Durban

I promised some words, at least halfway, so as your faithful entertainer here´s a small piece about the heroes and villains in this port town.

Durban is a fortress town, like most other South African smog holes. Not a fortress town because the Brits or Boers had fortresses there, but because of the Zimbabwization they´re working on in the country. The zimbawization-program includes boosting of corruption and incompetence, and with a richness of poverty and culture for violent crime it has had fantastic effects for the fencing and security industries. Everybody that can afford it fence themselves in, living in fortresses with at least barbed wire. A status symbol is electric fences on the top.

The incompetence and corruption is very well implemented in the port system as well. Even crime they´ve been able to bring in. A key success factor to achieve this might been to employ people after race and gender rather the skills, but it´s so masterly done that I don´t feel qualified to make anymore speculations about this.

Anyhow, to get out my bike took a week, which of each day cost 100 dollars in storage. Though we had very good help from Ken Sink, our local host that knew the port it took this much time and efforts. It seemed to be no lack in rules they didn´t know quite how worked, except from that the rule made it hard to get out the cargo. When we finally could roll out the bike and check it we had spent 1500 dollars. A quick count up showed that they broken into the box and stolen tools and driving gear for another 1000 dollar. Fair enough, I can understand the stealing of tools, but to steal fairly worn out leathers is another thing. One of the pants stolen was from the sixties, and I had used it for the last 12 years, probably put on 150k kilometers on them so you can imagine the conditions.

It doesn´t stop the world from spinning though, even if you could very well live without this extra expence at the end of the trip when funds are getting exhausted. Furthermore, Klaus bike got out of the port after just five days, and only half of the cost of mine.

This was not the only highlight, Ken was also a very lovable man. Both skillful and knowledgeable about mechanics, as well as full of jokes and anecdotes. On top of this, the crate of parts from Denmark arrived in time and contained exactly what we´d asked for.

This package contained the spirit of the ever helping Danish community of motorcyclists and others that care for what we do. Parts was gathered by the Mr “No doesn´t exist”-John Carlsen at JC Nimbus and Fin Ohlendorff . Soeren Groenbech and Claus Sibbesen got it sent as ship spares for a decent amount, and a lot others contributed financially due to Fin’s enthusiasm. Again it showed that you can always count on the goodwill of a handful of good friends rather than organizations.

If you mix in the local help we got from Raybell Automotive Machining and a welder, and not to mention Ken Sink, the rebuild became fairly easy affair. For the engines Terry at Raybell did the heads, including guides on mine, and deglazed the blocks. On mine engine I had a dead main bearing, and a dying con rod, which we had all in stock. The clutch was also replaced as it had taken some hits by doing the Andes without a first gear.

Both sidecar boxes were welded up again for hopefully the last time, as well as Klaus sidecar chassis that had started to dissolve. After almost a month with mostly waiting we could finally hit the road again the 4^th of December.

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I’ll make some boring text for the last two entries sometimes later. In the meantime enjoy some pictures with obese captions. The saying is that a picture says more than a thousand words, so at least there´s a few thousand words here.


Tormod

Jeg skriver lidt kedelig tekst til de seneste to indlæg senere. Imens kan I nyde lidt billeder med alt for store undertekster. Det påstås at et billede siger 1000 ord, så der er i det mindste et par tusinde ord her.

At least it was some big ships to look at down at the docks.

I det mindste var der et par store skibe at se på nede ved havnen.

Ken Sink’s grandson with my bikes just after the bike was finally freed from the greedy thieves called port authorities. Ken was our very friendly host in Durban and made the stay nice despite the problems.

Ken Sink's barnebarn med min mc kort efter maskinen omsider slap fri af grabberne på de grådige tyve man kalder havnemyndighederne. Ken var vores meget venlige vært i Durban, og gjorde det til et behageligt ophold trods problemerne.

At the local classic bike club’s own house. Ken was in charge of the club and offered the members very good service.

Huset der tilhørte den lokale klub for klassiker motorcykler. Ken styrede klubben og var god til at hjælpe medlemmerne.

Container with spares.

Container med reservedele.

Indian, about 1915. Dug down in 1935 after a fatal accident. Recovered in the mid eighties.

Indian, ca. 1915. Gravet ned i 1935 efter en dødsulykke. Bragt tilbage midt i firserne.

Note how all the alloy is gone.

Bemærk hvordan al aluminium er væk.

The engine for Ken´s Triumph.

Motoren til Ken's Triumph.

The crate with our spares arrives from Denmark. Big thanks to all involved. It was great effort by a lot of persons, both when it came to gather the parts, pay for them and get them sent. All done by individuals without any support from organizations you might had expected that would do so.

Kassen med vores reservedele ankommer fra Danmark. 1000 tak til alle involverede. Det var en stor indsats fra en masse folk, både da det gjaldt indsamling af stumper, betaling for dem og at få dem sendt. Alt sammen klaret af enkeltpersoner uden hjælp fra nogen organisationer man kunne forvente ville have hjulpet.

The following pictures is dedicated all Nimbus-experts and is brought to public so people can wank frantically and look at them. Just remember to cover up the keyboards and enjoy finding eight faults. The answer is below:

De følgende fotos er dedikeret til alle Nimbuseksperter og hermed vist til offentligheden, så folk (censureret) over dem. Bare husk at dække tastaturet og ellers god fornøjelse med at finde 8 fejl (svar længere nede).

Answer: Snow White and the seven dwarfs is missing in the workshop.

Svar: Snehvide og de syv dværge er ikke på værkstedet.

Checking the block after honing the evil spirits out of it.

Tjekning af blokken efter alle onder ånder er blevet honet ud af den.

Terry and his company Raybel did a magnificent machine job on heads and blocks, for free. This kind of people makes it worthwhile to travel around the world. Big thanks Terry!

Terry og hans firma Raybel lavede et meget fint stykke arbejde på topstykker og blokke, gratis. Det er den slags mennesker der gør det værd at rejse jorden rundt. Stor tak til Terry!

Ken at his best: in the workshop fixing stuff with his old Myford lathe. Ken was a man that was impossible to not love, helpful, kind and very knowledgeable in a broad range of subjects.

Ken når han er bedst; i værkstedet og i gang med at fixe dele på hans gamle Myford drejebænk. Ken er en mand det er umuligt ikke at holde af; hjælpsomvenlig og meget vidende om en masse forskellige ting.

Bits and pieces, also called an abused engine for an obsolete bike that’ll soon be retired.

Laser og pjalter, i form af en mishandlet motor fra en forældet motorcykel der snart skal pensioneres.

If you choose the right Nimbus dealer you won´t only get good nimbus parts and service, you´ll also get Nimbus candies. And who´s the right? The one and only John Carlsen at JC Nimbus. He has never let me down and supported me from way before anybody even believed in what I was doing.

Hvis du vælger den rigtige Nimbusforhandler, får du ikke bare gode Nimbusstumper og god service, men også Nimbus slik. Og hvem står dér til venstre? Den eneste ene John Carlsen fra JC Nimbus. Han svigtede mig aldrig og støttede hele vejen fra før jeg selv vidste hvad jeg havde gang i.

The front wheel getting relaced for the 4th time or so. Now the entire hub was ready to go back to nature and was replaced. The good thing was that new tires was sponsored by Intercontact so there was at least some positive things associated with the wheels this time.

Forhjulet bliver opegret for fjerde gang eller så. Denne gang var hele navet klar til at blive kremeet, og blev derfor udskiftet. Heldigvis var dækkene sponsoreret af Intercontact (forbindelse via ordet i den engelske tekst), så der var i det mindste noget positivt forbundet med hjulet denne gang.

However, the continuous relacing and beating has started to make the rim crack. Big thanks to Clive welded it so it´ll hopefully go home again, as well as a lot of other weld jobs that needed to be done. Very skilled man and interesting character that did all the work as charity to needing Norwegians. Big thanks for the efforts!

Men altså, den gentagne opegring og de tæv fælgen har taget fik den til at slå revner. Mange tak til Clive der svejsede den – og mange andre tilng - så den forhåbentlig kan klare resten af turen hjem. En meget dygtig mand og en interessant type, som gjorde arbejdet som hjælp til os Nordmænd I Nød. Mange tak for indsatsen!

Clive.

I was hit by a wild South African drillpress so my entire face cracked and bled like that flood they talk about in the bible, had to be sown together by loose bits and pieces of the face we found all over the workshop. Here I´ve found some thinner to relieve the tremendous pain and traumas that rid me.

Jeg blev ramt af et vildt sydafrikansk søjlebor og fik en flænge der fik det at bløde helt i stil med den der historie fra biblen. Det blev så syet sammen med de løse stykker og stumper ansigt der lå rundt omkring på værkstedet. Her har jeg fundet lidt fortynder til at afhjælpe de smerter og traumer jeg har pådraget mig.