As you can see from the photo, the BSA A10 is alive again. My friend Ted got his A65 out and joined me on a short rumble around the neighborhood to celebrate. In all, it ran pretty well, though I need to do some fiddling with the idle.
The bike started literal first kick after its five-year slumber, which was a nice surprise. (It did not start first kick last time I rode it or immediately after being restored!) The real acid test will be if it starts when lukewarm, always its bugbear. Hoping to go on a longer ride this coming weekend with the local Norton guys, that should give me plenty of chances to see, hopefully without invoking the Law of Starting a Kick-Start Bike, which states “the number of kicks needed is equal to the number of people watching, plus one”.
I’ve never had a toolkit for the bike, and was poking around eBay and found the above on offer and purchased it. I have no idea what–or even if–BSA included any tools with their 1954 models, but this roll certainly covers all the bases and is cool in-and-of-itself. I suspect it’s a cobbled-together assortment probably suited to an older and possibly more up-market machine, but gentrifying is a thing and who am I to fight it?
I promised to have a post about my friend’s car which is occupying time and shop space, and will try to do that soon. (Take a look at posting intervals to get an idea of what I consider “soon”.)