London

Old School motorcycle garage in South London

Everything I do ends up with lashings of anxiety. My bike was/is due its first MOT just after Christmas so at my KTM dealer getting a service done a couple of weeks back I asked whether my high beam Baja Squadron Pro would pass its test. I knew that it was sold as not street legal and I also know that it is blindingly bright. I was told that it would be ok but the dipped headlight would bring ‘an instant fail’. And why? Because its beam sloped up to the right rather than the left which is how LHD countries require headlights to point. (See below – subtle, eh?)

So, on the mail to Aurora Rally equipment, based in definitely RHD Greece. They pointed me helpfully to a Hella light on Amazon with a LH slope, ordered then delivered a few days later. I thought I would replace both headlamps and brought the bike back home from its usual location in Cambridge. Its not really that difficult to remove the front of the tower, just a little time consuming. For me though, the new light looked like it could never fit because the connection seemed totally different, so every step proceeded with a sense that everything would go pearshaped on this job at any moment.

Needless to say everything worked out well. The dipped beam is a small LED (over €100) which easily replaced the halogen bulb that came with the new light, though the Aurora tower does not seem to have enough upwards adjustment for the dipped beam.

So, rather than head back up to Ipswich I took the bike to a local MOT and mechanics, ChasBikes on Kennington Road. I was uncertain that the bike would get through.

It was easy to book, and there was no waiting time when I arrived and the test was done in half an hour, possibly less. The place is great and a welcome antidote for those corporate dealers where you get a coffee from a machine while your bike is whisked off and the mechanic’s space is out of bounds to customers. This is an Old school motorcycle garage at its best. I sat about 10 feet away from the mechanic testing my bike and could explain its oddities – like the headlight only comes on after the bike has moved a couple of yards. Chas and his mechanic both have an enjoyable dry humour (‘when electric starts came out I thought this won’t catch on’). I’ll be back for sure – next year at least. Chas mentioned that he had lived in East Africa, but I didn’t enquire further. The bike passed and I learned a few things about how the bureaucratic MOT system works. Interestingly this is what I found when looking them up to do a Google review:

‘CHASBIKES was started in 1984 by Charles Holt M.A.(OXON), a former East African wildlife biologist. Originally located on an industrial estate in Greenwich, the company hired out Honda CX500’s to dispatch riders, before beginning to specialise in repairing them for the public. The company then moved on to work on other popular dispatch riding models….’ https://www.yell.com/biz/chasbikes-ltd-london-6519580/

And here he is:

Ride to Epping Forest

The last few days have seen some of the year’s first predictably sunny days, though the temperature was a high of only 12 or so. I took a few hours today – Sunday – to follow a route around Epping and Ongar that I’d found on BestBiking Roads. Most of it was beautiful – though typically I missed some of the loop. This area right on the edge of London straddling the M25 is a little gem. Some of the old towns or villages, Epping for example, on the route are beautiful. Nicely there are quite a few car parks in the woods on different parts of the route. About the bike and a shakedown: I realised that the instruments on the tower needed to be readjusted downwards and the GPS mount needed to be revised as the GPS was rattling around wildly. Both these teething problems are sorted.

Still to sort – the highly distorted voicing from the GPS to the bluetooth helmet headset. Some instructions are just crackles – completely useless.

Total 54 miles over 3 hours
Pretty much finished now

Once I got home and it was dark I tried to adjust the headlights in the new Aurora tower. I’d made a chalk mark on the drive 5m from the garage doors and put some masking tape at the height of the headlamp. A dipped beam is meant to stop 5cms below this line – but it was a couple of feet. The adjustment on the Aurora tower did not seem to be designed to do this properly – and the full beam did not seem to have an aim at all and flooded everything in sight with light – no wonder it is not road legal. Perhaps I need to swap it for the proper lamp before MOT time.

What lies beneath: drilling down into the past

Everyone says that the most unpredictable part of any building project is the ground work. Like the human psyche, you never suspect what lies concealed under the surface. So, with this renovation project in Southwark, near the Thames, the foundation work even of this small extension has been causing problem after problem. First the engineer says that because of the unstable made ground (artificial ground the result of previous human activity) that the house is built on, we need 6 metre deep piled foundations. Made ground because the whole site is built on the old Courage bottling plant, demolished in 1981. Here it is in the 1950s:

and here is the entrance to our estate today, from street view compared with the year before it was demolished (1980), with the Sold to Saville’s sign in evidence:


The piling company finally arrive, after abandoning their first appointment because their truck would not fit under the Park Street bridge just by the site of Shakespeare’s Globe and the route through Borough Market is now restricted since the attacks on London Bridge. But, finally they get 1 and a half metres down and come up against a concrete slab – in all four locations that they are drilling down.

The four holes of the piling maching

Piling company retreat and now diamond drilling companies are being approached to find one willing and able to cart their machinery into our back garden, through the front door to drill through what might be 2 metres of concrete. And then who knows what is under that: a hollow vault? Roman remains? Both are feasible.
So the project is delayed so far by 6 weeks and getting in by Christmas is maybe possible, when before we joked about it because of course we would. But the fundamental unpredictability about what lies beneath still remains.

Renovations start

At last all (well not all) of the formalities are done and work started on our renovation project last week. When we moved in last September we stripped out the carpets and some of the kitchen but the builders have absolutely stripped out everything – and in two and a half days. Added to that they have swept up after them – and built themselves an office.
Here’s the horrible kitchen before:
kitchen before
Here is what it looks like now:
kitchen sans all

MCN Motorcycle Show at Excel Centre London

Two years running I have been to this show, after a gap of 2 or 3 years. Its a minor highlight in a tedious winter month. Even quite early on the Friday it was heaving with people. The demographic is clear: the great majority of attenders are middle aged men. I’d say there is 5 – 10% women. And a few families with small kids who climb all over the bikes. There are always a small number of the injured, either with their wrists in a brace or with crutches or in wheelchairs. Every year I wonder what the stories are behind these more serious injuries.

The bikes, of course are beautiful and shiny and great fun to swing a leg over.

Legendary light weight British adventure bike

But mostly they are there to admire. Some, like the BMW R1200GS Adventure (huge already) up on a plinth higher than all the other Beamers.

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Or there is the chrome Norton in a glass case.
Norton at MCN motorcycle show

There is always masses of stuff you can buy. I never know whether there are really any bargains to be had but the market creates lots of excitement.
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My journey there is always fun too. From Bankside I took the Thames Clipper untitled-1.jpg up to the O2 then caught the Emirates air line untitled-5.jpg

untitled-6.jpg over the Thames with its stunning view and commentary about the history of invention and the Lea Valley.