Britbike forum Forums British Motorcycle specific Brands Bsa bulletin board Restoring (to a point) my '68 BSA Spitfire Mk4

If you know what you're doing it's do-able. But for $30/hole, I think leaving it to a pro is totally worth it. Here's how that looks (Harley ironhead cylinder)

And again, make sure it's a coarse hone.

I’m not a fan of those ball hones, they scratch the surface but don’t maintain a contour of the barrel. I use a Draper honing tool it’s done many bores although needs new stones for it now, but it maintains its round shape. Only thing is you need to be pretty brave using it as the stones are centred in the middle.

But unless your working on a lot of cylinders then I would just pay the $30 and have a shop do it for you. The results will be far better than what’s you can achieve at home.

I agree, get the barrels honed at a local shop who knows about british bikes. At the same time get them to measure the pistons and bore to ensure they still have the right clearance.

I would use the Hastings rings as suggested as these seem to have better sealing and oil control characteristics than standard cast iron rings.

The engine appears to be in good shape so far so hopefully there are no major surprises in store.

Will be interesting to see what kind of oil pump is fitted, you may want to consider upgrading to the iron type or SRM version as well as fitting an oil filter.

Help me identify some parts! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMy2n3EYpQU&feature=youtu.be

I think that tool is the clutch spring adjustment tool. The tool pouch with the zipper is the original one. The other tool rolls were popular at the time as well.

As far as the copper part you asked about, I think it's a valve guide. Didn't get a good view of it.

The gears and sprocket likely won't have part numbers on them. You'll need to count the teeth to see what they are. Check for pitting on the teeth to get a good read on their state. The gear teeth may not be chipped or cracked, but if the transmission collected water or overheated, it will show on the faces of the gear teeth themselves.

Not sure what those two mystery blocks are. Maybe turn signal mounts or something aftermarket (or unrelated)

Regarding the gears, check for rounding of the edges on the engagement dogs. Its these dogs which take the wear when changing gear and eventually lead to slipping out of gear.

The fact that you have gears and change forks in your box may give some clues to the bikes previous life such as high mileage or running with low gearbox oil.

Your right about the silencer brackets, only they are for an oil in frame.

As mark says count the teeth on the gears, if your taking the box out of yours you may wish to count those teeth as well.

looks like the motor is coming out and apart.
A few tips.
Leave the chain on and the the back brake connected, until you have stripped the gearbox/ clutch / primary. it comes in handy for restraining the drive train when undoing stuff..

You will need a clutch centre extractor tool, didnt see one in the box.

use a hair drier or heat gun on low to warm the alternator tails before extracting them, they will be brittle by now.
When removing the timing case keep pressure on the idler pinion so it stays in place/ mesh, this will allow you to confirm timing marks are present and correct.

After opening up the timing case,
Before you remove the gear cluster/ trapdoor/ cassette , check the layshaft end float, a simple push pull on the protruding shaft can tell a lot, it should have " just perceptible end float", if you feel it move more than a gnats tadger and hear a clunk try to measure how much end float is there with a clock gauge and write the figure down , this will be good to know when shimming the box on final assembly.

It could be one of the PO s had saved some good parts for a potential tranny rebuild, possibly with a view to a refresh, whats not in the box is any other sign of a rebuild , no old bearings or springs, even though they seem to have held on to old valves and pistons.
The two sliding gears with the dogs can be swapped from main shaft to layshaft, getting double the life out of worn dogs, hang on to them.The head gaskets and speedo drive are handy, most of the rest is the sort of knackered junk people keep for no good reason apart from maybe reference purposes. The tool rolls are handy and the original purse is quite a find.
Budget for a new clutch hub centre, if the rubbers are original they will be toast regardless of mileage, they can be replaced but the hub centre is a high wear item and its hardly worth refreshing a worn old one.
The speedo drive and cables in the box suggest you can take whatever mileage is on the odometer with a bag of salt.

The primary side cover looks to have some RTV holding it on. I'm going to try leveraging in the access hole with a bit of wood, though I am looking for a replacement cover.
I need to drain the timing side next and get that case open. I'll take your advice on keeping the gears in place in order to verify timing and shaft play as you mention.
The odometer reads 0000 and I was told it was replaced (and wasn't connected). No clue on miles on the bike before or after the re-build.
I'll post another video once I get further into things. Heading to a bike meetup tonight (in Rochester) where I'll ask around for some brit bike shops who could handle honing and other tasks.

One thing I'd forgot to mention: your coils.

I think I noticed in the early videos that the coil brackets were not original, but it appears that you have the original brackets (and coils) in your parts box. The Lucas coils came in two sizes: "large" at 48mm diameter (original), and the standard 40mm diameter. It's likely that they were replaced and that the large coils weren't easily available at the time, so smaller ones were used.

In my case, I use the standard-size coils with a piece of radiator hose over them to fit the larger brackets. This has the benefit of also insulating the coils from vibrations.

If you are going to replace the points with EI, it is recommended to use a pair of 6v coils in series or a 12v dual-plug coil.

On this forum, the name Ed V will come up a lot: https://www.shopevengineering.com/servicereq

Made some good contacts tonight. The guy who runs http://www.britishbikeconnection.com/home.htm was there (he's local). I also found where I can get the frame sandblastest and powder coated, another place for chrome work, and they can strip chrome as well, so good news for my side covers. Another place does vapor blasting. I can get my head done there for about $45. Whee!

I found one minor mistake from a previous owner. Of course, some of the screws have buggered heads as well.

I'm not sure that the gear change return spring should be crossed and IM happy to be corrected if wrong.

There's a free A65 factory workshop manual 62-66 on Classic British Spares Here which seems to show the spring with straight legs, see fig B45, you may need to zoom in to see the detail.

In other words I think your return spring setup is correct.

Look at about 6:10 in this video. I assumed they knew a thing or two, but now I'm going to look at my factory, haynes and clymer to see what the minority report is! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jt2x5QoTUVk&list=PL5Bv2JegwabcPCTwImDqr8sy4_q2PQbBU

Here's what I found.

Far from it, the ends need to be crossed, regardless of spring position pre 69 or post 69, the spring should get tighter as the lever is against it, in this position it will get more open. It’s possible that it’s the wrong spring altogether though, the trails on the spring would stick out at right angles had it been fitted like this (if you could twist one that far that is)

The position of David’s first picture is correct, and the spring should look like it does in the third picture, the middle pic is of 1970 onwards bikes

Ha, hadn’t see the video before my last post... some great tips on there!

I think there are different springs, but I only say this because I've always installed it like it is on your bike, not like in the video. Then again, I might have been installing it wrong the whole time, but it worked nonetheless.

What Chilton is showing in your pic above is for the later inner timing covers, where the spring mounts the other way. That's correct for the bikes where the clutch cable mounts to the top of the cover instead of the back.

One somewhat-related point: look at the Haynes manual pic... see the way they show the kickstart place with the tab facing out? That's incorrect and should be the other way around (as shown in the factory manual)

Yes, the tab was facing in on my bike as well.

Seeing these pictures and thinking I had it wrong and switched it round, that plate makes a nice job of carving a radius into the outer timing cover

To further marks point about the springs, the spring changed when they started using the bobbin (1970) there are also some crap springs on the market especially kickstart springs. Not only poorly wound but not of spring steel. I buy mine from SRM. Usually find spring steel is a similar colour to a hacksaw blade, if you see anything in bright zink plate... avoid it. Unless like me you ordered them over the phone expecting to receive a quality part.

The Chilton manual shows the later 70 onwards spring fitting with the useful eccentric top hat to adjust the spring tension., the earlier springs are different.

What's a good way to get the timing advance weights off before pulling the timing inside cover? That's all that stands in my way. I have the bolt out.

There is a BSA tool for this part no 61-5005 but I've never seen it used.

Usual method is to screw the center bolt in and tap it lightly with a small hammer, this is usually enough to break the taper.