallic or polychromatic as one colour. Often a petrolly sea green. Though I think I had blue and red too. The cheaper ones tended to be ordinary paint and not always two tone.
The fourstroke sounds odd as it has a strange exhaust which is effectively two systems meeting in a small football shaped silencer in the tip of the back of the pod shaped rear cowl with a single outlet.
Te other clue on looking at the pictured offered again is it does actually say on it that it is a 175! Doh! Then again this might not be the very scooter you were playing with at the event.
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Thats interesting, it appears the 175 two stroke versions engine was derived from the Bantam. As a man once said " The day I stop learning is the day I stop living"
Bantams arte great. They are often considered crap, worthless ans boring. My dad has a B14, which is the 14hp 175cc model, best bantam made. It's very fast, feels really safe, sort of eliable. Great bike.
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Always have to bare in mind that the BSA Bantam is not a British design , it's a pre-war DKW or suchlike . Postwar reparations and all that .
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Yes and yes, the Bantam design was nicked and the BSA Sunbeam at the rally last weekend was a metalic green one, a 250 twin.
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metallic/polychromatic green or blue seems to have been the theme of the week. yep the sunbeams seem to have been all green and the triumphs mainly the blue .
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Blimey, we all agree! Errrr. They always break down on Thursdays!
Seriously though - If you have a chance of a well priced one and feeling scootery I recommend buying as it is different to most anything else and it does actually work rather well unlike some oddball Brit bike things. It is the RUM persons usable scooter, in a way.
Indeed war reparations. To BSA the Deek engine. To Ariel the Kreidler twin that turns up in the Leader etc. To Bristol the BMW best. To Austin the Seven, damn, that was one of ours! To JFK little sausages called Berliners, and so on. Not quite sure where the Raliegh Whisp came in, nicked off the French there, but its an easy mistake to make if your from t'NORTH, I say NORTH.
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sorry rather pixelated on my pc click on the title below the pic rather than the pic itself for possibly best results
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Ahhh! Nowadays wheels are done up on a production line with some fancy controlled-torque air gun, but I see the Triumbeam scooters were built by real professionals where the other end of a socket speed handle is pressed against the operators knee as a finely-tuned torque meter....
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Note the loose fitting trouser of the period. Ah, the old Windy Gun, and his mate Gusty Gareth in good shirt sleeve order, there.
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hehe forgot to tell the result of my moped trip...
My dad insisted he brings the moped on the trailmer until we arrive at the starting point. After unloading, having a drink, etc... we set off. My moped was the oldest one there (quite funny since I was one of the youngest riders there!), and it was also the fastest one... Well there was another moped like mine but more modern with different frame and tank, which was juist as fast... Until the point my brakes started to go bad... Something must have happened, making the brakes "work" even without touchibng the lever. It lmopst a lot of power due to that, people though uit was a brake pad that came off.
I given up after 40km, which still isn't bad, but nothing like the 150km I was going to do!
Back home I dismantled it all. The wheel "bolt" (spindle, whjatever yo want to call it) was bent, making the brake backplate squiffy, making the pads touch. I changed the "bolt" with az good one I had. It stil didn't do much difference, but it stopped braking. The exhaust was very coked up! Soimeone gave me some fuel sice I didn'ty have enough, and his fuel was VERY rich, it kept making clouds of smoke... After changing the fuel, decoking exhaust,; etc... now its perfect!
This morning I'm off to school on it, hoping it won't break down, and if it DOES, hopefully it will be on the way there ;D
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Dont let your first experience put you off, I takes a good few mile to flush out the faults untill you end up with a reliable machine. Are you sure the guy who gave you the petrol wasnt a saboteur because you were going faster than him? ;D
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Dont let your first experience put you off, I takes a good few mile to flush out the faults untill you end up with a reliable machine. Are you sure the guy who gave you the petrol wasnt a saboteur because you were going faster than him? ;D
hehe nope he was the one who was just as fast as me ;)
I was going to bring it to an old vehicle exposition and autojumble, but my dad won't let me since I only have a provissional license and no plates (you can ride 1 month with no plates after buying it, all you need is a dummy receipt!)
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A reciept from a dummy, or to a dummy?
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Big Al: Indeed war reparations. To BSA the Deek engine. To Ariel the Kreidler twin that turns up in the Leader etc. To Bristol the BMW best.
Big Al - you forgot the most important of the war reparations! - to EMI the Cyclemaster
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qDbUlwiat4
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Yes indeed. It is really quite predictable that the Brits playing with nicked old German technology would get overtaken by Germans playing with their new technology. Seeing how many times you can rebuild the same unit is not really quite the same as making a better one.
I still feel that the Germans were the first nation to get to the Moon. Just happened the passengers were, and bill was, paid by Americans.