Thanks mainly to work by mechanic, engineer and BSA M-Series enthusiast Len Page, my black 1955 M20 was now starting reliably, held road well on new Avon tyres (the previous rear cover had been from 1950!), and pulled surprisingly well.
But one problem did persist. The gearbox with its six-spring clutch still hosted a load of unwanted false neutrals, which on the move compromised the side-valve 500’s need to husband its borderline ‘power.’ So I bit the bullet and ordered a replacement four-spring clutch kit from Kidderminster Motorcycles (telephone 01562 66679).
From both my previous A10 and a long-term M21, I knew how well these clutches worked. Kidderminster said that with my year M20, no adaptor kit would be necessary, as it was for BSA twins. The price of the clutch, at around £375, was what had stopped me so far; M20s don’t make big money, bar the wartime ones, so I was probably never going to recover that cost. But this was getting on for the last (classic) go-round, so damn the torpedoes/heating bills.
As Clint Eastwood wryly observed in ‘Magnum Force’, “a man has to know his limitations”, and my spannering skills are limited indeed. So to fit the four-spring, I rode off again to Len Page.
In his clutches
Len got the BSA up and secured on his hand-pumped lift in his workshop. He began by removing the left footrest so the primary chaincase could come off. “The only metric bolt on my M20s and M21 holds the footrest on,” he observed, “I use a 20mm spanner – it’s not 7⁄16ths and it’s not ⅜ths inch. Maybe it’s 19⁄32nds, but on mine I’ve had to use a metric one.” So
