What Did You Do With Your Commando Today?

It’s a Corbin Gunfighter Pillion which I think is no longer available. Used it to carry my luggage but agree it’s a nice alternative.

Congrats on your award and on the trouble free performance of the bike!

The ride back was 100% autoroute/motorway both sides of the channel were possible. Set off 9am arrived home midnight. Less than an hour total stoppage + 4hr ferry. Cruising 60-85 mph and still comfortable at journeys end! The only shock was the U.K.’s shite roads after the French billiard tables

What did I do with my Norton yesterday? Well, for the 1st time in almost a year since the bottom went on my Combat and blew a big hole in top of the case, I started and rode it once again!

I cannot thank this forum enough for the information and etc for this project.

And esp Greg Marsh for all the help and advise, in addition to building me the new bottom end. Without him, this project wouldn't have happened.

First kick btw- and in every restart, 1st kick.

A long project, a learning project for sure. Was a happy boy last night for sure- 1st night in many I wasn't thinking Norton rebuild...now its Norton riding!

Back home after my Nordkapp trip, total of 3,832 miles in the 12 days away.

Mark Savage said:

Back home after my Nordkapp trip, total of 3,832 miles in the 12 days away.View attachment 120351

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That's a great effort Mark, well done! Hopefully no ignition problems during the trip?

cliffa said:

That's a great effort Mark, well done! Hopefully no ignition problems during the trip?

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Not at all, thanks Cliff

Mark Savage said:

Not at all, thanks Cliff

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I'm really chuffed to have contributed to your successful journey Mark.

By the way, is that a fibreglass tank?

cliffa said:

I'm really chuffed to have contributed to your successful journey Mark.

By the way, is that a fibreglass tank?

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No, it would have been originally. It’s an Emgo, supplied and painted by FD Motorcycles in as close to Fireflake Blue as possible as that was it’s colour when new.

Another day, another Norton event!

This time it was Norton Day yesterday at Prescott Hill. Obviously if you know me it’s another first. Great turnout with some very nice bikes. I got to meet The Lemon Drizzle Gang (YouTubers who feature classic bikes), they were all over Arnie like a rash

I wasn’t going to risk my bike on the hill but got talked into a couple or parade runs with the club which were fun, 15 bikes and no earplugs, great noise



Finished the day off with a circuitous ride home through the Cotswolds including the Chalbury TT, filled up with my favious juice (Esso E5) at Chipping Norton then headed home, great day.

Certainly a lot of adventures noted lately with everyone riding their Nortons to faraway lands. Always inspiring to see what these old Nortons, and their riders, can still do

Me, I didn't do any riding for a while now. I decided to remedy my wiggly rear end (I had about .025" end play in the left side rear isolastic) and spent the last two weeks toiling in this Michigan heatwave working the swing arm and rear isolastics, and for good measure installing Matt's LH switch cluster kit I've had laying around for the last 3 years, and his head steady that I recently bought. I'm almost done with the final bolts on the head steady and will do a final inspection before taking it for a ride, hopefully before this deluge of rain hits us here in Michigan later this week. I'm excited to feel the difference of the newly tightened up rear end and the cNw head steady.

In all, I installed Rick Walker's roller bearing swing arm upgrade kit. Plus, on Mike's recommendation, and shims he sent me in the post, re-shimmed the rear isolastics (.015" shims on each side) to leave .010"end play. Much tighter now on the side to side movement of the swing arm. And I installed Matt's head steady kit, and master switch cluster kit. This will keep me going until I revisit this job again to install Matt's electric start and install a vernier isolation kit in the back.

Now that I think about it, quite a lot of work for this novice, and definitely need to credit this forum as well and guys like Mike for their encouragement and support. Can't wait for my first ride with this new and renewed setup!

That's awesome Cafe man! Very nice I want to get out there and ride to some shows here in Michigan too.

Mr Starvingphotog, I chased a sloppy rear wheel for years. I changed the isolastics. I changed my good bronze swingarm bushings for new ones thinking it was the bushings and still I couldn't get the rear wheel lateral play to go away. Eventually I saw the Kegler clamp fix and realized what the problem with my bike was, and that the problem was fixed with a change in the design of later model commandos.

A single bolt swingarm tube doesn't fix the swingarm axle good enough. Eventually the axle just wallows out the tube at both ends so the entire axle is sloppy in the cradle tube. It doesn't matter if you have a cool roller bearing in place instead of the oillite bushings The axle play will develop and be felt on the back wheel as lateral play. The good news is that it's not expensive to fix, and I would say that if you have the single bolt swingarm tube rather than the later model twin wedge pin style cradle tube, the kegler clamps will eventually be required. It's not mentioned as much as it should be on the site probably because a lot of nortons have the improved wedge pins design, but those of us who have the earlier design and have fixed the sloppiness of our bike's handling know this situation very well. I'm not trying to rain on your parade, just give you a head's up....

cliffa said:

That's a great effort Mark, well done! Hopefully no ignition problems during the trip?

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any pics of the bike up north?

Hey there o0norton0o!
Thanks for your perspective for sure. I'm no expert on this bike in the least. I'm thankful for the advice and didn't think negatively about it. Another member mentioned these clamps as well when I was embarking on this project. I plan to get myself a set of these clamps for when I need to install those. In fact, when I was taking apart the rear the swing arm play wasn't that bad and I could likely have left it alone. The biggest end play was in the rear isolastic by .025" so if I had just done that bit, I would likely have arrived at the same result as I have now.

I'll look into where to get a set of those clamps to have on hand for when the time comes up. I'm more excited to get it out this weekend for a test ride!

Cheers,
Rob

Starvingphotog said:

Hey there o0norton0o!
Thanks for your perspective for sure. I'm no expert on this bike in the least. I'm thankful for the advice and didn't think negatively about it. Another member mentioned these clamps as well when I was embarking on this project. I plan to get myself a set of these clamps for when I need to install those. In fact, when I was taking apart the rear the swing arm play wasn't that bad and I could likely have left it alone. The biggest end play was in the rear isolastic by .025" so if I had just done that bit, I would likely have arrived at the same result as I have now.

I'll look into where to get a set of those clamps to have on hand for when the time comes up. I'm more excited to get it out this weekend for a test ride!

Cheers,
Rob

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NYC Norton have those clamps. I made a set many years ago using Heinz Keglers instructions and the swing arm has stayed good.One thing nice is you can install these in situ.
Mike

I wore my “we are Norton people” T shirt while on a car trip to very sunny Aldeburgh on the east coast of England, and saw a Matchless tee shirt worn by a guy on a BMW GS…..

Washed mine then took it for a run round North Wales, it was windy as hell. Only casualty was the rear left indicator dropped off but was saved by the wire, now back on with a drop of thread lock to help it stay there.

Dave

Took mine out in the sunshine for a short ride and finally had to admit that the h bars I put on don’t fit me well, no matter how I try to convince myself. They’re too far away and low for this 70 yr old lanky bod to get comfortable. Have ordered some slightly higher with a bit more pullback but not as radical as the original set.

Stevo said:

Took mine out in the sunshine for a short ride and finally had to admit that the h bars I put on don’t fit me well, no matter how I try to convince myself. They’re too far away and low for this 70 yr old lanky bod to get comfortable. Have ordered some slightly higher with a bit more pullback but not as radical as the original set.

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Don't fool yourself, just put whatever bars feel right. I run Hi rider bars because they make my back happy.