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Slimline frame / steering head question

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I've have the frame stripped in preparation for painting and have a question... In the front of the  steering head are two 1/4" BSF screws that don't appear to do anything other than block up the tapped holes. I did wonder if there should be grease nipples there but they aren't really in the right place for that unless you completely fill the steering head with a couple of pounds of grease !! Any idea what they may be for??

Also,. I was expecting to find the cup and loose ball type bearings in the steering head, but my frame has been fitted with a pair of single row angular contact ball races. Was this a standard Norton fitting or a modification by a previous owner?

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There is a cover which fits over the headstem which is attached using these two screws.

Trouble is the cover is not shown in the parts book, only the two screws.

I can photograph one of you're interested.

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I have read somewhere that angular contact races were fitted  to some bikes. They would have been expensive though . 

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Some (maybe all?) Commando models has ball bearings.  They should be fitted with a spacer tube (RGM sells one).  It's a mod I considered.  Use the search on this site.  There's been lots written about it.

As Bob writes, those screws are for a cover.  Not many bikes have one fitted. It seems to have been a fitting on the De Luxe model and when they stopped selling the covered-up bikes they used up the front head covers on the normal bikes.  The cover makes it more difficult to inspect, and squeezes the control cables.  Hardly anyone notices it, and nobody cares.  I keep mine because it's there, but I wouldn't go searching if it didn't have it.

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The angular contact bearings were fitted as standard to some bikes. When I stripped my 1962 650ss for rebuilding, it was fitted with them, & as I aquired it from the first owner I know they had never been changed.

 



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