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ted under the seat. To run the the road! The rubber bands were
spark back into the distributer, the useless, but I thought this was
coil’s high-tension lead traveled normal for a year or more.
under the seat, along the upper
frame, and into a hole drilled into As the months passed, I disas-
the bottom right side of the origi- sembled the transmission & repla-
nal (and empty) distributer coil ced the bearings, and did the same
housing. Next, a wire from the litt- for the front hub and the rear
le angled clip at the bottom of the crown wheel and pinion assembly.
coil was run back to the remote I didn’t have any of the correct
coil under the seat, to allow the tools for shimming, but managed
coil to be hot when the ignition key to make it all right. Lars had me
was turned on. Then, a second disassemble the forks to empty out
wire from the opposite lead on the the water, replace the rubber
A wooden block instead of a coil! remote coil was run forward again, boots, fill them with oil, and then
back to the empty distributer hou- reassemble them. Nothing was left
sing and attached to the upper untouched, save the black brush
bearings, and there was no Babbitt screw of the cap. This wire fed paint job. The pistons so deeply
to be found. I had to chip pieces of power to the points via the large scored and filed smooth were
piston from the cylinder walls, and brass pin sticking into the distribu- never replaced and remain in place
I filed the sides of those roughed ter plate where the points are today.
up pistons smooth. We replaced mounted. Here it got even more
the ball bearings on the “Krumtap” creative: in order to get the spark Long story short, after about a
and the roller bearings in the wheel from the coil’s high tension wire to year of emailing back and forth,
hubs, the oil pump wheels, and the the little carbon brush pressing on the Nimbus started almost immedi-
piston rings. I was able to use a the rotor, the high tension wire ately, and I took my first ride up
set of American “Perfect Circle” that entered the side of the distri- and down our steep driveway.
Piston rings, as the pistons were buter was stripped of its rubber What a thrill! On my first longer
an American decimal size piston, in insulation at the end, and was ride on the road, after about 2
between the standard Nimbus inserted into a block of wood and miles, the Nimbus was starting to
oversize dimensions, a great way attached to a spring whose other misfire. I kept pressing on, but the
we found of doubling cylinder life. end passed through the block of misfiring was getting worse by the
wood (the insulator) and onto the minute. I turned for home, and as
A second interesting discovery was carbon brush to transfer the spark. I climbed up our drive, the bike
that the ignition coil was anything All this was highly creative, but barely ran. Once back in my gara-
but standard. The “Vermontian” trying to explain it to Lars via e- ge, I removed the spark plugs and
coil, as Lars termed it, was an igni- mail was not a simple task! One they were as black and powdery as
tion coil of unknown Japanese ori- other drawback: the seat bottomed charcoal. I hadn’t realized that by
gin that had been remotely moun- out on the coil on every bump in tightening the mixture screw all

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