Well, it has been a while now and there has been no news about my Siambretta which went under the surgeon's knife before the weekend. When I left it at the workshop the indication was that it may take more than a week to fix. There were several things that were dependant on other people to finish and these were the unknown lengths of time.

So being of an inquisitive nature, I wandered back down to Mr Verdun's place to check up on my bike. When I arrived, there he was in the process of putting the gearbox cover back on the bike. He was happy to see me and told me about many of the repairs that he has already made to the thing, showing me some of his work and explaining other parts of it that I could not directly see.

Mr Verdun wroking on my Siambretta
Mr Verdun sorting through the parts while working on my Siambretta.

With the cylinder head back together and the gearbox, clutch and drive-train assembled, the bike is starting to look almost ready. This was something that Mr Verdun was very quick to dispel, explaining that he still needs to glue the brake pads onto the shoes, fit the electronic ignition, create some parts to get the choke working, and so on. It was quite an extensive list. After giving me this list, he then tells me that it is likely that the bike will be ready in two days. That means Wednesday.

From my conversations with Mr Verdun, he is still a very strong Siambretta enthusiast and loves to see the bikes in good working order. He has been excited by the work I have asked him to perform on my bike and informs me that it will be a completely different motorbike to the one I left with him only a few days before.

Another benefit that has come from asking him to do this work for me is that some parts which I had been told were previously unavailable, are now appearing. It seems that Mr Verdun is eager to see the bike returned to a good state too, so now some of the rare parts that are reserved for good customers are becoming available. I guess that means that I am one of his good customers then.

Fixing up the gearbox
With a box of parts at his side, Mr Verdun fixes on the gearbox cover.