lockdown lovely

LOCKDOWNLoveley

MZ used to be a pretty famous name in off-road circles with good reason. Phil Speakman from the Lancashire Group gives a 1985 MZ TS125 the green-lane treatment

1985 MZ TS125

Ioriginally bought “Maple ” (reg letters are MPL) to rebuild as an adventure tourer, in order to enter the Mongol Rally alongside a mate, sometime in the mid 2000s. We bought four old MZ TS125/150’ s as a job lot, then sold two on and covered the costs of the two we kept.

Unfortunately life got in the way and the rally ’ s rules changed to disbar bikes over 10 years old. By the time I got around to doing anything at all to Maple, other than giving her shed room, I’d been made redundant, spent two and a half years in Afghanistan, set up a new business (The MZ Shop Ltd), become engaged and was on a steep learning curve on how to be a dad to an eight-year-old step-daughter.

By 2015, Cara was 13 and during the school holidays, it seemed like a good idea to teach her some practical, hands-on skills by dismantling Maple for a complete rebuild. Although initially apprehensive, within a few weeks, we stripped the 125 down to its component parts and shipped the cycle parts and tinware off to the local powder coaters. As the bike was to be a green lane bike, the tough finish of powder coating seemed preferable to the superior finish of a paint sprayer. By now, Cara was even asking to go to Halfords to look at socket sets.

My Mongol Rally mate, James, was kind enough to show us both how to re-lace the wheels with new spokes, after Cara had cleaned the aluminium rims and hubs with Scotchbrite pads and Brasso.

Unfortunately due to a communications failure, Cara had it in her head that Maple would return in a British Racing Green colour scheme instead of the bright Kawasaki racing green that we had interpreted her descriptions as. After that, with increasing pressure from ▲

school examinations Cara understandably lost interest and Maple was dispatched to the loft in cardboard boxes for an unknown future as we were increasingly busy with building our second business, a real ale Micropub (The Skew Bridge Alehouse).

Fast forward to May 2020 and our pub was closed to customers, yet still trading successfully by delivering beer to local addresses in the early evenings. This gave me more time in the afternoons with which to finally get around to reassembling Maple as a bespoke green-lane ride, suitable for the gentleman rider in his mid 50s who knows he ’ s not getting any younger.

The motor ’ s bottom end was put out to a mate for a complete rebuild with new bearings, con-rod, gaskets and seals. With copious quantities of diesel, oil and a wooden drift, I managed to remove the seized piston and had the head & barrel vapour blasted, then rebored to 2nd oversize with a new piston.

Being a major supplier of MZ components, the bike soon came together on the bike lift, being rebuilt with all new stainless fasteners. However, it was the modifications that provided the most interesting problem solving solutions.

The front mudguard was raised to take off road tyres, simply by fabricating riser plates in stainless steel. The rebuilt motor was converted from a 6V dynamo system to a 12V Vape alternator which was sealed from water ingress where the clutch cable enters the right hand engine cover.

The bars were swapped with Simson enduro bars and I chose to fit later MZ ETZ levers and switchgear, simply because the clutch and brake lever blades are readily available and easily swapped in the event of a breakage. Indeed, I carry a spare of each in the offside side panel, along with 2-stroke oil, tool kit and spare plugs and fuses.

With no indicators fitted, much of the new wiring loom wasn ’t even required. Ebay provided an excellent set of very robust bark busters in a perfectly matching green, leaving only the high level exhaust, aluminium belly plate and pannier frames as the final pieces of the jigsaw.

This is where I called in the assistance of TigWeld4U in Widnes for their welding and fabrication experience. Lee and myself have completed many successful projects both previously and since, for both of my businesses. We work well together in finding practical solutions and modifications.

I’d bought a high-level pipe for a BSA Bantam Bushman exhaust, which is the same diameter as the MZ TS 125 pipe. Lee was able to cut and shut the pipe to line up with the MZ silencer, suspended from the top pannier frame mounting which he ’d also modified to strengthen the two point mounting frames with a third mounting point to the rear pillion foot peg bolts.

The pannier frames are original MZ units, designed to accept the DDR manufactured hard luggage. However, with a rethink, they were modified to accept a pair of Touratech panniers which I’d never got around to putting on Ebay, having sold the Tiger 955i on which they were fitted. I’ll only use them occasionally for camping trips, but it’ s nice to have the option.

Lee fabricated a silencer heat shield from stainless and the last job was fabrication of the bash plate, utilising the top two inches of the broken aluminium centre stand to form

The pannier frames seen here on the bike were modified to support a pair of Touratech panniers

the two rear mounting points, whilst the front mounting is shared with the motor securing bolts.

Once a switched USB port had been fitted, my iPhone could run the ViewRanger app, allowing me my first day out ever, following a downloaded route, off road in the Peak District and the bike performed impeccably.

I may choose to lace in a 21” MZ ISDT front rim which is in my shed, to give me more tyre options than the 18” TS rims. But if it carries on doing as well as it did on its first trip, I might not even bother. ■ Trail Summer 2021 49