Whilst I enjoy my time on this website, chatting Lambretta and showing an interest in Vespa, dealer innovations, dyno charts, etc, etc, to me this has always been a forum. Sure, a very good forum but that was the extent of it. The Scooterotica Garage has always seemed like some remote dealer that I'd had no dealings with and Sean Brady was simply a name that I saw/read on this site. However, that changed for me today!
A year or so ago I started to put out feelers to UK dealers that I thought might be able to split a crank and do some modification work for me, which seemed to run into a brick wall with those that I tried. Sometimes the brick wall came in the form of "Can't be done!", at other times it was a case of me choking at the price that I was being quoted for the work. However, I'd noted the bespoke crank modification work that Sean and Dan were sometimes showing within the Vespa Tuning section of this site so thought I'd drop then a private message. Within a couple of days I had talked through my requirement and had a very reasonable quote for the work to be carried out. I'd supply the crank, rod and bearing that I wanted to use as a base, he would do the work. Typically, me being me, I then somehow shelved this idea until a month or so ago but then made contact again to see if the offer/quote still stood. Sean confirmed that he was still prepared to take on the work for me and I sent the crank his way.
The modifications that I had in mind relate to a crankcase induction motor that I've been lucky enough to get involved with at an early stage of development and take the development work that a.n.other had done and start to play with ideas of my own (for the record, the crankcase motor development work has been continued by the original designer to be a truly lovely motor to ride and way ahead of my own dabbling). Having worked the crank induction casing to my own format, what I needed was for a crank to be reworked to give better gas flow from the reed block into the casing, via modified webs. This modification would be a fairly straight forward (conceptually) chamfer to the inner edge of the web, however, that would require my crank to be split and the webs accurately modified (to retain balance), then for the crank to be rebuilt and trued. One dealer approached said that this could not be done as it would have to be machined and that it would therefore clash with the pin bosses, making it impossible to do. Sean's attitude was quite different and he said that it could be done, with the quote not breaking the bank.
So, today I got the crank back from Sean and I'm thrilled with the standard of workmanship! Sean has got it absolutely as I specified and with a level of craftsmanship way above what I was expecting. I've been so disappointed with some of the other crank work that I've had done by other UK dealers (poorly assembled and then welded on the p155!) that it makes a really pleasant change to be overwhelmed, rather than underwhelmed.
It seems as though I was wrong about Scooterotica simply being a very good scooter forum... the Scooterotica Garage and the workmanship of Sean Brady really is something that I'd previously overlooked.
Thanks Sean, great work.
Adam
