MARKING TIME

All of the paperwork has been collated, test and insurance certificates, registration douument for the donor bike, Certificate of Newness from Arthur, a Build Up Report, proof of identy, photograph, just to mention some of the paperwork required and it has now all been sent off to DVLA in Swansea. The waiting period to be issued with Registration documents, is four to six weeks and not quite 2 weeks into this period and I am getting impatient.

I removed that ugly grill the moment Marjorie was unloaded from Arthur's trailer and I handed it back to him. Since then Marjorie has been restored  to her pretest prettiness, with honky horn, spotlight and windscreens etc. being replaced. Before I refitted the luggage rack, I gave the hard wood supports fours coats of varnish and now they gleam, I also had some leather straps made up to give the illusion that the spare wheel and my wicker hamper were belted onto the car, rest assured, the hamper, like the spare wheel is securely fastened down, both belts just being for show.

From one of the Brookland silencers I pulled out about half of the fibre glass wadding.  I could see shards of glass glittering and dancing in the sunlight and was very glad I was wearing my face mask and gloves. I fitted that silencer onto the car and when I started her up I was surprised that the remaining Moto Guzzi silencer was still considerable louder than the Brookland can. I removed the can and pulled out more wadding, it looked  like, how you would expect witches hair to look like.There was now just about 1/4 of the original wadding left in the can. I refitted the silencer and again it was still quieter, but had a pleasant tone to it. I removed the same amount from the other silencer and when that was fitted a quick spin around the block proved that I still had full power for accelerating up the hill with only the slightest popping on the overrun and a small application of exhaust gloop around the connections with the side pipes, cured that completely.

I noticed during this run around the block that all of the instruments except the speedo were no longer correctly aligned. Off with the hatch at the back of the dashboard and I wiggled my fingers in to straighten and tighten then, the little gauges now all look right, but the tacho, although now firmly fixed, is still a degree or so out of alignment, I'm sure I'll be back behind the dash for something else before long and I will straighten it then. In the meantime the above photo is my driving view, hopefully it won't be much longer before I can really start to enjoy it.

MARJORIE STRIPPED FOR BATTLE

It was time to strip Marjorie of all her bling, off came the eagle mascot, horn, spotlight and headlight eyebrows, plus spare wheel, luggage rack, little Brooklands windscreens and the badges.

I then added the big safety grill that covers the whole front of the engine, and numerous bits of rubber trim and plastic nut and bolt covers, to ensure that there were no exposed sharp edges.

Arthur turned up bright and early on Thursday morning and we got Marjorie loaded on to the trailer and set off for the VOSA test center in Gillingham in Kent.

We arrived in plenty of time to unload and park Marjorie in a designated bay, before our scheduled 10 o'clock appointment. Arthur did a final check to ensure that we hadn't forgotten anything and his eagle eye spyed a bolt head that was missing a plastic cover, his large tool box provided the right size of plastic cover.

Adam the tester sauntered over and introduced himself and invited me to drive Marjorie over to one of the bays, One big problem, despite repeated jabs of the starter button, she wouldn't start and then we checked the fuel tap, it was turned off. This was not doing my nerves any good, but eventually we arrived in the designated bay.

All was going well until Adam asked me to operate the steering lock and it would not engage, a 'Show Stopper' apparently. Whilst Adam moved on to other areas, I removed the little panel behind the dashboard and realised that I hadn't tightened up the bolts that hold the ignition switch/lock onto the steering column. The heads of the bolts sheer off when fully tightened and I deliberately hadn't done so in case I had to remove the switch for one reason or another. With Arthur wriggling the steering wheel and me jiggling the switch/lock I was able to get the locking pin to engage with the slot in the column. I tightened the bolts and demonstrated to Adam that now the wheel locked when the key was removed and unlocked with the key in the ignition and Adam declared himself happy.

The only other problem was the upper straps to the seat belts, I had originally had them crossing over to the upper anchorage points, but Arthur said that on a previous test, the examiner had said that they could slip off the shoulder, so I had changed them around. Our tester said that such matters were at the discretion of each tester and after some deliberation he said he wanted them crossed over and when we done so, again he was happy.

At this point he said it was lunch time, but he was impressed with Arthur's build quality of the kit, welding etc. and I had done a proper job in putting it together and addressing all the safety issues. So far so good, just emission, brakes and noise to be tested.

After lunch it was a different bay and Adam waited whilst Marjorie warmed up before sticking a probe up her exhausts. Emission levels were fine. On the rolling road I had no idea what was going on, I just kept my eye on the computer screen and did as bidden. I had been worried about the handbrake test, but when I applied it as instructed, Marjorie shot back off the roller and Adam called out to let go, obviously handbrake was well up to it, as was the front brakes.

Just the noise test to go, I was asked to bring the revs up to three and half thousand revs, whilst Adam just stood and listened, no decibel meter required. A final nod from Adam and Marjorie had passed.

We loaded Marjorie back onto the trailer and I took a final photo of the huge and underused testing area, whilst Adam filled out the paperwork and came over and presented me with what looked just like the old MOT certificates, a shake of hands and we started our return journey back home. A celebratory glass beer before Arthur headed back to Sussex, where he would start to prepare the paperwork that I would need to get Marjorie registered and licenced, the final step to getting number plates made up and legally enjoying driving Marjorie down to a pub or two,