Matchless WD G3L

[Peter Laidler]

The major oil companies all have technical departments that will advise engine builders. I know from my experience that CASTROL at Swindon had a large tech dept who would/could answer all the questions asked. Obviously they only suggested their own products of course but give them the info they ask and they'll give the answer. Straight from the horses mouth so to speak. Some of my uni group spent a lot of time there as part of their coursework. I was the engine builder for a Mod Sports racing team based nearby in the late 70's/early 80's and they were VERY good to us and as we were racing modified sports cars (ours was an MG Midget) which were basically just high speed road cars, they'd often insert special oils and sensor gauges in various parts of the transmission.

[bigduke6]

Had another run today just to check what was what, although burning a bit of oil at first, once the air valve was opened it soon cleared up still a few clouds but just was oil burning off the head and cylinder, was getting a bit paranoid so changed the pipe I had rigged up to the rocker feed to a clear one so could check the flow.......... obvious it was going the other way to as the return was nicely bubbling over, would of took it down the street but front brake to sort and a spacer for the rear wheel ( the speedo drive) is missing.

A day good so far and to round it off will have a seat in the garden and prep the tank for Monday (paint arrives) a few hours with the wet and dry should get me a nice finish......... just doing the tank for now to see if I'm happy with the colour, war time vehicless come in an array of colours, mid bronze green, Khaki, service brown and olive drab........

[Sentryduty]

Darren, had a bit of late night reading on the zinc etc, need to read up more though very interesting.

choosing an oil for a vintage engine is never an easy thing.

Agreed it's somewhere between science and a black art.

As an aside, an petro-chemical engineer friend once said of modern engines "that with a 5,000km change interval you could run it on Crisco (Vegetable Oil) if you wanted to" when I was pressing him about the advertised "advantages" one oil producer claimed over another. Of course that is an oversimplification, it was illustrative about people overthinking engine oils beyond the basics of proper grade etc.

There are many wonder oils and snake oils out there and the market is very muddy with advertising.

In the car world there are almost religious cult followings behind the stuff, it is a crazy group.

[bigduke6]

As the weather improved (for a day or two) spent a bit of time on the bike, engine was stripped...... not what I was expecting and from the cylinder head down a lot of parts to replace, expense that I hadn't catered for.... simple things such as no cups for the valve springs, spacer for the exhaust valve, it all adds up, but thats life.

Biggest hurdle was the Big end, new made ones are £200...... I was tempted to skim the old crank pin and fit a hardened shoulder to suit a new needle bearing and buy an inner race for the conrod and machine to fit..... but that was just the start, the crank pin I had was the one piece one well known for shearing due to no radius on the shoulder and was too hard, the cam shafts had seen better days too, but I could regrind them (still may) but the tappets were much the same.........

So had to bite the bullet and start sourcing the bits to renew for the bottom end and crank case, soon adds up but managed to get a bottom complete bearing and pin which are WD NOS, thanks to Ron Pier on the HMVF, who is a word of Knowledge and has contacts all over, he guided me towards a dealer and someone local I spoke to also guided me in that direction, so started with the big end today and will forward a list of bits I need, anyway on a lighter note, does anyone know how to put this lot back together...... ( don't know who had been at the flywheel previous but it was a bit errr)

[mrclark303]

It's all looking good Geoff, the great thing is, you might have to spend some money on parts, but the majority of the expense with these things is always labour and you are doing that yourself, also you are really adding value, so if you ever sell her, you will get a really good return on your investment thanks to your hard work...

[bigduke6]

It's all looking good Geoff, the great thing is, you might have to spend some money on parts, but the majority of the expense with these things is always labour and you are doing that yourself, also you are really adding value, so if you ever sell her, you will get a really good return on your investment thanks to your hard work...

Thanks John, If your ever up this way then feel free to drop in and repeat the above.... to the Boss

[Peter Laidler]

That AC90 stuff you are using....... It's from a place that's local to you. We were using a derivative of this stuff - I forget the name of the stuff now - from them to protect certain vehicles going to the gulf by deck cargo. Best of all the stuff tested including waxoil........ Anyway, I thought that if it's good enough to protect vehicles going by deck cargo, it's good enough for my then new old shape Mini Cooper! Absolutely flooded EVERY box section, seam and hidden nook and cranny on the whole body shell. That was 17 years ago and it's still rust free. Unlike most Rovers of the era that look like they have gone via deck cargo - on a submarine!

[bigduke6]

Its the same stuff we use at work...... similar to WD40 but cleans the hands better.........

[mrclark303]

More importantly Geoff, how was the Hobgoblin Gold, I can recommend Brakspear Gold if you can get it your way mate, it doesn't dissapoint!

[bigduke6]

Very nice....... even better when washing down the dark rum, like an angel is crying on your tongue