Hi All. After a few hundred miles on my rebuilt ,very early 1962 A65 Star, I am pleased to say its exceeded all of my expectations as a great fun bike to ride-I just LOVE it!
Only criticism i have is lowish gearing, but no big deal really, its a hoot.
I was not so keen on the handlebars though, which I thought at first might have been the original ones. They point downwards a bit.
I have come to realise now that they are not correct, and point downwards because they cannot be rotated forward in their clamps to raise the bar ends up, as the nacelle top prevents this....
So, it seems the early A50/65 with the nacelle needs a certain "bend" to be correct.
1962-63/4 parts books give the part number as 68-4950, but this number does not seem to be anywhere these days when searched.
Have any Star Owners out there any recommendations as to a suitable bar for the nacelle? I have looked at Triumph T100/T120 bars at autojumbles and these may well be OK, but at £30-40+ a set I dont want to buy and find out they are not right....... Any suggestions?
Cheers, Bob C
Hi Rob
Am also putting together an early (cable rear brake ) Star and over the years accumulated the correct nacelle and tin top cover. However as you have found it presents problems. I bought Draganfly's "generic" handlebar which are not quite right and proved to be a bit of a struggle to fit with the tinlid. As you say there was a special bend bar required and not only that but the levers apparently are a bit special to angle the cables to route under the top cover...DOH. Amongst some of the unit twin articles I have picked up is a Classic Motorcycling Legends from Spring 1993 which I have attached with similar problems. Unfortunately his source of the correct handlebar (MCS) do not appear to be still around ?..anyone ?
Hope this helps but I doubt it...( I have attached a scan of the page but doesn't seem to upload )
Hi Starman, thanks for the reply.
In the end, I heated up the bars and bent them to where I wanted them!!
They were er, um, "patinated" anyway. The chrome was shot having what looked like a screen brackets fitted previously. I polished them up after bending and they are fine (for an unrestored bike) and well comfy now.
Now I have a good pattern to compare to new ones available if I decide to buy new ones.
I bent them to be more or less horizontal at the grips, and this gives a good run in (and room) for the clutch/ F.brake cables to fit inside the nacelle nicely. There is a fairly tight bend to the cables but no big drama- I made my own clutch cable with Venhills silky smooth nylon lined outer- and it copes a treat- lovely clutch control.
My bike came with a (brand)N.O.S nacelle top fitted, and I noticed that the opening for the bars is a bit wider on the clutch side- possibly to accomodate a thicker clutch cable. I have noticed from contemporary road test/publicity pics. of the early Stars that BSA used the John Bull type rubber cable ties on the cables/handlebars at the point where the bars enter the nacelle- no doubt to cushion the cables from the nacelle edges- works fine on mine.
To fit the nacelle the centre section of the bars needs to be narrow- about 5 1/2" if i remember correctly, which is the same as some C15 bars advertised- the ones with no welded brackets may well be ones that might suit the A65??
1660bob