17. Ariel Golden Arrow - Wiring Begins

On the last blog I was awaiting the arrival of the correct bolts to hold the chain guard in place. Well they finally arrived and, as you can see, the chain guard is finally in place along with the back wheel. You will note the large stainless penny washers behind the chain guard fixing nuts. This was a decision I made to hide the flaked paint around the fixing holes on the lower, fibreglass, half of the chain guard. The washers on the top guard are purely cosmetic so that it matches the bottom half.

This seemed like a good time to fit the rear foot pegs and rubbers. The original rubbers turned out to be in good condition, so it was just a case of giving them a good clean and pushing them on.

The next little job was to fit the new petrol pipe. As with the BSA A10, I built last time, I decided to fit a braided stainless steel hose. These look really nice, but the bad news is that I only needed 200mm and it is sold by the meter. So I've got a spare 800mm for future projects waiting in my spares draw. The trick with these pipes is to wrap the ends with insulating tape first before trying to fit the rubber end caps. If you don't do this the stainless braiding will pierce the rubber end cap as you push it on. As you can see the original petrol tap has been cleaned and polished and fitted to the tank. However I have resisted fitting the inner plunger in the tap and have left it soaking in petrol to ensure that it doesn't dry out before I need it.

 
I then thought that I would try fitting the front foot rests, the exhaust pipes and the side stand, all of which share the same mounting studs underneath the crank case.I was aware when attempting this, that much of it would need to come off again, but it is sometimes wise to do a "dry build" and this proved wise.

The foot pegs go on first and they were no problem. Then the side stand. This I had bought off the Internet and had sent the mounting plate and actual stand away for chrome plating. However, when it came to lining it up with the mountings under the bike, nothing lined up. There is no mention in the manual how to fit a stand and the bike had not come with one fitted, so it was down to common sense. After trying every combination of positions, I was beginning to feel that I had bought the wrong stand and in a last ditch attempt to find an answer I posted a question on the Ariel Owners Club forum. "How do you fit the side stand?". The answer came back in a couple of days and it turns out that my nicely chromed mounting plate is bent and that's why it doesn't fit. Once I knew that it mounts diagonally on two threaded bushes in the front of the crank case on the left side and shares one of the foot peg mounting studs on the right side, I could straighten the plate until it fitted. It's about time I had a little luck and this time I managed to straighten the plate without flaking the chrome.

Next came the two mounting bushes in the crank case. These are steel bushes set into the aluminium case and both threads were shot. After investigation, I found that these threads are slightly smaller than an M10. So I decided to re-tap the threads to the larger M10 size. The only problem was that I don't own an M10 plug tap. I thought of borrowing one, but in the end decided to get a new set of M10 taps (Taper, Middle and Plug), only £8 on the Internet and they were bound to come in useful again at some point. With the new threads cut the stand bolted in place. Now all that was left was the new side stand spring. This is very strong and needs a huge amount of leverage to hook it onto the two lugs on the stand. Well it was almost on when the screwdriver I was using slipped and the spring shot off across the workshop taking a piece of my finger with it! After the loss of some blood and the help of some sticking plaster, I tried again and this time it was successful.

Time to try the exhaust pipes in place. These pipes mount at the front with a toothed mounting ring and, with a welded on bracket, at the back to one of the foot peg mounting studs. First you fit the toothed ring, then a sealing ring and then it screws into the cylinder exhaust port. Well firstly the new toothed mounting rings that I had bought and had chromed, did not fit over the exhaust pipes and secondly they were 10mm longer on the threads than the original old ones that I took off. This meant putting the nice new toothed rings in the lathe and turning off 10mm of thread and then very carefully running a lathe tool down the inside of the ring until it just fit over the exhaust pipe. And believe it or not they fit!! The left pipe then fit into the cylinder and the rear bracket slipped over the foot peg mounting stud. But the right side was a different story. The ring went in the cylinder OK, but the bracket did not line up with the foot peg mounting stud. I tried everything, but in the end decided that the bracket would have to have an extra piece welded onto it and a new mounting hole drilled in it. As I've said before, "my welding skills are limited", so I've take the right exhaust pipe to my friends workshop and he's going to do it for me.

And that brings me to the stage that I have been avoiding for weeks, the wiring. Now I've a background in electrical and electronics but this bike has been previously badly modified to electronic ignition and 12v electrics along with electronic voltage regulation. It's now my job to get it right and I'm not looking forward to it.

Anyway the first step is to assemble the head light unit. So the new shell received it's new ignition switch and light switch, its refurbished speedo and a new 12 Amp Meter. The only problem here was the speedo mounting bracket. The original was missing and had been replaced by a piece of meccano and was unfit for re-use. I set about making a new one, which you can see in the picture. I then discovered that the wiring loom that I was given when I bought the bike (which did not fit) had these rather nice connecting sockets to fit on the ignition switch and the light switch. What a stroke of luck. I thought that would have to solder all the wires onto the terminals.

Well I've started crimping all the new bullet connectors on the loom and then I must remove the dummy petrol tank and commence trying to mate the new loom with the existing electronic voltage regulator and a brand new electronic ignition kit. This looks like it's going to be a long job and I'm going to study the wiring diagram carefully before jumping into this bag of worms.

More wiring next time.

Copyright K. Hopcroft  11.06.15 All rights reserved
You can contact me on: hopcroftscoot@gmail.com

My Other Blogs:

1961 BSA A10 Super Rocket Motorcycle:
 https://60sclassicmotorbikes.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/before.html


Miniature Land Rover Defender:
http://miniaturelandrover.blogspot.co.uk/2016/02/1-miniature-land-rover-defender-idea.html

1971 VW Karmann Ghia Convertible Car: 
http://karmannghiarestoration.blogspot.co.uk/2017/03/1-karmann-ghia-retoration-project.html 

Motorcycle Trailers / Caravans:
http://motorcycletrailersandcaravans.blogspot.co.uk/2018/01/1-motorcycle-trailers-problem.html