Fresh Meat

This past week I met a guy named Kurt, a friend of Tanya, an old student of mine from back in my First Baptist Snellville days. Kurt owns the above 1969 Triumph T100 motorcycle. He asked my help in getting it running again, having heard I've done a few motorcycles over the past few years. Intrigued, I agreed to ride up to his house and have a look at the bike, and see if it was something I could help with. Not exactly a master mechanic, I asked my father to join me, who along with my mother was coming up last week to celebrate my last (and hopefully final) chemo treatment. Now, I had an old Triumph "master" to give me his assessment as well. Dad's owned various old Triumphs since the days of his youth, and knows these old bikes very well.
We arrived at Kurt's home, and were ushered to this gem sitting in his garage. He also owns a 1966 Mustang fastback, which he's owned since his youth- it was his first car, and he kept it. Very cool! Kurt said the bike kicks over (literally, it is a full kick-start), runs for about 40 secs, then quits. Immediately we suspected either debris blocking fuel flow to or even through the two petcocks, or a carburetor gummed up. The old British Amal carbs were notorious for having issues, yet Dad had worked on plenty over the years. He's helped me with several carb jobs, a few tank reseal jobs, and we've tackled petcock rebuilds, so knowing I had his experience to help me, I agreed to take it on.
I came back Friday and picked up the bike in the rain (we've had a bit of that lately), and got it back to my little "shop" at home. Looks pretty good, down in my man-cave, I must say!
Getting into the old Amal carb, I was able to take it completely out and apart, gave it a thorough piece-by-piece cleaning, then reassembled it.

Pretty cool, doing an old carb off a vintage Triumph that's almost as old as I am- almost! Next, I'll need to tackle the tank, give it a cleaning, then go through the twin petcocks. Hopefully within a week or so, I can wheel it back out, give it a kick-start, and she'll not only start, but run. And run, and run.
I have learned a lot over the past few years of finding/fixing/flipping motorcycles. And it's helped having an old veteran motorcycle rider and mechanic as a father too.
Looking forward to breathing life back into this baby!