Innholdsfortegnelse for April 2024 i Real Classic

Great to see John Young’s 1200Triumph in RC238. However, the fourth cylinder was most definitely not added on the right. Both triples and fours have their engine centre on the chassis centre line. Because they share the same petrol tank, the cam drive is visible peeping out from under the tank on the wider engine whereas it’s more hidden on the triples. The fours were actually designed a few months before the triples. Martyn Roberts, member It’s kind of difficult to accept that my 1200 Trophy is 32 years old: VMCC eligible! When I started riding in 1977, myfirst‘big bike’after passing my test was a 1961 350cc Triumph 3TA. My riding friends at the time all thought it was really old... 16 years old, half the age of the apparently…

Interesting to read of George Todd in the fastest Bantam in the world article (Ollie’s OddJob in RC238). Back in 1969 I rather fancied one of George’s high compression cylinder heads on my new Bantam D14/4. I rode out to George’s house and he showed me round his workshop, complete with all manner of Bantam racing 125s and pictures of his racing successes. He preferred the 125 engines as they were easier to tune. Off I went with my new sparkly high compression, central spark plug cylinder head in my backpack. Did it make much difference? Not a lot. but as a naïve sixteen year-old I never thought about any extra tuning that might’ve been needed. Happy days indeed! John Walton, member…

Thank you very much for helping to sell my BMW, which has gone to a very good home in the Highlands of Scotland. Can you please give a big shout to the amazing Tracey of 2WheelTrans.co.uk who propelled the bike from the lowlands of Somerset to the heights of Loch Laggan... in the snow! Tracey is herself a biker and kitted out the van to suit the particular needs of bikes. She shrugged when the Beemer wouldn’t start (!) and heaved the bike up the ramp with minimal help (or was it hindrance?) from me. She was a delight to deal with and very competitive on price. 2WheelTrans are on Facebook, or 01633 270299. David Hayhow When the moment came to get Frank’s latest‘ride surprise’insured, I almost told him to…

I totally agree with Frank’s view about the use of LED headlight bulbs in motorcycles. I have them fitted in three of my four bikes, purely to make it easier for other road users to see me. I also don’t choose to ride at night (that’s when the kangaroos come out to party) but I always carry an original halogen H4 bulb in case I have to. Australian law is ambiguous on the use of LED headlight bulbs, but the reality is that when they are installed with a reflector that was designed for an H4 bulb, the LED beam is unfocused and lacks any cut-off for a dipped setting.They do make for a brilliant daytime running light! A few years ago I nearly did to a motorcyclist what I…

I had a look at the 650 Gold Star in my local dealership. I was impressed overall but a couple of questions came to mind. The pillion peg tubes have so many welds: why? Looks like they were assembled from a number of stock tubes. More importantly, am I the only person who finds the rear light / plate unit to be horribly positioned? Is there a compliance reason it sits so low? It makes the rear view look worse than post-war Ariel rear mudguards... Morgan Rue, member We fell over this artfully improved Goldie during a seaside stroll the other day. Among the many little modifications, the owner has upgraded the suspension, added a wind deflector and given it some carrying capacity. The result? A practical ‘traditional’ motorcycle which…

I’ve been shouting at the TV for some years, usually when some twit gets the name of something wrong or uses American pronunciation. Recently I have been noticing more and more in supposedly technical magazines that people give items the wrong name. I put this down to lack of engineering knowledge and experience. For example, in a recent article about an MGB sports car, the writer incorrectly called the clamps around the rear axle tube a ‘spring hanger’. Then I assembled a new bicycle for one of my granddaughters. The instructions referred to a ‘cotter pin’ but nowhere in the bag of bits could I find any.Then a diagram showed a split pin being fitted to the part where the instructions said ‘cotter pin’. So here’s a little ditty on…

BSA’s parallel twin was both inspired by and intended to compete with Triumph’s Speed Twin. The latter was - as you know - famously designed by EdwardTurner. What you may not know is that the same Mr Turner worked for a while on the design of BSA twins while employed by that company for a couple of years from 1942. If you’re feeling enthusiastically anorak, Signs Of Turner can be found here and there in the early 500 twin engine, the A7, including Triumph-style screw-in rocker adjustment covers in the rocker boxes. And the original engine had two rocker boxes, like the Triumph, but unlike the A10. Happily, the fiddly round covers over the rockers were soon replaced with a wider window - a move which Triumph twins failed to…

This machine was an eBay purchase more than ten years ago; it was a fairly complete machine in rather rough condition. I remember placing a rather cheeky bid early in the auction and then more or less forgetting about it. When I saw the email saying ‘Congratulations, you have won the item’ I wondered what on earth I had bought, and was amazed to learn it was this 1955 British-built Bullet. The Enfield had no documents but was well worth what I had paid and more. I couldn’t understand why I hadn’t been outbid; I can only assume that any other potential buyers thought it was a much more recent wreck of an Indian-built machine. I knew just what it was and thought the engine might prove useful as a…

The talented Peter Gaunt was one of the first riders to spot the potential of the little Bearcat. He was a trials rider with James, but as the AMC empire began to disintegrate so the competition shop at James was axed. However James had been importing small Suzukis from 1963 to 1965 and Gaunt saw the possibilities of the tiny but powerful lightweights. With much modification he reduced the weight to a minimum. By boring out the cylinder and using a T10 250cc twin piston he upped the swept volume from the standard 118cc to 124cc. In 1967 Gaunt won the SSDT 150 cup and a special first-class award. In 1968 he helped Martin Lampkin to a fourth place in the SSDT using the dual range gearbox engine. With the popularity of…

EASTER MONDAY 1 APRIL ➤ The Ashford CLASSIC MOTORCYCLE SHOW and bikejumble opens 10am to Ashford Livestock Market, Ashford, Kent TN24 0HB. The date may be April 1st but it’s no joke! Plenty of private entries plus indoor and outdoor jumble and trade stalls. Workshop clear-out stalls available for just £15 (this also admits two people). Free BikeMart display-to-sell area; just ride in or drop off the bike you’re selling for no extra charge over admission. Entry still £6 or earlybirds at 8am for £10. elkpromotions.co.uk / 01797 344277 SUNDAY 7 APRIL ➤ The FIVE VALLEYS RUN leaves the Barford Inn, SP3 4AB at 11 am. 90 mile ride with lunch and tea stops. £8 entry fee, sign on from 9.30am. salisburymotorcycleandlightcarclub.co.uk SUNDAY 14 APRIL ➤ The AUTOJUMBLE at Newark…

There aren’t many motorcycling organisations which survive and thrive to celebrate their hundredth anniversary. We mentioned the Sunbeam MCC recently and then - like London buses - here comes another one. Based in the Guildford area, this organisation has been heavily involved in motorcycle sport for all of its ten decades. After a couple of years as a loose association of like-minded riders, the Witley club became affiliated to the ACU. This meant they could formally field teams to participate in the trials, sprints and hillclimbs which became so popular in the 1920s. As time passed, members took part in all aspects of two-wheeled competition, from the club’s own Boxing Day scramble to grass-track, long-track, ISDT and ISDE events, and claimed the team prize in the Manx GP in 1965.…

JACQUELINE BICKERSTAFF The weather just before the Bristol Classic Bike Show was pretty foul, and the forecast was wet and cold – conditions in which starting the Scruffy Suzuki has become a bit‘iffy’. Since PUB had a plan to round trip via friends and family (and is getting old) she wimped out and went by car. Fate did not allow such an easy get out, and on the journey she was worried intermittently by dashboard warning lights! She should have used an ancient classic bike that she understands (the Suzuki now has a new battery and is hopefully a bit more willing even in the cold). The Scruffy Suzuki has also passed another milestone just shy of two years after it rolled over the mileometer past 100,000 miles and back…

As always I enjoyed the latest edition of RealClassic (RC238) but I was particularly struck by Rowena’s Members’ Enclosure. It was a very evocative description of the reality of producing a small magazine, particularly in its early days - no Clark Kent, Lois Lane and roaring presses, just a couple of Real People at their kitchen table. Thank goodness you took the chance, and then persisted. Regrettably I will be unable to accept your kind offer of saying hello at the Bristol show as (according to Google) it is 16,421 km from my home in Adelaide but I’m sure you will both be surrounded by well-wishers. Geoff Wood, Member 13,965 Thanks to Geoff and everyone else who wished RC well on reaching our doubledecade milestone. Unfortunately we managed to stand…

The DNY registration number on the Rudge - mentioned in the letters in RC239 - denotes an issue from Glamorgan in South Wales in 1938/39. When breaking down two or three letter sequences by issuing authority one doesn’t use the first two letters, but the second and third. The D relates to the period of issue. The registration authorities worked through the alphabet starting with A and going through to Y. Z was reserved for Northern Ireland, with Q and I not being used, for administrative or clarity reasons. Any combination such as spelled a‘rude word’like SEX were weeded out, but CEX was allowed and indeed was issued by Great Yarmouth c1958. With three letters, they would be followed by three numbers from 1 to 999, and Glamorgan would have…

Most of us have experienced that sinking feeling when we go to start our bike and we hear the click-click of the solenoid but not much else. It usually happens when we are in a rush to go somewhere! The chances of this happening increase if you ride an later, electric-start classic; the larger Laverdas were devoid of kickstarts, for example. Even with a good alternator / dynamo, there can be some current drain through alarms. Or, as I recently found out, my bargainbuy supermarket battery charger had the opposite effect on my recently-purchased Enfield battery. Over four days, the charger drained the battery it so the bike would not start. That charger will goto recycling... Luckily, I had already purchased a multifunction jump-starter earlier in the winter. Jump starters…

VINTAGE NSU 201 Back in the late 1980s while passing through Banbury, my wife and I chanced upon a large group of very old motorcycles and their owners. Having just returned to motorcycling, and being inclined towards obsolescent machines, we spent a happy hour or so watching them ride out to take part in what I discovered was a thing called the Banbury Run. I decided there and then that one day I would take part in this event. That‘one day’turned out to be over a quarter of a century later! Fast forward to 2014. We were living in Suffolk, a county notably lacking the fast, sweeping A-roads so beloved of the machine I rode at the time - a 1997 Triumph Speed Triple. It was glorious to look at…

In the UK, Suzuki (Gt Britain) Limited first imported and assembled machines between 1963 and 1965 from spare AMC premises at the rear of the James factory in Gough St, Birmingham. Although no actual trials machine was offered by Suzuki at the time, the B105 Bearcat was available in the States from 1966 and rapidly evolved into the TC and TS100s of the early 1970s. The Bearcat sported an upswept exhaust, knobbly tyres, scrambles-style front mudguard and high bars. It also featured a piston-ported 120cc 2-stroke engine, with 4-speed gearbox, posi-force lubrication, and twin rear sprockets to allow relatively simple switching from tarmac to trail. In 1968 the KT 120 Trailcat appeared, with a new three-speed gearbox and an all-new Hi-Lo final drive using a heel lever above the gearbox sprocket. This…

REALCLASSIC READING: BIKES & BATHURST Bathurst was Australia’s first inland settlement the other side of the Blue Mountains, 130 miles northwest of Sydney. It was founded in 1815, the same years as the Battle of Waterloo. The town is best known around the world as the venue for many memorable battles of the automotive kind, the location of Australia’s most challenging and most thrilling race circuit. The spectacular 3.8 mile Mount Panorama course was first used in 1938 after bike racing began on the nearby Vale circuit in 1931. Success in the annual Bathurst Easter weekend motorcycle races was for many decades the pinnacle of achievement for legendary Australian riders, whose triumphs were occasionally interspersed with the odd victory for their overseas rivals. The first such feat came when Kiwi…

Staring into the abyss of the collapse of the British Motorcycle Industry can make you a little obsessive, and the odd jewel or glimmer of lost hope is always both a joy and a sadness to discover. Take, for example, this motorcycle. It was not made by some grubby son of toil in a dirty West Midlands workshop or a Victorian factory in south London. This came out of a corner of a design shop in a gleaming and glorious art deco aircraft factory to the north of London, a factory that was all about the white heat of technology and jet engines, and polished aluminium, where the engineers wore white coats and were given soap to wash their hands with, and there were showers in the social club. These…

The astute among you might’ve noticed something a little odd about last month’s magazine. I’m referring to RC239, the March issue… although what you received claimed to be the April / May magazine. There was also a bright red bubble on the cover which suggested you’d be getting two magazines for only £5.50 – when of course the plastic wrapper contained only RC itself, lonesome as a cloud. (Or possibly a pine). Your second magazine didn’t go missing en route, it wasn’t pilfered from the post, and aliens did not abduct it. You were sent one copy of RC, as usual. However, that magazine had the wrong cover on it. What’s all that about? A couple of times each year, our publisher runs promotions to introduce the unsuspecting public to…