GO... GO... GO... GO... VUUMMMMMMMMMMMAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!...... PR.PR..PR... PR

And there was a huge cloud of smoke ...!!!!... immense.!!!!.... at first it was black.... then grey.... and finally white ... white-blue ...the engine started....... it was running slowly but with a tendency to block: it was “hardened" but it was running!!!!! Without turning off the engine (I would have never found another steep slope like that one!!!) and driving almost 15 km with practically no brakes, I managed to carry it to the garden of a friend of mine - the Peppo. There we began to disassemble it on a wooden table in the greenhouse where there were still all the flowers.The saddle leather– or what was left of it rather – was absolutely unrecoverable. All the other parts, even if in need of major restoration, were good enough to understand how they were made in the first place, so that we could eventually rebuild them from scratch. After having dismantled all of it - up to the very last bolt - we had a huge number of pieces aligned on another table: the body (holder-plate, mudguards, tank, front and rear lights, handle-bar and saddleback); the chassis with its steering and fork; the wheels (dismantled the tyres, the wire spokes, the hubs and the brakes); the rear suspensions (the springs and hydraulic shocks-absorbers); the front fork (the springs and hydraulic shocks-absorbers); the engine and the wiring loom, which was made of a bunch of wires connecting several components (front light, ignition key, rear light and brake light, battery,  dynamo, horn and switches).After this we decided that was the right time to face the engine. This was an undertaking on its own, because it weighed more than 80 kg... try to lift it by yourself!!!!! First we removed the head (which is a flat cover like the one of a two strokes engine); then we dismantled the group selector gear and the crank starter (which is external on the right-hand side); then it was the turn of the group timing the camshaft of valves; the oil pump (which is in the second external sump on the right-hand side); then we dismantled the cylinder & side valves group and the pistons, the dynamo and the clutch block; and finally we removed the shell and the crankshaft, which had three main rolling bearings (two external and one in the middle), the two conrods and the two gear shafts.

I sent the pistons (which were well seized), the cylinders and the head gasket (copper made) to the factory Asso, so that they could make a copy along the line of the old ones. The cylinders were reamed and rectified on the base of the gauge of the new pistons and the new piston rings. The crankshaft was in fairly good conditions, so it only needed to change the three main rolling bearings and the big end-bearing and the small end-bushing of the conrods. Clearly, in that occasion we had to build up from scratch a set of ad hoc extracting tools in order to remove the bearings from their seat in the motor sump. However, only in two instances we had to rely on a workshop specialised in engine machining in order to re-make the bearing seats. This was because the bearings were blocked and hence the external shell have been turning inside the sump, thus shattering completely their seat in the sump. The gear box was in good enough conditions, in the sense that the gears of the primary shaft and the secondary shaft did not show any particular damages. At the same time, the gear selector – what "it changes the speed" engaging the two shafts sliding on a broach – slid beautiful free and without particular radial play. The pads of 4 clutch discs were still thick enough (about 3 millimetres). On the contrary, the valves were a true mess!!!! Both the exhaust valves showed an unrecoverable corrosion on the head, but not on their seat. On the good side, the seats had never been machined before, thus leaving enough room for our intervention. Furthermore, the inlet valves were almost perfect too. We were also please to discover that the geometry, gauge and material of the inlet valves are exactly the same ones of the exhaust valves, and therefore perfectly interchangeable. An old mechanic (who was supervising our adventure "from far away" – after all that was our first motorcycle and our first engine!!!!) suggested to check if the inlet valves used in the Alfa Romeo 1600 engine (those were sodium made!!!) had the same measures (diameter and length stem and diameter of the head valve) were similar to those we needed. Amazingly, the two almost matched and we could use them as a replacement: the only difference was that the collets grooves of the Alfa Romeo valves had a slightly different design. However these were smaller than the Sertum ones, and therefore we could mount them on a grinder and increased the groove profile so as to adapt it to the measure required for the Sertum. After 15 days we received back the cylinder-valves group with the new copper head gasket, new pistons and new piston rings. Interestingly, the new pistons no longer had the second groove for the scraping-oil ring, which originally was at the bottom end of the piston. The cylinders were sent to the workshop in order to grinding the valves’ seats and to also change the guide valves because off tolerance. At that point it was possible to reassemble the valves with their springs, the upper and lower spring plates and the collets which were perfectly engaging in their new grooves. While we were waiting for the delivery of the new pistons from the Asso, we asked the workshop to check the alignment of the crankshaft and also to lock the bolts of the conical junction on the crankshaft. Afterwards, we assembled the crankshaft on the new main rolling bearings, the two gearshafts and the engine sump. We mounted the new pistons with the new piston rings on the conrods; we inserted the pistons in the cylinder-valves group; we reassembled the right hand side sump with the gears timing of the camshaft, using the synchronization marker on the gears (we took note of it before dismantling them); we reassembled the oil pump and the left hand side sump with the clutch, engaged with the main gear of the crankshaft through the spring absorber. In order to tweak the clearance of the valves we use the measures of a similar engine – the Fiat 500 - 0,25 millimetres for the inlet one and 0,30 millimetres for the exhaust one.... and they worked well!!!! By the way, we built the several gaskets of the sump using lots of sheets of sealing paper and rivers of mastic....

While doing all these mechanical workings, we sent the all metal parts of body to a coachbuilder so to rearrange them and paint them of a beautiful shining black. We also sent a myriad of pieces to a chrome workshop: the fuel tank (which we cleaned up of the rust from the inside), the front light, the rims, the wire spokes, the front fork, the starter crank, the pedal of the gearshift, the handlebar, several levers and hangers and lots of small other pieces such as bolts and washers. The chrome workshop sent back all of these after 15 days, practically at the same time as the mudguards, chassis, rear fork and the other pieces come back from the coachbuilder. Meanwhile, we let another workshop re-make the pads of the jaws of the brakes. After the engine was completely reassembled, we began to rebuild the motorcycle starting from the wiring loom which was to be made from scratch on the basis of the old wiring scheme. At that time we did not found someone who could re-make the exhaust pipes and silencers, therefore we had to reuse the old ones. The old pipes and silencers really crashed with all the new chromes, but the overall look did not seem to be badly affected.

We didn’t work full time on the motorbike: Some days we were spending few hours and some other times we were spending the all day; surely, weekends were always dedicated to the bike. So, it took the two of us 4 months to finish the bike, including also the time spent waiting for the many workshops to finish their jobs.

Surely, I will never forget the emotion I felt the day – at the beginning of June – when the engine kicked off as a thunderstorm (exhaust pipes were not on yet): the usual huge smoke cloud came out, but this time it was "only" white from the beginning. For almost a month, I went around without the saddleback: I used a piece of a wool blanket tied with some wire, which was always turning around. Then, a proper saddleback arrived at the spare parts store: it was from the Moto Guzzi Alcione and fitted perfectly; then I also got a rear saddle for my girlfriend Paola (the cute haversack…romana “de Roma”!).

The Sertum became my main and only mean of transportation. At that time I was studying at the University of Milan and I was commuting every week back and forth from Lecco. When in Milan, I was using it to go everywhere: from home to Uni, to the cinema and to meet up with friends, no matters the weather… I guess that at the time I was never feeling too cold, although in several occasions we (myself and my Sertum) got drenched because of the rain and frozen because of the snow. In 1972 I moved to Rome to finish my studies (… and also because my love was living there!) and the Sertum clearly came with me. I graduated in 1973, and then in 1975, after the military service, I got a job in a big company in Rome and I finally married Paola. The time went by and I was always riding the Sertum. And so in 1978 the first son Luigi came, and then the second one - Andrea – was born in 1980 (and that was it!). At that point with two baby boys and a wife, I thought that a motorbike could only help me to run away… and I had no intention to do that!!! On the other hand I didn’t want to see once again the Sertum leaning against a wall and exposed to any sort of weather conditions (I didn’t have a covered garage). Hence in 1981 I decided to hibernate it.  So, as painful as it was, I dismantled it to the very last bolt and I placed the hundreds of pieces and parts in 3-4 wooden boxes. Since then – notwithstanding moving 3 times – the Sertum has been resting in those boxes but secretly and patiently waiting for a new youth…