When it first arrived, both the customer and ourselves thought it was black that had faded. Once we took the tank panels and a few other bit's off we realised that it was this stunning gun-metal grey colour! So thats what it was painted. Our painters matched it perfectly, along with the bright silver for the fenders and the "flat" silver on the engine side cases.
The mufflers.... It took a LONG time to sort those out! The customer managed to buy the last pair in existance at enormous cost. Unfortunately 40yrs of supercessions mean't they didn't fit!! The right side was only slightly out, but the left was way off! We had to get them de-chromed, then start cutting and fabbing up new brackets. On the left hand side we had to completely cut the the front pipe off, as it sat at the wrong angle and wouldn't go into the exhaust port. We then had them re-chromed. They turned out really nice!
I spent 10hrs polishing all the bare alloy parts by hand. (my fingers were raw!)
But it has given the perfect finish, not too shiny and has kept all the details that can be lost by over buffing.
We also fitted a 5sp 'box into it. It runs beautifully. It was a little rich at first, but a quick tweek of the float hights sorted it.
Stevie
