Whilst we are slowly rebuilding the mainframe, we have also been attending to some other aspects of the restoration. Graham spent a fair amount of time trying to track down new bearings for the sidecar wheel hub, assumed to be a  Mini Cooper as is the wheel, but which turned out to be Austin Healey Sprite! Presumably the wheel studs are in the same position, but the bearings are different. We also took a look at the swinging arm which is a Manx Norton one, and which had been modified to fit the BSA pivot points on the mainframe by shortening the fulcrum sleeve.

With this in mind, and in view of the fact that we still have the original back plate and brake shoe assembly (we modified the rear brake to a hydraulic twin leading shoe by utilizing a mini cooper back plate and shoe assembly in the seventies) in addition to the original brake pedal and cable components, we have decided to rebuild the rear wheel with a new Manx hub. If we were to use the BSA rear wheel which used to belong to this machine, we would need to utilize a BSA swinging arm which would then involve re-positioning the rear suspension units etc. and creating more problems. So, as luck would have it Stuart Pearson has a Manx swinging arm from which we have taken all the dimensions for replacing the missing lugs and brackets on ours.

The drawings and photos on the right give us the dimensions for the suspension mountings and brake anchor etc. Again, we will need to manufacture these items as the original ones were attached to the rear telescopic units that have since gone missing from the NMM. In view of the fact that others have reported that their entire machines have gone missing, we do not expect any of these items to surface, although someone must know what happened to them.