Innholdsfortegnelse for March - April 2016 i Motorcycle Classics

• 1985-1987 • 10hp @ 7,500rpm (est.)/65mph • 152.7cc liquid-cooled SOHC 4-stroke single • Centrifugal clutch, Honda V-Matic belt-drive CVT • 231lb/75mph • Price then/now: $1,798 (1986)/$1,500-$3,000 1985-1987 Honda Elite 150 Honda entered the 150cc scooter market for just four years, but produced three different versions. In 1984 the first Elite, the 125cc CH125, arrived as the “Deluxe” with a pop-up headlight and digital dash, followed by the similar but larger 150cc CH150 in 1985. A “standard” version featured an analog dash and integrated headlight. For 1987, the Deluxe was dropped and the standard model fitted with new, sleeker bodywork. All were powered by a unique single overhead cam, liquidcooled 4-stroke engine with an automatic transmission. Suspension used a trailing link at the front, while the transmission acted as a…

In addition to our Pennsylvania and Isle of Man tours, we’ll also be at shows across the U.S. in 2016. First up is the 6th Annual Vintage Rally, June 4, 2016, at the National Motorcycle Museum (nationalmcmuseum.org) in Anamosa, Iowa. The 2016 rally pairs the museum’s annual antique and classic motorcycle show with a vintage bicycle show, plus there’s the annual swap meet and the museum’s newest exhibit, Streamliners. Telling the story of Land Speed Record competition, Streamliners looks at racing at Bonneville, Daytona Beach, Muroc Lake and other courses around the world. Always an excellent event, we’ve been a supporting sponsor since the first rally in 2011. A week later we’ll head to the Rockerbox Motofest, June 10-12, 2016, at Road America racetrack (rockerbox.us) in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin. The…

At the end of the 1980s, the high-horsepower superbike category belonged to the Japanese motorcycle makers. But Germany’s BMW was about to unleash — in the words of Monty Python — something completely different. Based on BMW’s 4-cylinder K100, a touring-oriented model first introduced in 1984, the new for 1989 K1 was a sporting performance machine without a hint of touring pretensions. According to motorcycle historian Ian Falloon in The Complete Book of BMW Motorcycles, in the late 1980s BMW took a look at the available Japanese superbikes with their firecracker performance and taut handling. Tops in horsepower and agility, all of these Japanese rockets featured chain final drive. “BMW decided the time was ripe for a shaft drive Superbike,” Falloon writes, “one considerably more performance focused than the K100.…

Quick. Name a few rare Ducatis: The 1993 Supermono? OK, sure, many of us have heard of that one. The original 1973 Green Frame 750SS? Yeah, that one, too. OK, how about the Utah? Never heard of it? You’re not alone. Somebody should script a movie about the labyrinthine politics of the Ducati factory in the 1970s, because it would be almost as riveting as the 1972 film The Godfather. The trouble is, like The Godfather, the plotline is so all-consuming you’d have to make it into a series. One subplot to the amazing 1970s transformation of the Ducati factory is this soft off-roader. Dubbed the Utah, it was aimed squarely at the U.S. market, yet it was only ever shown in Europe, and then quietly tucked away into a…

In 1994, with Harley-Davidson’s production of the motorcycles that made Milwaukee famous about to break the 100,000 annual barrier for the first time, America’s Finest had a new, radically different “street” bike in its catalog: the VR1000 Superbike. For the first time ever, you could buy a V-twin Harley road bike that was A) liquid-cooled, B) had anything other than a 45-degree angle between the cylinders, C) used some means other than pushrods to work the valves, and D) could break the 55mph speed limit in second gear. The fastest street-legal production motorcycle ever made in America could have been yours for just $49,490, a huge sum back then, in exchange for which you had to promise you’d never ride it on the streets of America. Poland was OK, however,…

Last issue, we told you about a broken mounting lug on the lower left of our 1970 Honda CB350’s engine. That broken lug was something of a mystery, as there wasn’t any indication how it might have happened. Thanks to a reader with experience in the matter, we’re pretty sure we now know what caused the break. Former Honda CB350 owner Bob Sheehan wrote in to tell of us of his identical experience with his 1972 CB350, on which he’d mounted a set of crash bars. Bob told us that the left side crash bar mounted to the frame up top and the lower left engine mounting lug at the bottom. Following a left side crash, he discovered his engine mount was broken, even though at first it didn’t appear…

Ignition or carburetion Q: I recently finished rebuilding my 1978 Triumph T140E. I installed a Boyer Bransden Mark III ignition and set the static timing. I installed the crankshaft plunger tool to confirm that the rotor mark on the alternator is at 38 degrees before top dead center (BTDC). On my rotor, which is keyed to the shaft, there are two marks 180 degrees opposite each other. I first found the TDC mark on the flywheel, then, with the bike in high gear, backed the wheel up with my finger on the plunger until it clicked into the 38 degrees BTDC hole (full advance). This made the pointer on the primary drive cover line exactly up with one of the marks on the rotor, which I marked with white paint.…

When I was in high school 45 years ago, there was an older kid who was unremarkable except that he owned two Royal Enfield Interceptors. That made him cooler than cool, because the merely cool rest of us rode more common British bikes or maybe something Japanese. Greg Lawless bought this 1963 Interceptor for $500 in May 1973 as a college graduation present for himself. I suspect he experienced an immediate spike in his coolness. Over the last 42 years — including six moves involving three states — Greg’s put lots of miles on it and made many memories with it. Though his current collection includes 26 motorcycles, Greg says the Interceptor is the last bike he’d sell. A little background Royal Enfield was founded in the 1890s in Redditch,…

In terms of new models, things had been pretty quiet at Triumph of late. Yet Triumph set a new sales record in 2014, with 54,432 motorcycles delivered around the globe, a 4.5-percent increase over the previous year. That quiet spell just came to an end. A radically revamped Speed Triple is coming out shortly, but reaching showrooms first is what’s arguably the single most important new model introduction made by Triumph since John Bloor breathed new life into the extinct British motorcycle industry with the 1990 launch of the bornagain Triumph brand. Make that models, because at Milan’s EICMA Show in November 2015, Triumph presented five new parallel-twin motorcycles powered by all-new liquid-cooled engines — one 900cc model and four 1,200cc big twins. These represent the next generation of the…

When Jim Bush decided to take a stock Commando and turn it into a custom using only Norton factory components, he actually had quite a few to choose from: The Interback was the result. Over its eight-year, almost 100,000-unit production run, the Norton Commando came in many different guises. All of them rolled on what was essentially the same chassis, drivetrain, suspension and wheels, with the later addition of disc brakes and electric start. As our model-by-model call-out on Page 53 underscores, the differences were primarily in the bodywork, the handlebars, the exhaust system and the seats, all of which are easily removable and replaceable. That means Commandos are perfect for customizing, so could you create a unique, cohesive, custom Commando using only factory original parts? That's what Jim Bush…

“A lot of groups wouldn’t allow electric bikes on the track.” Rider: Arthur Kowitz Age/years riding: 66/53 Occupation: Commercial real estate broker and property manager Race bikes: 1975 Kawasaki Z1B/ 2013 Brammo Empulse TTX Daily riders: 2006 MV Agusta F4 1000, 2007 Aprilia Tuono, 2009 Kawasaki Concours, 2013 Brammo Empulse R At first blush a vintage Norton Manx and a Brammo Empulse electric seem like odd track mates, yet they’re both American Historic Racing Motorcycle Association eligible. How that came to be is mostly the work of one person, Arthur Kowitz. In 1975, Kowitz got his AMA expert license and started riding a new 903cc Kawasaki Z1B in Superbike Production. He took first at Pocono that year, and ninth at Daytona in 1976 in the then-new AMA Superbike Championship. But…

What: Salmon Arm, nestled on the Shuswap Lake system, is a great base for exploring the Okanagan and Shuswap regions of Southern British Columbia. The Dreamcycle museum is about 20 miles away in Sorrento, B.C. How to Get There: From Vancouver, take BC 1, the Trans-Canada east, through the Fraser Canyon, or the Coquihalla Highway, BC 5 (faster but less interesting). From central Washington, take US 97 north to the Oroville border crossing and keep going north on BC 97 to Sicamous. Best Kept Secret: BC 5A from Merritt to Kamloops: a blissful ribbon of twisty tarmac crossing Douglas Lake Ranch, one of the 10 largest ranches in North America. Check your fuel! Avoid: BC 97C, the Coquihalla Connector. A concrete slab firing over the Thompson Plateau to 5,760 feet…

Forget about gravel runoff sections on a racetrack. And don’t even talk about safety barriers like Airfences and other hightech devices that line racetracks today in the name of rider safety. When motorcycle road racers took to the streets for a sanctioned AMA meet as part of the Formula 1 Grand Prix car race through the city streets of Long Beach, California, in April 1977, only a few feet separated the field from contact with the cement K-Rail barriers marking the 2.02-mile course. The Long Beach race was a true road race, a rarity in the U.S. even then. The 38-lap, 77-mile race spawned from an effort to help fill the Formula 1 race program when Long Beach Grand Prix organizers invited the AMA to host an invitational motorcycle race…

What do you do when you can’t find a Vespa P150X for sale anywhere? You buy the next best thing, we suppose, in this case a 1980 Bajaj Chetak 150. Not completely identical to the Vespa (see “Contenders” on the next page), the Chetak 150 uses the older “round tail” frame of the Vespa VLB 150 Sprint, but is otherwise an almost mechanical if not spiritual twin to the P150X. We found this scooter on eBay, where it sold for $2,000. That may sound like a lot, but consider that it was a straight-from-the-crate machine, never filled with fuel or fired up once it was shipped from the factory in India. Suddenly it starts to sound a bit more interesting, as it was essentially a brand new, 36-year-old machine. It…

Bonhams Auctions motoring specialist Jonathan Vickers first heard the legend of the lost Brough Superiors of Bodmin Moor about 20 years ago, but like many others he thought that it was just an urban myth. “I was at the Royal Cornwall Show when a man told me that a family who lived in a remote village on Bodmin Moor might need advice on the best way to sell some old Brough Superiors,” Vickers says, “but he couldn’t remember the address.” Rugged and desolate Bodmin Moor covers over 125 square miles of northeastern Cornwall, England, so Vickers’ boss Ben Walker came up with the idea of using Google Street View. “We knew that the property was run down, and that there were a number of outbuildings, so we used Google to…

With 119 horsepower at 8,500rpm and torque to match — 81 foot-pounds at 6,500rpm — the GS1150E was strong, reliable and fast, and was quickly drafted as the basis for numerous racewinning and record-breaking dragsters. Never built in large numbers, stock survivors are now rare. This particular bike is doubly rare. It has not only survived in stock condition for the last 31 years, it is completely original except for the tires. Unlike many rarities, it is also practical transportation. All these years later, the GS1150E is still a comfortable long-distance cruiser. “I think what is special about this bike is that it’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing,” says owner Zeki Abed. “It can be ridden as a cruiser or a dragster.” Saving bacon Up to the mid-1970s, Suzuki Motors…

While the ride on the old Honda has always been a highlight of my travel life, I was never at peace about not reaching the Arctic Circle. Back in 1986, the roads to get there were nothing more than rocks, dirt and gravel. I remember the moment we decided to return to Fairbanks as clear as day. We just couldn’t take the pounding any longer, and with little money and jobs that required the motorcycle for transportation, it was a selfpreserving move. We had no idea how much farther it was, or what would happen if we broke down. Twenty-eight years later, I rolled out of Calgary on a new Triumph Explorer with my 13-year-old son, Patrick, riding pillion, and my good friend Ray McKenzie to put it right. We…

Changing tires isn’t a particularly fun or rewarding job, but like many chores, it’s a good one to know how to do when the occasion arises. Frankly, this issue’s How-To reminded us of how rusty we are at the job, rarely changing our own tires because A) it’s usually rolled into the cost of a new tire and B) you still need to get the wheel and tire balanced once you’re done, also usually rolled into the cost of a new tire. If you want to change your own tires, there are a few tools we suggest having on hand. You won’t use them all at one time, but they’re worth having and they’re relatively inexpensive, to boot. Our lineup consists of a valve core tool for removing and installing…

Southern British Columbia is all about mountains and lakes, from the Coast Range to the Rockies. So it’s not surprising that it also has some of the best riding roads on the planet. For example, on BC Highway 97 from the resort town of Sicamous on Shuswap Lake to Armstrong in the Okanagan Valley, you’ll find a breathless succession of fast sweeping turns as the highway swings along the lakeshore. From sleepy Armstrong, Salmon River Road dipsy-doodles around rolling wheat fields back to the Trans-Canada Highway in Salmon Arm. And if you continue 15 miles westbound on the Trans-Canada Highway, just before the lakeside hamlet of Sorrento is a smart new industrial building bearing the name Dreamcycle. The middle of B.C.’s Shuswap Lake resort region is an unlikely place to…

3/4 This year marks the 75th Anniversary of Daytona Bike Week, which runs March 4-13. The racing kicks off on Saturday, March 5, with the Daytona Supercross, followed by Flat Track racing on the 10th and 11th on the Daytona Flat Track outside turns 1 and 2 of the super speedway. And there’s more good news — for 2016, the Daytona 200 returns, featuring American SportBike Racing Association’s (ASRA) 600cc sport bikes racing on Daytona’s famed road course. For more info, schedules and specific locations of activities visit the Bike Week site. On the web at officialbikeweek.com 3/5 Back for its sixth year, the Modern Classics Motorcycle Show will feature the competition machines of “Motocross, Trials and Enduros.” About half of the 100 show bikes come from a featured category,…