Carburator, Carburetor, Carburettor, Carbureter, Carburetter

As you can see from the title of this post, there are many different names to indicate that mechanical device used to mix air and liquid fuel to provide an atomized spray into a engine's intake.

All are accepted spellings and all describe the same thing. Similarly, the two carburetters (that's the spelling I typically use, as it's what Amal has traditionally used) you see below are called by different names, but they are the same thing.

All photos below have the used Amal on the left and the new Wassell on the right, for comparison.

The slide at the very left of the image is an original type Amal.

When Wassell originally launched this product about a decade ago, there was a collective gasp as - surely! - this must be a flagrant copyright infringement. So many people, from the average biker to respected members of the trade were up in arms and angrily proclaimed "we will never use these!" and various abuse directed at Wassell. However, there was one clue we should have all paid attention to: they were advertised in mainstream publications, in print and online, showing very clearly the brand "Wassell" where one would typically find "Amal" cast into the body. I don't think that if whoever holds the rights to the Amal name and products had a valid patent or other right to it, that they would have just let it happen.

These are not "pirate parts" as some people call them (yet sell them!). These are not cheap Chinese knock-offs, which we should always avoid. These are a nicely made version of the Amal Mk1 Concentric.

Sure, I found some brass swarf and "dust" on some of the threads, some debris in the pilot circuit (which is very easy to clean out though, thanks to the removable pilot jet). The upper edge of the float bowl seems a little bit uneven but is reasonably flat and doesn't leak, and the float height was set correctly. The slide isn't finished very nicely, but works smoothly. The main jet was a little bit chewed up, whereas the needle jet looks very nicely made. The needle looks fine and measures the same as a genuine item (in terms of diameter above the taper), but it is probably slightly shorter (admittedly I did not measure this, I might do that in the future). It should go without saying that you should always disassemble a new carburetter, inspect it and thoroughly clean it before use, so I don't find any of the above to be a particular fault.

Here's a nice little detail, they've added a washer as a retainer for the float plunger:

All of the defects I mentioned earlier are shown in more detail in the following shots:

brass swarf in the banjo filter location, not a huge problem but make sure everything is very clean before use.

The main jet, probably damaged during installation at the "factory".

non-descript "dust" on the pilot jet's threads

I couldn't get the needle out, the retaining clip was getting stuck on this:

It looks like whatever tool was used, wasn't controlled very carefully and gouged out a pretty sizeable chunk. I had to use a file to carefully even it out.

Another deep scratch on the outside of the slide, which I also gently sanded down.

Finishing on the slide leaves a bit to be desired, but then again that's why these carburetters are so much cheaper than those made by Burlen.

All of this is fine... just not great. As we say around these parts "bene ma non benissimo".

As a closing thought let me ask you: what's original anymore, these days? All the names that gravitate around classic motoring have passed hands so many times, changed location, died and resurrected so many times... that at best what one can hope for is some original drawings and tooling to still be around. These Wassell carburetters are fine and I'll report back once I've had a chance to ride the Rising Star a bit and see how it does.