At last nights POG meeting the topic of the Wassell conversions came up and Jack Penton provided some interesting details of the conversion of the Wassells.
The conversion of the engines to 152cc took place in the old original Penton Brothers Motorcycle shop. Jack said at that time the building was pretty much deserted, he described how there would be a whole row of Wassells laying on their sides with the top ends off of them. They did the conversions assembly line style, reaming the top end bushings, installing the pistons, ect. He also said that they used an air chisel to remove the SACHS name off the cases and that he and his brother Jeff became very proficient at removing the SACHS name and not disturbing the rest of the cases, PENTON name plates were then glued in place.
The Penton Brothers machine shop was right next door and very handy for doing the machine work that was needed on the cylinder bases and the heads as well as the boring of the cylinders.
He also touched on how the Husky 125 pipes were cut and altered to allow them to be fitted and how they installed the taller seats.
Jack also touched on the final sale of all the remaining Wassell parts and remaining "in the crate" machines and the loading of these items. He said he can still picture the shelves of Wassell items before it was sold and loaded.
I personally find all of this information very interesting and just wanted to pass it along in case any of you feel the same.
Paul
Very interesting story Paul. I wonder how many Sachs motors this was done to. I know the 5A I have has nothing on the case covers, between the two raised lines. Just a Penton sticker.
But for all I know, maybe all the 5A's are like that.
Gorden,
All of the Sachs engines that Penton used had SACHS on them originally, as did all of the original Wassells equipped with Sachs engines. The original plan by Wassell was to use the BSA Bantam engines but the availability of them dried up and the Sachs came into play.
The original 152cc engines were created using a piston from a Yamaha 305 twin, the problem was the size of the wrist pin and its higher location, hence the reaming of the wrist pin bushings and the machining of the cylinder base. Once Penton had Weisco make pistons for them with the same size wrist pin as the Sachs pistons and with proper pin placement, the reaming and cylinder base machining was not needed.
Another benefit of the Weisco piston was that now Sachs engines with steel rods and needle bearings could be made into 152cc engines. I ran one for quite awhile in hare-scrambles and it had a bit more grunt than the Sachs 125.
I have seen a number of Wassells that were 125cc as well as 152cc. If I had to make an educated guess I would guess that less than 100 were made into 152cc, but like I said that is just a guess.
I think Dane said he helped to bore those cylinders, maybe he can give us some idea of how many were created.
Paul
Speaking of Wassell, Matt at Speed and Sport is selling small lots of goodies for the trials machines on EBAY. Give him a call for your needs.
Darnit Kip, I wish you hadn't mentioned that!! :(
Move along Mudlark owners .... Nothing to see on ebay!! :D
I have one of these modified Wassell's. Mine has a cool modifed large alloy tank, Husky pipe,PP IT rear fender, Falk front fender, Koni rear shocks,big seat and upgraded forks. The rear frame loop was cut and rewelded to fit the PP IT fender.