teamferret

Mad, love it

They are more use on old bikes with steel tanks which are starting to rust and the filter will prevent some of this entering the carb

Check your rear shock is the right one, at that age anything could have happened to it - replacing a knackered shock with something that was available being one. If it is standard length make sure you don't have too much sag. I would carefully check the frame too for any signs of stress in case someone has done a huge drop off and bent it

I agree the frame could be DOT, but from the early 60's probably a trials marshall and would have left the factory with a 197 or 250 villiers engine and leading link forks. That is a very late starmaker engine so spares will probably be easier obtained from AJS. I would refit a villiers engine and steepen up the fork rake

Take it for a long ride or burn out the excess oil with a blow torch

Cycle parts are common to lots of bikes round that era, venhill do the cables, maico conrod will fit. Ignition is very similar to RL250 suzuki, i've interchanged coil and CDI, Electrix world do a replacement CDI and coil combined which is good value for money and I've used for some time. Kick start is same as early Gas Gas and Fantic 200 kickstart can be modified into a gear lever. It's worth changing the seal behind the flywheel, it's a standard item available from most bearing stockist and I think Amazon, it comes out fairly easily - no need to split engine. I'm running one of those PWK chinese copy carbs and inlet rubber and so far so good. My air filter was made to fit a Merlin and probably not available now

I've not see any pistons for a while, there used to be the odd one on Italian ebay though I haven't checked recently. I sleeved mine down to 280cc as I had a scrap aprililia climber barrel and machined it to suit. There are more options for 76mm pistons than the 81mm for the 310. I was looking at an oversized RM400 item by an American manufacturer. Fitting the 250 barrel is not an easy option either.

It used to be a popular mod to lengthen the inlet tract to improve low end performance. Actually it's of little value and you won't notice the difference with a much shorter one. Most people now have the carb bolted virtually direct to the barrel

Yes, filter on return so has pressure to push the oil through rather than relying on gravity. There used to be one called a hidedehi, or something along those lines which was well made and used the filter from a triumph trident. Add a clear tube running up the outside of the tank connected top and bottom so you can see the oil level at a glance

With the ex-army B40 we went into an empty box then into a silencer much like a 2-stroke one but with a slightly bigger baffle bore and that took the bark off, had to be repacked regular though

I would machine the top off and sweat on a new piece. The forks aren't brilliant any way so I fitted conventional ones by making four adapters for the yolks, can't remember if I used the original caliper but certainly the front wheel

No ball bearing in my workshop manual clutch exploded view and no mention in the text

how come there is nothing on the main site?

If you are going for their 'yamaha' conversion the pushrod will need shortening (and the mainshaft)

If it's got 6 gears then it's not a TL125 engine

Disc brakes are a big no no ( not sure why). Oversized forks are on the banned list, but I see lots in use, some disguised, again I can't see a big advantage in them. Putting mono engines in twin shock frames has led to problems, I know of RTL engined bikes that have been turned away, but you can convert an SWM to Aprilia Climber specification and that's OK?

Never rated seal skinz I got my waterproof socks from Silvermans who do ex army stuff

it should also be near impossible to put back on

It will go on, but you might find it difficult to keep it on if you run really low pressures, it will slip back into the well of the rim

You should be OK with 4 inch. You can space the sprocket left slightly by putting a washer between it and the hub then counterboring the sprocket slightly to clear the brake plate (mine wore it's self one but this was 30 years ago, nowadays I would put it on the lathe).

The A refers to the size of the piston. They are grouped into size bands and matched to a bore. you need to make sure you put an A back in or you will almost certainly end up with a loose or tight piston

The MZ301 piston is very similar and can be found at good value

I've only had a quick look, but I would say that it's the lining on the clutch that is giving you problems, Re-line perhaps???

All the engine bits are available from Villiers services. Don't think those forks are the right ones i think they had MP's

I've bought off ebay in the past, but agree there seems a lot less now. Try Gumtree and facebook market place