classic motorcycle forum

The pretty little bike in the pic-
nothing worse than mudguards which don't follow the tyre properly, although I suppose the builder would argue that he couldn't get a better fitting 'guard at the time.

My Venom was a tooth out on the valve timing and that bike could've been kicked until the next Millennium without starting.
I have two 350 singles, both with decompressors, and using the Big Single starting technique (easing over compression, etc) neither tax my knee, hip or heart too much to fire up. Not like twins, where you're always kicking through compression.

When I inevitably get to the "I can't start them any longer" stage I'll treat myself to a new Bantam at 350cc, or even one of those little AJS 125s, both cheap as chips and leccy start.

That's if I'd still trust myself to last on busy roads!

Re new pushrods, couldn't you do that old trick of repurposing rods from another engine? Shorten and refix ends as required?
At least you'd know that the material was good for the purpose.

If you ever have to (God forbid) centre the conrod in this way again, stick a piece of masking tape on the face of the rod and measure and mark the centre line using vernier calipers.

Seems universal. Now these old bikes and the old boys who "knew" them recede ever further into history, the amount of published BS seems to grow year on year.
Even worse, BS when published, then becomes the truth when later Googled.

I don't recall ever seeing a BSPT thread on a British bike, they've all been BSP as far as I can recall.
US bikes used them a lot though.

Wicks don't always seem to be fitted to mags, same as the little felt effort that used to be in distributors years ago.
 As the post above says, a tiny bit of grease on the face cam or cam ring is more than enough.

Yes and no. The final colour usually depended on what the paint shop foreman had in the vats that day, and nothing to do with an advertising pamphlet printed possibly months before.
Indian Red is a perfect example; Indian afficionados endlessly obsess over this, but the reality is it's just what old Billy-Bob and Cyrus had available to use.