My 1970/74 Commando

I've been posting a bit more here, and thought I would post some pics of what I have in the Commando world.

I bought this 1970 Commando Roadster as my first bike in 1996 at the British in the Blue Ridge rally. I had been riding for about 12 years prior on old borrowed 250 and 350 dirt bikes. Fell in love immediately.



Rode her for a short while and decided to repaint. I loved the looks of a seafoam green/black machine featured in one of the mags (associated with Kenny Dreer I think during his VR era), an decided to do a two tone scheme. Me on the bike circa 1998:



Left grad school and headed to New Hampshire 2 weeks prior to the Norton Rally in 2002. Decided to repaint again, this time in blue:



After 8 years of running her this way, it is time to change again. I discovered a hole in the frame (where the original side stand was). I need to repair the frame, nd decided to rebuild the bike at this time. Messed with some possibilities, including a set of Production racer bodywork a friend offered (not shown)

Original bodywork:


A fastback tank (one of my favorites):


Fastback with Gus Khun John Player made fairing:



In the end, I thing I'm going with the simple fastback tank sans fairing. Picking up bits for the transformation, and upgrades. Forkk upgrade, rear-sets, cam chain tensioner, belt drive, are in the works. We'll see how she goes.

RSR

Never happy, always trying new looks/stuff.

That is the life.

Gday RSR, your off to a good start with that bike, nearly complete but undicided in what cosmetics/looks to put in place. ML on this forum sent me this pic which may help you some. I cant say Ive seen a red Dunstal in the flesh but this with a few lights added, as Mick put it " make all the Jappers green with envy" Thanks Mick!



Foxy :mrgreen:

Hope you don't mind too much if I advise against installing an automatic cam chain tensioner.

A while back, we had a long discussion on these.

Myself and some others who had run one for a while posted our personal belief that they do more damage than "good".

Yes, they do keep the cam chain a more constant tension. But really, every 5000 miles to check and reset the tension manually is not such
a big imposition, especially when considering the negatives of running with a spring loaded tensioner.

When I rebuilt my motor this spring, I found that the excessively(in my opinion) tight tension of the cam chain had worn an oblong hole in the intermediate gear centering hole. This had to be carefully fixed with spot weld. I will never again install such a device.
It puts too much pressure on the cam chain, and for a fact, on my own bike and one other friend who also tried one for some years, had worn
the intermediate gear's locating hole oblong.

An auto cam chain tensioner is a good idea in theory, but can and did, cause real problems.

Thanks for the info on the Chain tensioner. I'll look further into it.

Foxy,

That is one gorgeous bike. I love that exhaust! I'll admit, I've been tempted to run the Prody racer bodywork. Just not sure if I want yellow again, and am not sure if I can bring myself to paint it. It's old stock that my friend had left over after he stopped racing his PR. Has a few sets of used bits that were crashed, but this one is the last of the non run stuff.

RSR