Breakdown

Broke down on the way to MOT. This is the problem with SORN'd vehicles - there's no opportunity to test-drive them before you actually drive them to the MOT station.

Anyway, what happened here was entirely my fault - it later dawned on me that I'd underfilled the cooling system because I didn't even look at the expansion tank and made no attempt to turn the engine over to eliminate air locks after filling.

No damage, only to my pride.

Inlet manifold worked loose, gasket fail

So I've been using the scoot happily for a long time now with little bother, typically once a week getting to work in Bristol. It must be over two years of reliable starting and riding in all weathers - hot, cold, wet and dry. The only thing I've been having to stay on top of is a very slow loss of air from the rear wheel and regular disintegration of my air hose regardless of whether I buy Indian or Italian. Regular oil checks have revealed no noticeable oil loss through leak or burn. MOT's have gone without a hitch.

All good then, until a few weeks ago when midway through my journey home from work it started running rough - not idling without throttle, and low on power. A test ride the next day revealed that the engine would race frighteningly fast with choke on, and die without it. This is symptomatic of air getting into the cylinder not via the carb.

Then it went cold. Then it snowed:

Finally today the snow has gone and basking in 8 degrees warmth I was able to take a look at what's going on. The inlet manifold has become loose and part of the gasket disintegrated, allowing air ingress. With the choke on this had the effect of a wide open throttle.

So now I need to drop the engine by a few cm's (again) to get the manifold off, replace the gasket, and fit it back with some nylock nuts and wavy washers. Tight. And hopefully this time it'll stay on!

Lambrettas everywhere

A Friday off work and it's a beautiful September day, so it was high time I took the scoot for a fast run up the Long Ashton bypass to check that everything is working as it should be. I had to fill her up with fuel first and here's where I made a mistake. I expected to be putting in 6 litres of fuel so I dropped in 250ml of oil prior to filling. Unfortunately the tank was full after 5 litres, so I'd miscalculated, and now had an incorrect fuel/oil mix of nearly 5%. I figured this shouldn't matter too much so carried on with my ride.

I sped along the bypass and it ran really well, keeping up with the traffic probably at around 55 or 60mph, although with my kph speedo and non-standard tyres it's difficult to tell.

But then, pulling off at the first junction the engine died while coasting, so I bailed out to the central reservation and started poking around. Compression was ok, and everything sounded ok, but it wouldn't start. The only tools I'd bought with me were some pliers, crimpers, meter and screwdriver - I was planning only to tweak the erratic rear light!

I'd been there 3 mins max when out of the blue a chap called Geoff pulled up on his S3 to lend a hand.

He had a spark plug spanner, so we removed the plug, gave it a wipe, cranked the engine a few times with no plug, and then refitted it. Geoff had the honour of trying to restart it - and start it did, with Geoff's 'full throttle' technique. Although I did have to increase the idle speed to keep it going, and my theory is that my problems were down to the fuel mix. Thanks to Geoff who turned up at just the right time!

Geoff went on his way and just as I was about leave, another Lambretta rider turns up. This time it's a chap called Ian:

It turns out he lives just down the road from Geoff, but they don't know each other. Ian was tentatively running in his GP and had only a few weeks ago suffered a seizure on this same stretch of road.

So if you want to meet other Lambretta riders, break down on the Long Ashton bypass on a sunny Friday morning. From now on I'll be carrying 200ml of oil for a 4.8 litre fill-up, giving me my target 4% ratio.