Neil's toolbox....

Good friend and neighbour Neil C. has come up trumps again...

He's built a bespoke wooden toolbox and has collected all sorts of tools from friends & family for it.

He's put alot of thought into the tools needed and his experience of travelling in the remotest parts of Africa has been invaluable in the preparation of the bike (and me).

Additionally, he's made 6 brackets for the bike:


These fit onto the lower fairing to allow straps to be easily fitted to carry other items.

It's important to get as much of the weight forward of the driver and as low down as possible.

They've been designed for use with a self tapping screw in addition to the 10mm bolt. The self tapper should stop the moment of force trying to undo the bolt (well - that's the theory!)

Extra fuel tanks sorted

Well maybe....

These are Trangia fuel cannisters for use with a portable stove. They each contain 1 litre.

So that should increase the range of the bike by about 50 miles - or in other words since the standard tank is 4 litres this is now a 50% increase in the range for the bike...!

Now I have to test this using water first.

Also - the seat has gone away for repair. Thanks to DENNIS B. for arranging that.

Panniers - of a sort...

Over the last couple of days I've built a frame for the Carradice Super C Panniers (bicycle).
















I need to test them out now over the next week before the bike is collected on Wednesday for shipment to Spain.

SMS blogging

WOW! I can now update the blog via SMS! This is great since there might be times when GPRS is not available, but GSM is. Sure it's limited to 160 characters, but that's plenty just to say whereabouts you are.

Today's ride

At start: 18800 miles.



Rode to Hammonds to buy a waterproof suit. Then onto Bristol for the mantoux test (bcg). Called in on old pal Roger Daynes in Tetbury for a quick chat (http://www.snowsled.com/).

Covered 90 miles today - a lot of which in the pouring rain. The suit is waterproof thankfully. The cold bits are my boots and the helmet (no visor).

The bike is averaging 102 miles per gallon. So with 4 litres is has a range of only 90 miles - there is NO reserve! I need to fix this ASAP.

Blog update via Email

This message was sent by an email to the blog. That's neat.

First Ride

Mileage 18793
Picked the bike up yesterday from Hammonds www.hammondmotorcycles.co.uk . Dave H. has been looking over the bike in his own time which is really appreciated. He found less than 1/2 cup of oil in the engine - that explains why is was SO noisy (camchain needs oil for damping).

Anyway - the bike is OK for now and Dave has asked to have the bike back after I've put a few miles on it. He checked the tappets, replaced the final drive chain, fixed the wheels (which were about to fall off), tightened the spokes and generally gave it a once over.

I rode the bike yesterday to the Traidcraft fund raising event at St Leonard's Church. The bike seems fine.... much less work than cycling! It was a great event and there were lots of cakes and bits n pieces for sale. We could of had more people there, but those that did attend contributed significantly to the pot. Neil showed a few of his slides of his ventures in Africa and Gordon regaled us with his experiences of riding down to the Lebannon just after the second world war.

Today I fitted an inline filter and cleaned out the fuel tap filter. The bike appears OK and a test ride showed that it is comfortable around 45 mph. Mark told me today that the bike would go alot quicker without the screen (he found this out after the screen broke on his C90 in Bahrain). However that may be true, but I'd rather stick with the screen for now...

Next jobs - sort out panniers and fix the torn seat

Where's home then?

Click to view a larger map

...that will be on the edge of the Cotswolds (UK) then.

The beast (of burden)

The C90 with about 18,790 miles on it.