Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Long time coming...

It's been several months now since I've updated the blog. This is partly an indication of the progress to date and partly because I've just been busy. So a quick summary is in order.

During June and July I received a steady flow of the parts I had ordered. There were some errors however. I was shipped a cigar form Berlin exhaust instead of the Troll exhaust I'd ordered. I had to do alot of searching to find a Troll exhaust, but found one here: http://www.oldtimer-auspuffanlagen.de/ They were very prompt with the purchase and delivery.

I am still struggling to find brake shoes for the Troll. Many vendors seem to offer them but are unresponsive to my enquiries. I have found this the greatest difficulty ordering from German vendors. Although many do reply to my queries in English, they never seem to follow up on the enquiry. I have an order outstanding with http://www.dietel-fahrzeugteile.de/ for brake shoes, a new carburetor and petrol tap but haven't responded to my queries yet.

My ambition to take care of the rewiring myself didn't really come to fruition. The wiring set certainly appeared to contain everything required to completely rewire the Troll. The problem however was that the wires are not labeled and the schematic is very theoretical, like a subway map. Without electrical experience it simply proved too complicated for me. As one of my motorcycle owning friends commented, "why would you do it yourself when any little mistake will completely stuff it up." So I decided to enlist professional help. That proved easier said than done. I tried several motorcycle electricians but no one was interested.

Then my Vespa broke down. Again.

I'd mentioned earlier that the Vespa's wiring had failed after its last service. Sam the mechanic wasn't really interested in rewiring the electrics so I started work on it myself. All was going well for a while. I was able to trace the fault to a single wire in the headstock and then the engine failed. In desperation I tried to find a new mechanic and came across Ivo from The Vespa Shop. Initially the main attraction of the The Vespa Shop was that it was relatively close to my house. Ivo was very helpful and even arranged to pick up the Vespa from my house. One day later the bike was fixed and I could pick it up. Ivo and Roberto run a small operation and don't really advertise, but I highly recommend their work (phone -08-93315501, email - vespashop@hotmail.com).

After picking up the Vespa, I had some discussions with Ivo and he agreed to assist with the Troll. This was good news to me. He'll be picking it up (along with all the spares) sometime in October when he'd back from Italy.

More Heinkels
I haven't really done much with the Heinkel but now that I can see the end of the Troll project, I've got to restart work on the Heinkel. I'll need to audit all the parts I have to determine what I need to buy / replace.

I just happened to be looking on ebay the other day and Klaus Wolfe was selling another Heinkel Tourist. This time an 103A2 from 1961. It was in a very similar condition to mine. Ironically, the price paid after eight bids was A$670 - exactly the same price I paid after two bids. Here is a photo.

Unfortunately the buyers ID is private so I can't contact them. I'd like to follow the progress of their project too.
Speaking of rare and unusual scooters on the market, Joe D'Ercole of Scootersales in Queensland is selling a number of very interesting scooters, including:
1956 Triumph Tessy
1959 Velocette Viceroy
1956 Maico Maicoletta
1958 NZeta (Cezeta built under license in NZ)
1959 Manurhin Hobby (French built DKW)
1953 NSU Prima (German built Lambretta)
1958 Puch Stier
1956 Triumph Tigress
1959 Terrot
1961 Cezeta
Most are running but some are restoration jobs. I must admit I saw the 61 Cezeta advertised on Ebay a year or so back but it failed to meet reserve. I had even sent a query after the auction but never heard back.


Monday, June 30, 2008

The Work Begins

I haven't had much opportunity to work on the bikes over the past couple of weeks so I haven't really had much to report.

The Heinkel
While I'm concentrating on the Troll, I haven't really done very much with the Heinkel. It is currently wrapped and boxed up on my veranda. I have however been busily scouring the Internet for parts, which is both challenging and interesting.

Last week my membership to the Heinkel Club Deutschland came through. Membership costs E60 per annum and members are allowed to purchase spare parts directly through the club. Link: http://www.heinkel-shop.de/

The Troll
The Troll has been my priority since it arrived and I must admit I'm quite enamored with it. I'm amazed at the amount of spare parts available on the Internet. Here's a summary of all the parts I've sourced so far:

Sausewind supply a wide range of parts for old East German vehicles. There website does not cater easily for non-European orders, however, I contacted them directly by email and they were prepared to ship parts overseas, although they did take quite a long time to respond, but more on that later. They are shipping:
1 set of ox-eye indicators (for handlebar ends)
A full set of brake, clutch and accelerator bowden cables, etc;
A set of hood rubber piping (new).
Total cost = E93

TKM Racing supply a wide range of new and old scooter and motorcycle parts, including East German vehicles. They are shipping:
1 full set of electrical cabling for a Troll (they have kits for all IWL models)
Total cost = E45

From MT Superbikes (aka EMWService) @ http://www.ebay.de/
Selling a variety of East German new and used bike parts through German eBay. They are shipping:
1 x set of ox-eye indicators (a spare set)
1 x throttle kit
Total cost = E36

I've also managed to source several other parts, such as keys and lock mechanism for the glove box (currently broken).

None of the German vendors I've dealt with appear to get very much overseas business. Only one business accepted credit card for payment, which has meant it's a little difficult to send them the money. I'm currently sending it electronically direct to their bank accounts (seems a preferred method in Germany). So far the process has not been too difficult or expensive, but I've only transferred funds this way twice so far.
The general response to date to my queries has been incredulity. People just don't believe that there are IWL vehicles overseas - at least not in Australia. On one occasion the vendor refused to believe there were any Trolls in Australia, so I sent him a picture (not that he would be able to tell it was in Australia). This got me thinking - how many Trolls were in Australia? I spoke to Klaus and he knew of at least six. He owns two, he's sold two (one to me) and there were two imported in Adelaide. Although it's not conclusive, it certainly seems that the Troll is a rare machine in Australia. One of the sellers on eBay I had contacted asked me whether I'd bought the bike from him as he'd sold one to an Australian and he was very interested to find out how she was going.

Fun with Petrol
When I bought the Troll Klaus had warned that the petrol tank and carburetor needed to be thoroughly cleaned. On Saturday I added a little petrol tank and opened the petrol tap and sure enough nothing moved. So I removed and dismantled the fuel tap. It seemed every space within it was encrusted with lead and sludge.

After a damned good soaking I finally cleared the petrol tap. Underneath the tap (pictured above) is a rubber seal with three nipples through which the petrol flows. When I first viewed the seal I thought it was simply a flat seal as the nipples were completely filled with very solid black aggregate. I had to lever out the gunk with a very small screwdriver - carefully so as not to damage the rubber, which was in surprisingly good condition. The tap is now cleaned and fully functional. The Saturday I'll see if we can actually get the petrol to flow into the carburetor.

I installed the battery and tested the flow through the wiring. Despite the dodgy appearance of the wiring almost everything electrical seems to work, except of course the indicators, because they've been removed. The brake light too had been severed. All this wiring will be replaced when the wiring kit arrives.