Last two changes on my Seeley Commando

First Change:

A few weeks ago I made a post “The making of my new tank”
I polishd the whole tank, but it was to mutch, to many shiny parts on my bike; so I asked Pierre, the painter that did my top half fairingand seat in the past,
to paint a part of the tank and here is the result.
Hope you like it?
Pierre is a real artist, the whole paintwork is done by hand, Pierre is the man who paints the helmets from Schumacher, Senna, Prost and more top F1 Riders
Pierre is a former workmate from the past, we were working for the belgian Kawsasaki distributor for years.
Like always he did the work for free, thanks Pierre!









Second change:
I changed my front Yam TD/TZ 260mm drum brake for a Fontana 250mm in Magnesium Elektron
Why?
Because Daniele Fontana was the best brake builder in the sixties and seventies
Daniele Fontana passed away, but Menani in Italy still makes high quality replicas from Fontana’s drum brakes
What can I say about the differences between the Yam TD/TZ and the Fontana:
First the price, the Fontana is twice the price of the Yam TD/TZ
The Fontana is in magnesium, the Yam is in alluminium.So the Fontana doesn't weight so much
The finishing touch of the Fontana is mutch better than the Yam, great work Menani!
The Fontana is also smoother, and more powerfull, almost the feeling from of a disk.







Now I am waiting for the Fontana rear 210mm TLS drum brake
Keep you posted
Yves

Lovely. Definitely looks better with the new paint scheme.

Ken

Top class Yves !

And here I was thinking that there was no possible way to improve your bike Yves, however you most certainly have! I must say it is striking :mrgreen:

Almost perfectly laced, who did you that?

In the 50s and 60s, the best drum front brakes were Oldani and Fontana were almost as good. TZ drum brakes crashed a lot of guys when others were using discs and out-braked them going into corners. I love the way your bike looks, it really does it for me.

The paint design is outstanding! Very nice!

Well sorted out paint scheme and the gold finish to the Fontana is a nice compliment.

What is the capacity of the fuel tank and where did you source it from?

NKN said:

Almost perfectly laced, who did you that?

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When I pick-up the complete weel at Menani (Milano Italy) the weel was already laced but not trued, I ask my friend John, another workmate from Kawasaki in the past to do the job
He spent 3 hours to true it.
The fact is that how bigger the drum, how shorter the spokes and how bigger the angle, it was really difficult to true it
Yves

Dances with Shrapnel said:

Well sorted out paint scheme and the gold finish to the Fontana is a nice compliment.

What is the capacity of the fuel tank and where did you source it from?

Click to expand...

The tank is made her in Belgium by Frank Breugelmans from Streug Metal Shop
So far I never fill the tank to full capacity, but it must be around 22 liters
Yves

acotrel said:

In the 50s and 60s, the best drum front brakes were Oldani and Fontana were almost as good. TZ drum brakes crashed a lot of guys when others were using discs and out-braked them going into corners. I love the way your bike looks, it really does it for me.

Click to expand...

The first Rob Nort tripels where equiped with Fontana 250mm
The difference between drum btrakes is mostly the quality from the linings
Yves

I think I must be a bit strange. One thing I really hate is Japanese bits fitted to a British bike, where they can be seen. There is not much difference in appearance between an Italian Fontana brake and a Japanese TZ brake. However to me it makes a world of difference. The ISO9000 definition of QUALITY is 'fit for purpose'. So a Mini Minor can be equally regarded as being a quality product when compared with a Rolls Royce. Of course, the difference lies in the attention to detail and that aspect is conveniently not part of the international definition. Before you fitted that Fontana brake your bike just looked like a cheap hot-rod. Now it looks like the real deal.
Half of the historic racing bikes in Australia have an obvious mix of Japanese and British on them. It simply makes them look like rubbish, to anyone with any level of appreciation of road racers from the past. One of my friends has a very nice Drixton Aermacchi. When he first started racing it, he had a dustbin fairing fitted to it. Down inside it there was one of those big Japanese TZ brakes. He did it just to upset the idiots who run those historic meetings. Even then, they did not comment.