New member Matchless g9 1953 building from parts project

[plumbob]

Hi to all members
Just thought that I would write a few lines to introduce myself. My name is Steve, I will be 61 years young in August.I currently live in Plumstead near winns common. When my dad was alive, I remember him telling me that he once worked at the Plumstead factory before he met my mum. I am sure he said his work was on cylinder head production.
It always fascinated me ,so recently having had an interest in motorcycles for many years decided to embark on my project. Building a Matchless 1953 G9 from spare parts, starting with a dated g9 frame with cert.
I have collected together many used parts, and various books and parts lists for research.
Would someone be able to recommend an engineering company ,who has expertise in the twin cylinder 500 g9 engine.
As I am new to this forum, I would like to post some pics for all to see.
Any members can contact me on 07736783835 also if they are local to Plumstead are welcome to pop round and have a look. Keep well, everyone, and be safe. All the best steve.

[Groily]

Welcome - and congratulations on your good taste in choice of machine! You won't be disappointed, I'm sure.
As and when you need engineering work done you'd be hard pressed to find better than T&L Engineering in Bedfordshire. They advertise in the Jampot, know the Twins inside out and have a long history of making us happy. They have carried out a wide range of work on my own twins (and several other machines of other marques) over the years, including crankcase welding repairs, resleeving of barrels, rectification of con rod eyes as well as more routine regrinds and rebores, valve seat replacement and so on. Top people.
We have been - and still are, largely - quite lucky in terms of spares availability thanks to the Club, AMC Classic Spares and Russel Motors. A large percentage of bits you'll need can be had, and then there are Indian options for tinware if needed.
And the archives, if you haven't been there yet, are a superb repository of information year by year - see http://archives.jampot.dk/book/ while club members between them know more than everything about everything with a default mode which says 'I will help if I can', so you won't be short of advice if needed.

[clive]

Hi Steve and welcome to the club. I have moved your thread to the G9/model 20 section as the G11 is the 600. When building up a bike from parts you need to be sure that the parts are interchangeable. Many parts will fit lots of years but sometimes there is a change which makes it less easy. It sounds a good project, I did the same with a 500 single a few years back, put 500 miles on it to shake it down and then rode it to Poland to one of our International rallies.
You may find it helpful to visit one of the sections club nights. East London meet in Brentwood and Kent meet in Gravesend which would not involve the Dartford tunnel. You don't have to arrive on two wheels and there will be members with good knowledge who may be able to give you advice. Details of the meeting places are in the mag or from the home page go to "club" then "sections".

[alanengineer]

Hi Steve and welcome.
Great choice of bike and year, I have one!
Best advice i can give you is to go along to a section meeting and lap up all of the free information that floods the meeting .Kent is my local club but the wrong end of the county to go regularly for me, friendly, knowledgeable bunch. I have also met the East London lot at the summer rallies and they are also a good easy to get on with crowd. Take your pick.
The bike is eay to get on with but the wrong year part will fit, but may cause problems with assembly later on. Some can cope with that , some not.

Best of luck and keep asking questions

[SPRIDDLER]

Welcome, Steve.
If you want more history of the Plumstead factory there several articles in the Archives (under 'General' in the link that 'Groily' gave you) from the 50's.

In this one there are photos of the production areas. On page 5 there are pics of the cylinder head production area and equipment where your dad may have worked.

http://archives.jampot.dk/general/AMC_F ... Review.pdf

Here's a general article from a Plumstead employee detailing methods and conditions in the factory.

http://archives.jampot.dk/general/Working_for_AMC.pdf

Another series of anecdotes from an employee here:

http://archives.jampot.dk/general/Memor ... Rourke.pdf

I can also recommend the excellent and very interesting book: 'Motorcycle Apprentice' by Bill Cakebread detailing his career at Plumstead in the 50's and 60's;