According to a couple of my Norton books, frame and engine numbers match after 1947. I am fairy sure I have read that they did not match on prewar bikes, but I don't know in what book. And of course WD bikes were mostly mixed up anyway.
But I'm looking at a 1936 16H - and the numbers match. So when did Nortons get that well organised? There must be lots more. Maybe the factory records make it all clear to those who have access to them?
I've looked quite extensi…
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My silly mistake - I'm re…
My silly mistake - I'm reading crank case and barrel! Idiot! Can we delete threads like this,please, before they spread around the world wide web?!!!
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Ah, that is indeed a nice…
Ah, that is indeed a nice sign. Pre-war Nortons often had the crankcase number stamped on the barrel as well. It's a rare pre-war 16H that hasn't had an ex-WD barrel put on it. Is it a pre-war WD machine that you're looking at or civilian ?
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It is a civilian 1936 mach…
It is a civilian 1936 machine. One lady owner for most (maybe all) its life (apart from present owner who fired it up in 1982 butnever rode it owing to having various other bikes). About 7000 miles on the clock. Fork bushes seem to be sound, so that might be genuine. Fuel tank seems to be a bit rusty under some very shabby paint(chrome tanks rusted fast out in the practical world, allegedly), and has very crude brush painting. Frame seems very clean and sound almost certainly original enamel.
Cables are all functioning but shabby, and the mag is going off for servicing.
We'll probably renew valve springs (there's a spare set lying around if we can find them) - maybe valves - inspect the bores and with a bit of luck it'll be on the road again. The tank is the problem. I'll try to strip the paint and see what's there. Re-chroming seems to be over the top since the rest of the machine is 'patinated', but it can't stay as it is. Might end up with metallic grey where the silver once was, and silver where the chrome was.
The instrument panel is also crudly painted, so that's part of the overall tank issue to be decided.
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I've looked quite extensively at the factory records and can confirm that pre-war engines and frames did not have matching numbers. The first machine with matching numbers was from the first wartime WD contract and was WD16H W1001, produced on 7th October 1939. It followed on from a WD16H frame number 107986, engine 97677.
They did actually produce W1000 but seem to have omitted it from the ledgers and had to add it further down the page.