Collected and cleaned Mantis

As planned, I pushed Mantis home today and cleaned her up. It was just as well I took a footpump with me as the tyres were completely flat. She was covered in cobwebs and dust and had lots of rust-spots on the chrome; altogether she was a sorry sight. But by the end of the evening she was looking pretty good.

I sat on Mantis this evening and it brought back just how much fun riding her is. John's right, I really must get the chop running again soon.

Getting Mantis from the garage

I am giving up the garage this month, so I have to get Mantis out this weekend and wheel it back to mine. She is in a sorry state but it wouldn't take more than a long weekend to get her running properly. John keeps nagging me, but it doesn't feel a priority right now.

The carb is on a rigid mount and really needs to be suspended on a rubber or flexi mount in order to stop my mixture from frothing, which in turn makes it hard to set the the tick-over just right. Apart from that, it needs general maintenance, cleaning, polishing and the headlight will need adjustment (also, come to think of it, the speedo doesn't register either).

I need to get it and the Cyclemaster back on the road this year for sure. The Cyclemaster only needs reassembly, though the front of the bike will need some tweaking after the crash down a flight of stairs had me landing on the front wheel, buckling it.