Therapy for the Disease Following on from catching the disease triage takes place Large expenditures of cash were obviously out of the question so I decided to remove the motor and put it in the garden shed for another day and concentrate on the frame, starting on the easy bits first. This became Plan A. The most obvious thing was to get rid of the paint as the total expense of this would be minimal. Accordingly Plan A was swung into action and the frame and wheels were completely dismantled. The Disease frame is of pressed sheet steel construction with large double skinned boxed sections from the rear suspension mounts to the frame centre and frame centre to the steering head. These are extremely heavy and were obviously constructed from offcuts from the Bismarck. Various single ply pieces such as the headlight, fuel tank, oil tank, air cleaner and rear mudguard extension are bolted to these. The two main sections are clamped together with four long studs which look flimsy but the bike hasn't broken in half yet. An enormous Roman Helmet styled sprung front mudguard completes the assembly and the bikes appearance when complete make one want to find another meaning to life somewhere else. But what you've got is what you've got. Sandpaper and scrapers along with paint stripper now entered the scene and the gruesome task of paint removal began. Then Fortune smiled on me. Enter fiend Don. You'll have noticed the use of the word “Fiend” and are thinking “typo he means
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friend” but you would be wrong. Don was an absolute fiend on a motorbike and could make the things talk especially at extremely illegal speeds and amongst other things he taught me to ride a bike with reasonable competence on gravel for which I thank him. He also had an endearing habit of giving a little spit before he spoke to rid himself of the bit of baccy that was permanently stuck to his lip from the roll -your-own durry that was part of his normal daytime attire. Another acquaintance also told me recently that he wasn't averse to dragging one down to the Grove Tavern on a Saturday for thirty or forty eights but this never happened to me. Maybe it was something to do with Nurse Mariann’s steely eye. Don was an automotive machinist who worked at Andrews and Beaven, a fine little company that was swallowed up and consumed in the money pit that was Renouf Corporation. Thanks Sir Frank. Spit- “What are you doing?” said Don. I informed him I was removing paint and would be for some considerable time. Then he made the suggestion of a lifetime. Spit- “Bring it up to A & B on Saturday and we'll put it in the hot tank.” I duly turned up on Saturday morning and the whole conglomeration of parts, rims and all, were put in baskets and dunked in the huge tank. Spit- “Pick me up tomorrow and we'll get them out.” said Don. Sunday was a revelation. The baskets were hauled out and hosed down and tipped out. It was like a Nuremburg Rally, a vast expanse of grey-blue tinged German steel on display, ranked up and gleaming with a
