The bridge plate, from the front fork assembly, appeared to have some age to it. A standard bridge plate, stamped ‘FF32’, would have been anodised but was listed with the suffix of /1.
Two layers of paint were removed – a good sign! many of the parts had been painted twice: The top layer had been applied by Peter Johnson and Terry Prince and beneath that we found another layer of paint and primer that had been applied years previously. Peter has told me that when he acquired the “bones” of the bike many of the parts had already been painted, so we knew that this layer of finish had been applied in antiquity and, at the same time, to other key parts (such as the forks). Removing it proved a bit of a task as it was stubbornly impervious to Bert’s preferred method of stripping using thinners.
The finish indicates that it likely to be original to the bike, which means the bridge plate is also an original anodised part.
The above shot shows the bridge plate next to the G50 pivot bearing plate which is an original part, albeit modified in-period. The finish is identical which leads us to conclude that the FF32 bridge plate is the one that 2751 left the works fitted with.
Grey Flash 2751 