Saturday 3rd July 2004. Let us introduce a key player in the restoration process.

Kevin Bassam is the man responsible for the re-working of the frame assembly. He is not new to this task - or indeed this machine. He originally worked on the machine when we were racing it in the seventies, often having to repair cracked or broken frame components which had failed due to the various stresses that racing machines experience. He was also a stand - in passenger on a couple of occasions when Graham was unable to fulfill the role.

So it seemed fitting that he should be involved in the rebuilding of this machine. As you will see from the various photographs which follow, he has no mean task ahead of him. As we mentioned previously, the sidecar chassis was the easy bit, but that had taken up two week-ends to repair.

The main problem is the fact that every joint on the frame has to be re-brazed. When you compare the new joints with the existing ones you can see why. There is certainly a lot of work to be done.

When you consider that you require this kind of heat to melt the brass, it conjures up pictures in your mind of the intensity of the museum fire.

Here Graham steadies the frame while Kevin reworks the brazed joints. We could use a jig for this, but of course we don't have it. So maintaining the alignment of the frame is another nightmare, with checking being carried out after every joint is brazed.

In memory of Kevin Bassam  1951 - 2017