The 'Stripped Thread' - intro......

That's where it all began, or did it? Some will say it began when I first rode a Lambretta, some will say it all started after a night in the cells last Christmas. It doesn't matter, and perhaps I'll delve into the reasons why later. But for now it began with a stripped thread.

Apologies if the tide of time has muddied the waters somewhat memory wise, but I think it began in late July 2015.

It wasn't even a thread on my scooter that started all this. I was due to gain some cash from a sort of divorce settlement but was awaiting a house sale to happen first. The plan was to spend some of that cash making my already pretty quick GP just that little bit quicker.

It's another story entirely on how it came to have a MB 195 race tour on it and all the chopping changing along the way, however perhaps I'll reminisce on that another time.

So the plan to wait for the house sale went out the window. I was spending many an evening watching firstly Posh Marc have his engine upgraded at Mr Green's (aka Shister) garage, then chewing the fat whilst watching Shister try and rescue Daygan's 200 barrel (who is much to his protestation a hippy, only 30% hippy he says, quite often).

Now Daygan's barrel seizing is partly my fault you have to understand, after a trip to Burnham, he was testing his new cut down Lammy against mine, and probably screwed it just a little too hard. I watched as his steed was lashed to the back of an RAC van with a sad and slightly guilty feeling washing over me.

Daygan's barrel is a story in itself, and perhaps he'll tell it one day, but cutting to the chase after donating my old barrel and head, which was worse than his, his job came to complete halt when either his inlet or exhaust manifold decided to strip a thread. It was fucked.

Now I had decided Daygan could have my RT kit when my house sold, but that was a while away. But as I sat in a darkened garage witnessing the wave of disappointment wash over us like a Tsunami my sympathy for his cause pushed me to offer my RT kit as a solution, it was a gamble as if the house didn't sell I'd be up shit creek as to financing my rebuild. But fate has its way, and I couldn't watch Daygan suffer anymore.

We sat and thrashed out what I would need to upgrade mine, and it wasn't as much as feared, and to be honest I was glad of the excuse to get my upgrade underway.

Let's see, the plan was to buy Shister's old Monza 225 kit, stick a new crank in and buy his old JL4, and the small job of getting my casings reworked to take the Monza.

Reckoned all in it might cost about £750, with a few quid coming back to me for the RT kit too I was quite happy.

Now that £750 seems like a snip sat here today with a rather large credit card bill to settle. But you can't take it with you can you?

And so the job began...