Need help to identify a part!

A friend picked this up the other day...







Cheers,

Steven in Ottawa

email (option): goodbell@ripnet.com

It's the Lucas 1130 sidelight used pre-war (I think) and certainly post-war on various cars including MGs.

It has the same basic body part as the much rarer MT1130 rear lamp used on 1940 model year BSAs and Ariels...but they have a red lens and a number plate illumination window.

The basic 1130 bodies are around £20 - £25 at UK jumbles.

They can be converted into the motorcycle light...Ian

email (option): ian@wright52.plus.com

HOLY C%$P that was fast thanks for the info. It helps when you see this stuff all the time we never see this stuff in Canada
Cheers Steven

email (option): goodbell@ripnet.com

Well I got the Lucas 1130 from my friend and I am looking for the red lens and thinking of installing it on the rear fender at the top under the pannier rack as a brake light

Cheers Steven

email (option): goodbell@ripnet.com

It's a really nice light unit. Dan Dare was almost certainly working in the Drawing Office at the time.

The 1940 number plate bracket had a depression formed on the top edge for it and motorcycle rear lamps were supposed to provide number plate illumination.

They were only fitted between August 1939 and about January 1940. One unit of the BEF during the Phoney War interpreted the instructions to illuminate the left hand side of vehicles only a little too literally and cut the brackets to move them 2 1/2" to one side !



Have these buggers got 'T' shaped batteries ?

Hi Rik,
Thanks for posting the photo; is that a 3HW? I like the look of that and that would save me some work. If I paint BEF markings on the bike, would that satisfy the rivet counters Great photo!

Cheers
Steven in Ottawa

email (option): goodbell@ripnet.com

They all look like very early (pre war) BSA deluxe M20's. A 3HW couldn't have made it with the BEF. Maybe a pre war 3H or 3SW/5SW could be there. Ron

email (option): ronpier@talk21.com

Are these impressed civilian M20/M21 deluxe models, they don't appear to have the valanced front mudguard of the Dutch contract machines?

This tail lamp usually means 1940 rather than 1939.

A switch panel in the tank and the headlamp, I wonder which switch turned the lights on?

And no prop stand, I have always wondered if militarised impressed machines had them retro fitted.

Rob

email (option): robmiller11(a)yahoo.co.uk

Great picture, Rik! First time I see tankpanels in WD bikes, also cannot see field stands and bashplates which also makes me wonder if it could be impressed civilian bikes.

Rob, the only one with a switch panel in the lamp has no panel in the tank so that would be correct. Cheers, Michiel

Also noticed all the rubber parts are taken off, probably for recycling?

You could right, I assumed the little disc in front of the speedo on the other bikes was an Ammeter, but it could be a Lucas Medallion?

Rob

email (option): robmiller11(a)yahoo.co.uk

email (option): robmiller11(a)yahoo.co.uk

email (option): ronpier@talk21.com

If they were impressed civilian bikes they may not have had the washers on the ends of the footrests, wasn't that a military only fitting?

Saddle covers are gone too, but the "T" shaped batteries still seem to be there, would fire have destroyed them?

Rob

email (option): robmiller11(a)yahoo.co.uk

Isn't it funny how a a picture like this can raise so many queries? I can't see one rubber part. Tyres, knee grips handlebar and foot peg rubbers all gone. Even the truck tyres are gone. I can't see any evidence of the sort of fire damage you would expect if they were set light to and I also wouldn't expect the wheels and tail pieces to have been religiously replaced......So I reckon they must have been cut off Ron

email (option): ronpier@talk21.com

I think I remember reading of inner tubes being taken from trucks to help non swimming soldiers on the beaches of Dunkirk, but I can't believe they would put the wheels back on if that were the case.

The chain may have been removed and chucked in a canal to stop Hitler getting it.

I still think fire is the most likely cause of all of the burnable bits vanishing though. Either that or a time traveller from the year 2017 looking for bits. Rob

email (option): robmiller11(a)yahoo.co.uk

Presumably this is Dunkirk. There would not have been time to cut off all the rubber parts and why would they? The Japanese where not yet in the war. And why remove the rexine seat covers. My money is on that the've been abandoned and set on fire to deprive the enemy. Sometimes after a fire stuff can look remarkably good from a short distance. Also it looks like rear chains are still present. Looks very similar to that convoy from Kuwait we trashed in the first Gulf War.

My feeling is that these look burned.

There were quite a lot of civilian model BSAs and Nortons wth the BEF but generally not with the fighting units which appear generally to have been equipped to scale with WD material. However; RASC and Lines of Communication were another story.

The funny thing about the rear lamp is that it does actually reflect a BEF Standing Order relating to vehicle lighting - but it was intended to apply to motor transport with just one light on the (UK) offside...and very few units seem to have tried to move motorcycle lamps...and MT1130s mounte don the machine centre line at that !