Innholdsfortegnelse for March 2020 i Classic Bike Guide

Clean MyRide cleaner I’VE TESTED DOZENS of cleaners for bikes over the years. Most feel like they’re just car wash in a spray, while others have some thought put in them, like clinging onto vertical surfaces without drying too quickly, having a spray that will also turn to a jet, not marking seats, chrome or alloy and of course, cleaning and leaving a nice finish with minimal effort. Clean MyRide is in my ‘above a tenner so it better be good’ category, and pleasingly has proved to be really good. The spray bottle is just right with coverage and doesn’t feel weak or hard to use. The substance is of average thickness, meaning it does stick on vertical surfaces, though there is some noticeable movement down; such is gravity! Instructions…

If you want to know anything about Terriers and Cubs, there’s one man who knows more than anyone else: Mike Estall. Best of all, Mike published the brilliant ‘Triumph Tiger Cub Bible’, which will tell you all you need to know about the iconic learner legal machine. “A labour of love, and the result of many years of research, here is the complete reference to the Triumph Tiger Cub in all its forms: in fact, The Tiger Cub Bible. Every aspect of the Cub’s design, production and development is covered, together with its success in motorcycle sport and record breaking, and its use by the utilities, police force and the military. Amazingly comprehensive appendices cover every aspect of specification from valve clearance to paint colour. Altogether the definitive work on…

ENGINE:199cc OHV single four-stroke BORE/STROKE:63x64 mm COMPRESSIONRATIO:7:1 CARBURETTOR: Zenith 17MCX-CS5 IGNITION: Lucas AC/DC with battery. RM13 alternator. TRANSMISSION: Four-speed unit gearbox multi-plate wet clutch, chain final drive FUEL CAPACITY: 3 gallons TYRES: (F) 3.25 x 16 on WM2 rim (R) 3.25 x 16 on WM2 BRAKES: (F) Drum (R) Drum SUSPENSION: (F) Telescopic forks (R) Swinging arm rear WEIGHT: 220lb (100kg) POWER: 10bhp @ 6000rpm TOP SPEED: 70mph…

While we’ve looked at converting a Cub for trials use, perhaps a word or two on prepping the rider will be advisable too. Trials riding, being a slow sport, is generally not dangerous, so protective gear can be limited to a lightweight crash helmet and a pair of trials boots. A trials helmet is open face and has a peak – in the old days a helmet wasn’t compulsory and most riders wore a flat cap – but thankfully those days are long gone. As for boots, the once popular safety wellies are still around, though good trials boots are available. Gloves aren’t compulsory though are a good idea and again there are quite a selection of them on the market. That pretty much covers it for protective clothing –…

I HAVE A FRIEND, LET’S CALL HIM IAN; stop sniggering at the back, I really do have some friends. We met online (I said that’s enough!) via Twitter – @classicrider, as you ask, look me up. Being motorcyclists we share lots of similar views and experiences and both broadly sit in the ‘any bike is good’ camp, but freely acknowledge that some are better than others. Earlier this year, my local VMCC section organised an event purely for girder-forked machines of any age and not just pre-1931, like, for example, the famous Banbury run which is exclusively for vintage and veteran machines. Ian, despite a garage stuffed with bikes of differing flavours, was sadly lacking in the girders department; an appalling oversight. As the date approached, by some miracle I…

John Surtees is a motorsport legend. A six-time TT winner, seven-time motorcycle world champion and Formula 1 car racing world champion, he was also the man who brought Georg Meier’s BMW Kompressor back to life. Interviewed before his death in 2017, this is his side of the story: “I was evacuated to Yorkshire during the war and one of the things that went with us was a tea chest full of magazines. One of the top magazines was of the 1939 TT with a picture of Georg Meier practically standing up on the footrests as he tackled Bray Hill on the BMW Kompressor. It’s a famous picture and, as a kid, it really fascinated me and that’s when I fell in love with the Kompressor. I just loved the whole…

What’s on in March 2020 1 ’Normous Newark Autojumble: The Showground, Drove Lane, Winthorpe, Newark, Notts NG24 2NY www.newarkautojumble.co.uk 1 Sidecar Sunday: Ace Cafe, Ace Corner, N Circular Rd, Stonebridge, London NW10 7UD.london.acecafe.com 2 German Night: Ace Cafe, Ace Corner, N Circular Rd, Stonebridge, London NW10 7UD.london.acecafe.com 2 MARCH ISSUE OF REAL CLASSIC 5 Mod ‘n’ Mini Night: Ace Cafe, Ace Corner, N Circular Rd, Stonebridge, London NW10 7UD.london.acecafe.com 5 LE Velo Lancs & S Lakes, Blue Anchor, Bretherton. Tel. 01772 782516. 6 APRIL ISSUE OF THE CLASSIC MOTORCYCLE 6 Bike Night + Streetfighters: Ace Cafe, Ace Corner, N Circular Rd, Stonebridge, London NW10 7UD. london.acecafe.com 7 MARCH EDITION, OLD BIKE MART 8 S Dorset Section VMCC Club Run meet: The Three Compasses, Charminster DT2 9QT. Muchelney Abbey Run. Contact:…

WE ALL KNOW HOW IT GOES. THE FIRST stage is all impossible optimism, as a chap gazes in awe and wonder at something impossibly worn out. We beat ourselves into accepting that it’s a project. If we can convince ourselves that it’s a project for someone else – anyone else – then hurrah for us. Sanity is saved. We survive to fantasise another day. Unhappily, too often we succumb to temptation. An improbable sum of money – probably statistically connected in some arcane way to memories of a hopefully misspent youth when but for financial misfortune we would have been roaring through the gloaming aboard a glittery example of the bike before us – that sum changes hands, and the imagination is tasked with dreaming up excuses to maintain domestic…

Brew your own… The Government has now said it wants the country to be carbon neutral by 2035. So what are those of us with classic bikes and cars to do about fuelling our trusty steads? Perhaps we could start making fuel with illicit stills, and if we don’t use it in our vehicles we could use it as moonshine. Jonathan Law. Ed: Thanks Jonathan, why do I have visions of Mad Max and The Dukes of Hazzard in my head? I think the goals are ‘fluid’ at the moment… Building a TriBSA from scratch! These photos were taken two months in on my latest project, to build a TriBSA from scratch. The frame is a 1956 A7 S/S, the tank is a Manx Norton, cut and welded to fit…

Over the years, Triumph released a dizzying amount of Cub variants, so to help you get to grips with some of the most important machines in the line-up – here’s a condensed timeline. 1955 T20 One year on from launch, the high-level pipe was replaced – although it still came with 19 inch rims front and rear. Essentially, the Cub was just a bored and stroked Terrier, with different mudguards and paint finish. 1962 T20SH (SPORTS HOME) Based on the SL (Scrambler Lights) and SS (Street Scrambler) versions, the SH bowed to British sensibilities with low handlebars, a 9:1 compression ratio piston, R cam and close ratio gears. A large Monobloc carburettor was fitted too. 1958 T20 The swinging arm rear suspension debuted in 1957 – with the most notable…

“Motorcyclists of a certain age and inclination were naturally drawn to them for the same reason: unintended procreation and forced marriage (kidding/not kidding). Thus we have a seaside promenade, upon which one promenades, in our typical manner of verbing our nouns.” IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE SEA… OR MORE accurately, the seaside, and the construction of public walkways, or promenades, along the strand to keep the sand from our shoes. Adding pleasure piers, amusement parks and music venues to the promenade compounded the interest of a fun-seeking public, even in the midst of the Depression. Youth will find a way to its opposite sex in any economic condition, and a tourist-laden seaside resort is a happy hunting ground for perambulators of breeding age, whether the hunter is on foot or…

AFTER SORTING OUT THE CARB FOR Maria’s Benelli 125 Enduro last month, I had high hopes all would get sorted. But life never quite works like that, does it? With the carburettor all put back together it was surely just a case of putting everything back on and flying off into the muddy sunset – except my car failed its MoT and most of my spare time was spent with big, metric spanners and greasy CV gaiters and suspension rubbers… Still, with one piece of Ministry paper in my hand, I could get on with ‘Nelly’. Except, five minutes into the job and I could see daylight through the sides of the inlet manifold rubber, which sits between the carb and the airbox. Damn. It had completely perished, no doubt…

YET, DESPITE GEOGRAPHICAL AND chronological incongruity, one man, an IT consultant from North Yorkshire, has made it his life’s ambition to restore three Ducati scramblers to ride on the foggy, narrow lanes of God’s Own County. The machines include a standard RT desert racer and an RT ‘mongrel’ – a burnt-out, curious shell of a bike caked in dirt and heavily corroded. But it’s the latter that really grabbed his attention and led Ray Dudding – a lifelong Ducati collector – on an epic investigative journey, one that takes in Cold War technology, political crises and arachnid-reptilian invaders. Rachel Clegg tells the story... One wonders how many of history’s baffling, bonkers endeavours are owing to that simple, fateful phrase, ‘what the hell!’ Certainly for Ray, ‘what the hell!’ sparked his…

PRICED AT £127 WHEN IT WAS INTRODUCED IN March 1954, the 199cc Triumph T20 Tiger Cub was a little bike with big aspirations. Built from the bones of Triumph’s first postwar single – the 149cc T15 Terrier – the T20 Cub was intended as an antidote to the swathes of smoky British two-strokes tearing up the streets at the time. It was a clever move – and the Tiger Cub capitalised on the massive appeal of Triumph’s more established machines, inspiring brand loyalty in the next generation of riders as they eventually worked their way up to a Speed Twin, Tiger 100 or Thunderbird. Or at least, that was the intention of Triumph supremo Edward Turner – who noticed the massive market for lightweight commuter bikes in the early 1950s,…

To get under the skin of the Triumph Tiger Cub and learn why the loveable little rogue is so well loved, we took the time to speak to Mike Powell of the Tiger Cub Club. He’s a font of knowledge on all things Tiger Cub – and he should be, considering he’s owned somewhere between 80 and 100 of them in his time. CBG: HOW DID YOU GET INTO TIGER CUBS? MP: My dad had one. He left me three things, Tiger Cubs, premature baldness and Notts County. CBG: DO YOU HAVE A FAVOURITE VARIANT? MP: Yer, I like the Sports Cub. The ones from the mid to late Sixties. That’s when all the bugs were ironed out. CBG: WHAT IS IT ABOUT TIGER CUBS IN PARTICULAR? MP: Back in…

HAVE YOU EVER ENCOUNTERED THE LAW OF Inverse Desirability? Though not actually established within academia, both scholars and laymen will have experienced the effects of said diktat. The Law of Inverse Desirability states: the more something is wanted, desired or needed, the less likely it is to be delivered or received. In its most basic form, the ‘LID’ will ensure that the seized fastener that’s holding up a shed job will snap and break, rather than free off. Other applications of the phenomena include waiting anxiously for postie to bring that one vital spare part that’s taken forever to arrive, and without which you can’t get your machine back on the road. Many argue that the infamous shed pixies hold massive sway over the Law of Inverse Desirability, whereby these…