No Stock

[Simon.Gardiner]

Bunners, as you've noted. you guys who have been doing BSA/Triumph and AMC bikes have been well and truly spoiled silly for spares support. I started with Ariels in the 1970s and it was always necessary to scratch around for parts. Things like stands, mudguards and chainguards were completely unobtainable for years, as were Burman parts, proper VH big-ends.. (don't get me started, the list will become endless). It was pretty much down to the club to get things made if and when possible, and a lot of that obviously didn't come cheap if it was going to be half-decent quality.
DF came along when (as I remember) 'commercial' suppliers for Ariel parts had completely disappeared and you could mainly only get any parts through the club or autojumbles, so for people like me having any place where you can go and buy (or order) something for most of the bikes in the Ariel range is still very much a luxury. I'm not speaking as someone without reservations about quality and service but you'll appreciate that my perspective is coloured by having had years of b.all spares for my marque of choice.
And having said that, you will currently find that decent big-end shells for small-bearing A10/A7 cranks have become essentially unobtainable anywhere in the world and no-one has any plans to remanufacture them, so even the mainstream boys have problem areas.
However, as I said I'm not without reservations and having come to the point where I need to get the items on the current project's 'missing' list I'm not very happy at the amount of it that is going to go on back-order, I hope this shortage of stock isn't linked to possible changes at the top in DF over the last year or so.
Apologies for any rants.

SG