Innholdsfortegnelse for April 2021 i Real Classic

Before I sell a bike I usually take a stack of photos of it. This is not entirely to remind me how much I disliked it – surely the only real genuine reason for sale? Mainly I’m nostalgic about bikes I’ve owned for a while and then sold, but only rarely do I understand a genuine reason for buying it back again. In fact, I can think of only two – maybe three – bikes I really do wish I’d hung onto for longer. None of my oily-frame Triumph twins is among that number, although, like regrets, I’ve had a few… I have a love / hate relationship with the later Triumph twins. I love the idea of them, but not the reality. I love short rides; ownership, less so.…

If your memory is less unreliable than my own, you may recall that last month I finished off the story with the AJS 16 sitting on the bench poised to receive its rear wheel, complete with a new tyre of mysterious manufacture, a new battery and indeed some new oil for the forks. Phew. In a moment of optimism, or madness, which may of course be the same thing, I also included a photo of the entire bike, complete and ready to roll. Which it did. So! My plan for this episode was to triumphantly reveal how my masterful skills had overcome the strange mechanical mischief wrought upon an otherwise exemplary AJS by some anonymous maniac, and to share with you that delightful riding off into the sunset moment. However.…

Roll forward and take a bow, Suzuki Cavalcade. Hustle your 34 year-old, chrome laden, 870lb (62 stone!) mass over this way so we can take a good look at you. Don’t worry about that scratching noise; it’s just your twin radio masts grazing the garage ceiling. Ignore that unkind heckling from the back row. You may not be a contender for the Banbury Run or drool the contents of your sump across the garage floor in the time-honoured fashion but, as far as I’m concerned and despite your relative youth, you deserve a place in the pantheon of classics and some space in my garage. Indulge me for a moment and I’ll explain. Ever since I’d sold my Suzuki Burgman 650 scooter to pay for engine and gearbox repairs to…

The British formula for establishing a motorcycle company frequently entailed family ties. Take Matchless, Velocette, AJS or Greeves, for example, all with two or more siblings running the show – whereas in Germany it was invariably large corporations which owned the two-wheeled marketplace, firms like BMW, NSU, DKW or Zündapp. But one German concern was a standout family affair: Maico. For fans of 1970s off-road racing, when ‘Maico-maniacs’ like Adolf Weil, Åke Jonsson and Willy Bauer gave Husqvarna, CZ and the Japanese factories the hurry-up in winning GP races and peopling Motocross World Championship rostrums, it’s often a surprise to learn that the West German company was also a successful road bike manufacturer in its own right, always with two-stroke motors of its own design. Founded in 1920s Germany by…

Before we meet the subject of this story, here’s a little bit of background history about the first Triumph lightweight model since the XO in the late 1930s. The T15 Terrier was designed as a commuter / learner machine with styling and colour schemes that imitated the 5T Speed Twin. The Terrier was a financial loss leader, aimed at pointing the rider towards the larger Triumph twins in later years, generating brand loyalty. It wasn’t very long before it was realised that the Terrier had been ‘sent into this breathing world before (its) time scarce half made up’ (to quote the Bard), and was being seen as unreliable. Edward Turner’s dictum of ‘make the minimum amount of metal perform the maximum amount of duty’ had produced a machine that was…

I suffer from ED. No, not that one, the other one. The English Disease. This has led to a number of Triumphs (Spitfire, TR6, GT6, T140, T150) and some tribulations (Austin Healey 3000, Norton Commandos, Minis) on my way through a life filled with Joe Lucas, Strombergs, SU carbs, cars and bikes. I make no apologies. No quarter asked. I’m not a mechanic by training. My classics don’t get treated to full restorations. I’m not interested in 100% originality, if indeed there is such a condition. I don’t believe it’s ‘all original’ anyway if the frame has been powder-coated, or Proud Owner used a Mikuni rather than the Amals it came with; improperly placed tank eyebrows, polished to within an inch of holiness, etc, etc. I believe there’s a place…

A million years ago in my youth, the highlight of the summer would be the annual bike trip to Europe. Cheap wine, good company, nice food, well-equipped campsites – it seemed to have it all. Plus of course the sun. You know the rest. Work, marriage, children: the combination meant that if I was lucky the foreign bike trip was a weekend at the excellent Trident & Rocket 3 Owners’ Club rallies in Brittany and the Loire. Gradually the only European trips were in a campervan en famille. Thirty years later, with the free time that follows retirement, I began once again to hanker after the ‘joys’ of a hard day in the saddle and starry nights under canvas. Was it possible to rekindle the freedom of the open road?…

All the engine bearings were replaced. Most were standard sizes from Simply Bearings, but one bearing in the gearbox is very special. It is a very narrow bearing with a large outside diameter and a small inside diameter. The old one was rusty and could not be re-used. No one could supply this apparently obsolete size. So after some lateral thinking I bought a standard bearing of the correct outside diameter and modified it. I ground it to the correct width, removing the same amount of material from both sides and making a sleeve for the inner bore from EN24 steel. The grinding was carried out using my trusty Dremel and the even trustier Myford lathe. Then I washed out the bearing several times with solvent before blowing it clean…