First Commando - My New Winter Project

dennisgb said:

Matt,

Not sure if this is good or bad, but your starting to sound like Hobot

Click to expand...

I agree, and not to mention the emoticon :? :wink: :?: abuse! :shock: :? 8) :lol: :x :cry: :evil: :twisted: :roll: :wink: :!: :?: :idea: :arrow: :| :mrgreen:

Not that it's bad thing :wink:

Ron L said:

Based on what we see here you have what is left of a 1969 Fastback. The oil tank, battery tray and tach drive in the side cover are clues. The fiberglass Roadster tank was not likely original to this bike. Unless it was the extremely rare "R" model. There are no other indicators of this, however.

Click to expand...

The frame looks to be 1971-on type with the forward-mounted crossmember?

Mrchips said:

Click to expand...

Ron .
Leave the holes out, they do nothing.

Ron L said:

Any good turner on a lathe could shorten the stantions and recut the internal threads.

Click to expand...

I prefer to cut the lower end and turn down the bottom of the tube for the steel sleeve, cut a new snap ring groove and cross drill the holes. Much easier.

Click to expand...

Bernhard said:

Did you Yanks really go buying those choppers back in the day :?: :shock:

Click to expand...

Nah, we tore up perfectly good Tri, Nor, Beza, HD's and turned them into unsafe, uncomfortable pieces of shite. I've still got my old 750 single cam Honda chopper out in the shop, actually next to the shop, looking sadly forlorn next to my Rickman Honda endurance racer. I'll get to them one day...if I live that long! :twisted:

Possm: with only 9 digits difference between your bike and mine it would seem to me that I have what's left of a Fastback. That's good to know, thanks.

Matt: thanks for the explanation of the location of that 5/16 nut. Saves on gelignite!

Just getting to the tear down now. I like to see what I've got and what I'm going to be depending on to not leave me stranded. Since I have no idea of total miles on this engine I'll go all the way down to the bottom end and back up again.

I won't bore you with any photos of machinery you've already seen hundreds of times, but if I find anything unique I will share it. When it starts to go together again I will post my progress.

All sage advice welcome, and thanks for all you've shared so far.

The frame looks to be 1971-on type with the forward-mounted crossmember?

Click to expand...

Good eye, Les!

John Robert Bould wrote:

Leave the holes out, they do nothing.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the tip!

Interesting note about the frame. So the suspicion is that this frame is a later design and not original '69. I just took for granted the frame was right, since there is a number plate riveted to the front of the steering head with the "Feb 1969" stamp on it. That would seem like a lot of trouble for someone to go to to fake a matching numbers bike. But, I suppose someone could have done that somewhere in it's history.

Do you suppose that back in the day a dealer might have dealt with a widowmaker frame (possibly already cracked) by replacing it with a later model frame? It's irrelevant to me anyway, since I didn't care about matching numbers to begin with.

You never know what's happened to these old bikes. I don't understand why you don't have the tach drive off the timing cover except that if they removed the tach, they probably just got rid of the cable and drive assembly. The other things you can check on the frame is where the center stand is mounted, how and where the prop stand is mounted and the dogs on the headstock that stop the trees from hitting the frame/tank. Your 130xxx number would line up with Feb 69, mine is 132031 and is Apr 69. Your number would most likely indicate an early Fastback, but they just called it a Commando at the time. The early frames had the center stand mounted on brackets off the frame, not on the cradle. Early prop stand looks like this.



And early headstock looks like this.



Someone probably replaced the frame because it was either the widowmaker or any other reason you want to come up with.

Dave
69S

Mrchips said:

I just took for granted the frame was right, since there is a number plate riveted to the front of the steering head with the "Feb 1969" stamp on it. That would seem like a lot of trouble for someone to go to to fake a matching numbers bike.

Click to expand...

Not too difficult to change the certification plate, but the "fakers" don't always bother using the correct hammer drive rivets.



A plate fixed on with ordinary pop rivets would be a dead giveaway it's been tampered-with.

That plate on mine is a new one with the correct rivets. I kept the old plate even though it was pretty well worn out. I took the new one to a jewelers to have it engraved, I kept screwing up trying to stamp it and at $15/ plate.....

This is going all Perry Mason on me. The rivets on the number plate are not pop rivets, but neither are they the round headed ones in the photo.

Alas, no center stand. And no mounts on the frame tubes for one. Wonder what I've got? I'll take a few photos for reference and you can weigh-in on what year this frame might be from. Any particular identifier shots you'd like to see?

Mrchips said:

Alas, no center stand. And no mounts on the frame tubes for one. Wonder what I've got? I'll take a few photos for reference and you can weigh-in on what year this frame might be from.

Click to expand...

The frame is '71 - '73 type.


A '69 model frame would normally look like this, (crossmember below the gearbox) :


http://www.andover-norton.co.uk/SI%20Frames.htm
If the frame has the number "064140" stamped on the front face of the L/H fuel tank mounting bracket, then it's a '73 850 frame.

DogT said:

You never know what's happened to these old bikes. I don't understand why you don't have the tach drive off the timing cover except that if they removed the tach, they probably just got rid of the cable and drive assembly. The other things you can check on the frame is where the center stand is mounted, how and where the prop stand is mounted and the dogs on the headstock that stop the trees from hitting the frame/tank. Your 130xxx number would line up with Feb 69, mine is 132031 and is Apr 69. Your number would most likely indicate an early Fastback, but they just called it a Commando at the time.

Dave
69S

Click to expand...

There is no tach mounting on the timing cover because someone removed it, cut the mounting off, and filled in the hole with aluminum. Cut off the end of the cam too.

The headstock does not have ears on it, so the tree does hit the frame on lock. I'll have to figure out how to fix that.