I have wheels

After what seemed like an endless search I finally found a nearby shop that did beadblasting, so after a few days I picked up the newly powdercoated wheels.
This place- P&J Powder Coatings

They are more or less the same colour as the originals.
Its slightly exasperating that the removal of old, purchase and refitting of new bearings cost a lot more than the powdercoat process itself, especially as their was nothing wrong with them in the first place.
There is a little bit of overspray to remove from the drum brake to clean it up but thats them ready for refitting.
I've put off fitting tyres for a bit and will look around at my options, currently considering Bridgestone BT45's, but that may change.

Shiny forks

I've finally managed to put these back together
The fork legs were rechromed by Philpots and should last as long as the rest of the bike does now.
After a bit of fiddling I refitted the dampers and pushed in the new seals and they seem to sit well.
The only thing left to do now is add fork oil but I'll wait until I need to fit them before doing that.
The fork bottoms were cleaned as well as I could and sprayed black and coated with laquer, they'll probably need redone at some stage but they are much better than the horrible rashed red they were when I got them.



Shiny shocks

New shock arrived today, I wasn't going to replace these but the old ones did look really tatty,even if thats not clear in the photos.
The new ones are budget items from Tecbikeparts who mostly do Triumph parts and they were only £45 so I felt I could just get them without breaking any budgets.

Old ones on the left, new ones on the right with the black body. I did have a choice of colours but felt this one was favourite

Wheels

When I first got this bike I knew the wheels needed recoating and now I've started to get them ready.
I had already noted that the tyres were a bit past it...... that was the front tyre that was dated 2002, the rear was a much more vintage 1988! - probably April of that year, an impressive 24 years old and were so stiff I ended up cutting it off the rim.
To think it was riding about the streets less than a year ago.

The rear looks to be in decent condition but the front is fairly poor with lots of flakey paint and alloy corrosion all over it.
I may get them painted rather than powdercoated, apparantly the closest matching colour is 'Skoda' gray though I think a darker grey may look better.

Rattle can frenzy

I turned my attention to the alloy fork bottoms and finally finished them off, though not perfect a coat of primer and a few coats of satin black have made them look quite good.
I'll consider whether I should laquer them afterwards.
I've also started to refit the steering head bearings, the first piece to go back onto the frame.

North Leicester Motorcycles is pretty much the only place you can get some of the more obscure parts for old Morini bikes and I went there for the first time last week.
It reminded me of an old ironmongers shop, the like of which you dont get anymore with almost any part you care to name in stock.
I came back with a centrestand bolt and the hollow spacer it goes through, the old one of which I had to blowtorch off the frame, and some assorted gaskets and a new set of half rings- I was initially surprised to discover there are three different shapes of these, fortunately I got the correct ones as I forgot to take any samples with me.
I was initially disappointed to find the new half rings didn't seat onto the new castle nuts, but while looking at them all it struck me the ones that I removed from the from outlet was oxidised red- rust = steel and therefore too hard to easily file to fit.  The new ones didn't seem as heavy but were hard, after checking with a magnet, the smaller old set and the new set were not steel and five minutes of trimming with a file and the new half rings nested comfortably into the new exhaust nuts.

The two nuts in the foreground are the ones that were on the bike, the half rings were on the front outlet held by the nut on the right, they nest in that one easily, they dont fit into the other one or the new ones at the back.
The new half rings(at the rear right) fitted after a bit of trimming.

Back in March I went to the Scottish bike show, I usually avoid these glorified jumble sales but the Moto Morini owners club had a stand and I wanted a look.
It was good to have a look at another 350 and best of all I discovered that the panel badges were available from them at a very modest price, I was also going to get tank badges but only had a small amount of cash in my pocket, at least I know they are available and where to get them rather than the chancer on ebay who sells them at four times this price despite getting them from the same source.
Usefully they also had the little rubber bungs that secure the side panels so got some of those too.

I may try and visit North Leicester Motorcycle next week,who are the main suppliers of Morini bits in the UK.

On my list are a few small but awkward to source parts like the centrestand bolt and spacers.
Also I've discovered I need new half rings as, oddly, after comparing the shiney new castle nuts I've found they are the same as only one of the old ones, the really tight one on the front that caused me all the problems is bigger- a different colour and taller than the rear one and its internal diameter is bigger.
Probably another bodge by a previous owner. Fortunately the new nuts seem to fit securely into the exhaust ports so at least that hasn't been damaged.

I've finally got round to restarting some of the little jobs on this bike after a long time doing other things- and then having a cement mixer block the entrance of my garage for a few months while I built a garden wall meant I haven't done anything purposeful for ages.
Not quite true as some little things have been done, I just haven't got around to writing them on here.

Today I changed the cambelt.
This was a major pain at first, after buying a flywheel holder and faffing around trying to undo the nut I gave up.... for three months!
I eventually bought an electric impact driver and the nut came off in seconds, out came the small spring washer and the puller went in, this also needed the impact driver to get it off  but off it came.

Not a great picture, but the alternator is held on by three screws and on undoing them I discover the securing plate is broken around the right screw. I'm hoping that doesn't cause me problems later.

Then after thats off, theres a spring on the shaft,then a circlip holds in another spring and a guide plate for the belt on the bottom pulley.
The belt itself is just walked off and the new one goes one with a bit of effort, I checked the two timing marks matched and bolted it all back together.

I did notice the old belt was a size 'A' to match the engine (only a factor when the engines were new,any proper sized belt will fit now) and it had a Moto Morini logo on it. I have a suspicion that this was it's original factory fitted belt and is now over thirty years old, that said the old one looked OK.


I was expecting to have new steering head bearings by now but after holding onto the old ones for months the local shop has told me it cant get them, this was a disappointment after all that time, I'll just clean up the old ones now and put them back in soon as they are in decent condition other than some rusting and flakey chrome on the outside.