The Sidecar

The Panther Wreck came with a single seat sidecar which showed signs of its twenty year sojourn outside in all weathers.


The proud (!) new owner and the outfit on the trailer.

The sidecar is a single-seater with an aluminium skin on a timber frame. The floor of timber boards, the bottom rails and indeed all the timber frame below the window line is badly rotted but the skin is in fair condition. The sidecar has clearly seen a lot of use and has been heavily modified for comfort. It is fitted with a clock, cigarette lighter, radio, lighting and heating for the passenger. Heating was provided by an attachment clamped to the left hand exhaust pipe and fed into the passenger space. The radio and clock are rusted out and all the switches are seized.
        The whole body has been lined in a blue velvety material on hardboard although most of that is beyond repair.
 

The sidecar dashboard with glove box, light, clock, cigarette lighter and radio.

The heating system. The large part is clamped to the right hand exhaust pipe and connected to a hole in the sidecar skin via a rubber adapter and a flap valve to shut  off the air flow.

            One window and the rear panel are decorated with several stickers, shown here, plus one for Britanny Ferries, these appear to predate Eric's ownership.



Stickers for a Dutch campsite, the 1980 Dragon Rally, and the Isle of Man TT.

      It is not easy to identify sidecars which, as in this case, have no identity plates, badges or transfers but the best guess is that is a Swallow Tudor. Swallow of course went on to build Jaguar cars and there is a small chrome Jaguar (or Panther) on the front panel.

Is it one of these?

This Jaguar (Panther) is bolted on the bonnet.

       As I cleared out the debris from inside it became clear that the framing is in very poor condition, indeed worse than I first thought. The floor of pine boards virtually dropped out when I picked the body up. The bottom rails, also softwood, were also very soft and dropping apart. The further I went the worse it got so that eventually I decided to remove all the skin and get down to the bare framework. Finally the only pieces of timber reusable were the angled door-closing rail and the top, front cross rail.
       The roof sheet is of aluminium and non-original; it was presumably added by one of the previous owners. This was fixed with brass screws which all came out fairly easily. as did the stainless screws fixing the aluminium trim. Front and rear panels and trims around the door were held with pop rivets and these were drilled out. The skin had been folded over the timber and fixed with pins during manufacture. These had to be prised out. Eventually I had a pile of panels and the rotten remains of the frame.

Part way through dismantling/

The remains of the frame.

Panels.

        
           The Panther chassis that came with the sidecar is fairly rusty but largely sound apart from the plating around the swing arm pivot. This is tricky to repair as welding could affect the rubber bearing for the swing arm. The mudguard is scrap but the tow-bar and spare wheel carrier appear to be ok, albeit home-made.

The Panther Chassis.

Plating by the swing arm bearing rotted out.

               The rebuild is underway.

The Final Steps

Now that I know it runs I can finish the bike off.

    First the toolboxes. You may recall that both of these were rotted out at the bottom but P&M used the same box on each side of the machine with one mounted upside down relative to the other. This gave the possibility of joining the two good halves to make one box. So I set to with the grinder, mig welder, filler and paint and to my surprise ended up with, to me at least, an acceptable result.

The toolboxes as taken off the bike.

Two into one DOES go!

Finished with new knob.



Left hand toolbox remade from two.

     The second box I bought from Ralph Eborn, having sold it to him some years ago. This was already painted and just needed touching up after filling a few spare holes and redrilling for the mounting bolts. So now we have a full complement of tool boxes.

Right hand box bought in.

             The wiring loom and lights were fitted to the bike but gave some problems as I struggled to get the tail light to work. Eventually I realised that a small brass link in the switch was missing. Eventually all was well and the lights and horn functioned satisfactorily. The JG unit was mounted on new rubber mounts and bolted to the lugs under the saddle provided for the original regulator. Earth leads were run from this unit and the dynamo directly to the drilling in the frame under the saddle where earth leads from the lights and battery were also attached. I always provide earth wires from all the electrical items back to the frame rather than rely on current return through head bearings and painted surfaces. A check on the charging system must wait until another start-up.

JG unit on rubber mounts.

             I had fitted a temporary exhaust for the start-up using a rechromed pipe and an old silencer. The pipe needed adjustment so I altered the flange at the cylinder head end so that the pipe tucked neatly under the gearbox. The old silencer that I had found lurking in the sidecar was rusty but solid. This was of the demountable type so it was taken apart and the body parts derusted by electrolysis. This process also lifted off a lot of the remaining chrome. As it is so solid I shall get it rechromed and fit it to the bike. For now I have put back the battered old one which, although very dented, still has chrome on it.

Demounted silencer before rechroming.

         The primary chaincase was complete but covered in white aluminium corrosion product. This was cleaned back to bare metal and fitted with new cork gaskets and stainless screws. The long screw that is threaded into the battery platform on the frame was especially made from stainless steel hexagonal bar. With the case in place the left hand footrest, rear brake lever, spring, brake rod and stop-light switch were fitted.

Primary drive and brake completed.

          The air filter was complete although again white with corrosion. The mesh was rusty but a new one was to hand and the felt filter was cleaned and oiled before assembly and fitting. A piece of car radiator hose joins the filter to the carburetter mouth.

Air filter and Concentric carb.

        The seat base was painted and the seat reassembled using the old foam and cover; the latter being cleaned of old paint splashes using acetone. A small hole was covered by a patch glued to the underside.


Seat cover cleaned and refitted.

     The original fuel tank was beyond repair. I had picked up another badly damaged one at the National Rally with the idea of making one from two à la toolbox but that is probably beyond my skill level. Instead I decided to use a spare tank that I had once used on my rigid. It is the same shape as the scrap one that came with this bike. The original plastic badges on the wreck had gone milky but I have a pair of those tucked away somewhere along with the backing rubbers. This tank I lined with Por-15 ethanol proof sealer, respayed, lacquered and applied the Redwing transfer, an original varnish on type.



Redwing transfer, varnish-on type.

Resprayed tank.

            The taps were cleaned and fitted with new plastic 'corks' cut from plastic wine bottle stoppers. These don't dry out and seal well though the thickness has to be adjusted by trial and error. Time is not a problem when drinking the wine.

Petrol tap "corks". 1. Plastic type wine "cork", 2. 15mm copper water pipe with sharpened end.
3. Copper pipe in the lathe rotated at slowest speed, "cork" pushed on, hand held, (wear gloves).
4. Push out cut section. 5. Cut off 2 slices about 0.18 inch thick, cut square with a sharp knife,
6. Punch centre hole, assemble tap. It should be tight but slide sweetly.

        The gearbox was filled with one and a quarter pints of semi-fluid grease. This does not flow so is difficult to get it into the box. The answer is to heat it up to near boiling in a saucepan then pour it into the box through a funnel. Getting it out again is more difficult!

         With a battery fitting the machine was hauled off the bench and taken outside for a photo shoot. All that is left to do is to ride it and shake it down.

The complete machine, 1960 Panther M100S

     Now to turn to the sidecar.