Ariel Owners Motorcycle Club

It was a 212 mile trip for me yesterday and I was largely happy with the performance of the bike, aside from a fairly bad oil leak from the rocker gasket - I have an aluminium one on order from Draganfly so we will see how that goes.

Always a worthwhile journey, particularly when my step mothers home made cakes are on offer!

The bike is beautifully smooth, agile and really rather lovely to ride, if a touch more fatiguing on smaller roads than the swinging arm single or twin.

Very nice Rob. hope you now get many hours of enjoyment riding it.
David

Following my recovery from Scotland, progress was slow, partially owing to the fact that I got home on the Saturday and flew to New York the following day to celebrate my 40th birthday with my wife.

When I eventually got back to looking at the bike, I went over all of the obvious things, carburation, compression, timing and everything else I could think of.

I got to the point where I was very lucky to get the bike to fire on all 4 cylinders, and if I could it had no power. All routes pointed to a faulty magneto, so having discussed the Thorspark system with various members at the summer rally, I decided to order one.

It took a while for me to fit, because I wanted it hidden away, and then I got to the point of timing it, to find that my timing strobe was broken!

I sourced a replacement and got to the point where I was happy, although I only managed a quick run up the road to the pub.

I decided to test the bike properly at a vintage club run, but sadly after 20 miles riding, the misfires returned and I had an intermittent complete loss of power. The bike had also blown the fuse I always place in line to the battery, which I thought was curious.

I had made a fundamental mistake when I fitted the Thorspark - when I fitted it, because it comes with its own earth, I decided the extra earth I had put on the magneto was no longer required (bear in mind that I am a professional at this, so this was a particularly stupid thing to do).

Earth reinstated, and there we go, no more fuses blowing - until I kick the engine over. I eventually found that the backing plate of the Thorspark unit was catching the magneto when spinning, causing the blown fuse. I took the required amount of material away from the backing plate and it seems to be fixed. I haven’t had chance for a test ride yet though.

My assumption is that the earthing of the backing plate was causing an intermittent lost spark, paired with a poor earth. So far, square four ownership is doing what I wanted it to, teaching me an awful lot about them.