Innholdsfortegnelse for Issue 64 Autumn 2022 i Classic Dirt Bike

IN BALANCE Remember the long hot summer of 1976, for decades the yardstick for gauging extreme temperatures? Yes, it was 46 years ago and the effect on motorcycle sport at the time was quite significant, with events cancelled due to fears of uncontrollable fires starting because of mixing a hot exhaust and tinder-dry ground. It became so bad as the dry spell lasted two months that emergency powers were granted in Parliament and the government of the day appointed Denis Howell as Minister for Drought. It was probably only a coincidence that three days after the appointment the heavens opened and Denis gained the nickname Minister for Floods – more officially he was also appointed Minister for Snow a couple of years later as the other extreme of the weather…

On September 2 a selection of lots from Alec Dorrell’s private collection will go under the hammer at HJ Pugh’s two-day sale of motorcycles, spares, literature and petroliana at the auction house’s Hazle Meadows Auction Centre, Ross Road, Ledbury, Herefordshire HR8 2LP. There are to be eight lots from Alec’s collection including this B50 BSA which aroused the interest of the CDB editor. Nearly 20 years ago Alec was brave enough to loan a magazine editor this very BSA for his first trundle up Red Marley Hill Climb. Shall we say the bike was much faster than the editor… Also from Alec’s collection are more MXers, grass bikes and loads of spares too, so expect interest to be high. Find more on www.hjpugh.com or get in touch by emailing auctions@hjpugh.com…

Monoshock suspension has been a feature on trials bikes since the Eighties but who had the kudos of being the first production machine to feature such suspension? Yamaha? Honda? Nope, sorry, it was the Chapman BSA in 1981. There had been monos before; BSA supremo Brian Martin tested the idea on a C15 for a season, Sammy Miller produced an experimental version for Bultaco in the Seventies while the Kent-based Norman company had a cantilever frame in its range which presumably could be ordered for trials but none of these were full production machines. Fully restored to show-winning condition by the present owner the remarkable machine – the first of 20 manufactured – has an excellent specification including Yamaha’s DT175 engine reworked to make it better for trials and, of…

The archive at Mortons is a vast repository of incredible motorcycling history – from the dawn of motorised transport, when it was all new and no idea was deemed unworthy of exploration, to the more modern times when it seemed everything had been tried. A trip through the boxes and files in the archive reveals all manner of weird and wonderful things from those days when the inventive world had shown there were other ways of producing transport which didn’t rely on either human or animal power or shovelling coal into a furnace to heat water. Carl Benz’s early experiments with the hitherto discarded by-products of oil production culminated in a single cylinder two-stroke engine bursting into life in 1879. “...an apology to the new generation,who have the light of…

As the 2020 Classic Dirt Bike Show closed, the major concern for most people was the worsening weather and its effect on the next few weeks of the dirt bike scene rather than the then still vague concerns over a virus. People at the show had met with event organisers, friends, riding buddies and so on to discuss the coming season… then almost overnight, the pandemic took hold and accelerated; the country went into lockdown in an attempt to halt the spread of Covid. Our eagerly awaited events were at first postponed, then cancelled. But it is the nature of people everywhere to look to the future and many organisers planned for the days when normal life could return; organisers such as the Galloway MCC, whose massive classic scramble in…

The best classic off-road show will be back at Telford International Centre on Saturday and Sunday, February 11-12, 2023. With off-road machines as far as the eye can see, the Classic Dirt Bike Show, sponsored by Hagon Shocks, will have dirt bike machinery to cater for every need. Get stocked up for the off-road season with everything from parts and spares to accessories, riding kits and bike projects if you’re up for a challenge! From pre-loved parts to complete machines, you can go for a rumble in the autojumble, starting at 9am, to get your hands on the best bargains. At the heart of the show are the stunning private entries and club stands which will once again pack into the venue to display their fascinating collections of off-road machines.…

Montesa Mono The life of a dirt bike is generally hard from the get-go; it doesn’t matter what discipline they are used in, the off-road world is tough on them. Level of care varies from owner to owner and some do get the attention they need to perform at their best, others less so. There are those rarities which miss all this though and lead a gentler life to survive the passage of time mostly unscathed; for them the problems stem from not being in competition and being pulled apart between events. Just such a machine Albert Bergada unloaded in the car park where the entry assembled for the Pre65 Scottish Two Day Trial in Kinlochleven at the end of April and Richard Allen set eyes on a 1990 Montesa…

The connection between the military and off-road motorcycle sport is a long and fruitful one since the realisation that a bit of trials and enduro experience would work wonders in ensuring vital despatches would reach their intended recipients in the days before reliable worldwide communications. Most military motorcycles would be ordered with the stipulation they had some off-road capability and in the days of the British industry even the proper competition jobs were simply road machines fitted with bigger wheels and a few heavy parts replaced with smaller, lighter bits to save weight. So meeting the off-road capability specification wasn’t difficult for a factory such as BSA for instance. Once its B40 had been accepted as the replacement for the M20 sidevalve and the Matchless G80 then the military rider…

Is there a more competition-oriented marque than Greeves? The very founding of the motorcycle side of the company was in the world of off-road sport and its first machine was a testbed for a suspension system. When it went so well the clamour for replicas became so loud they had to go into production. Since those days in the early Fifties the company has embraced every aspect of motorcycle sport and done it successfully too – so, in 2022, is it any wonder there has been a Greeves Championship running for 21 years? Notable names associated with Greeves have been tempted to the track with Vic Allan and Freddie Mayes competing occasionally on the marque on which they first burst on to the scene. In order to celebrate the series…

OSSA Special How do you go about building an OSSA for someone like Mick Andrews? After all the lad is responsible for there actually being an OSSA trials bike in the first place. Well, this was the task before Martin Rickman at IdleRide when he was asked to build just such a bike. Now Mick Andrews is a genial sort of lad but he does know what he wants and, after a lifetime as a development rider in the off-road motorcycle world, is incredibly knowledgeable about how a bike should work and feel. Martin’s answer was to take a long hard look at the OSSA and what had been successful with the marque over the years and ask Mick himself for his input – and the result is this stunning-looking…

When anyone uses the saying ‘it was a real roller coaster ride’ it is generally accepted whatever being referred to has wildly and rapidly changing circumstances such as the actual roller coaster from which the saying is coined. It can be used to describe someone’s personal life, a country’s political life or a company’s business life, as in this case. The German motorcycle manufacturer Maico certainly went through peaks and troughs from its inception in 1926. Things started well on the MX front for the company as it was the inaugural European 250cc class MX champion in 1957 but there followed a long dry spell until its new racers – a 250 and 360 – combined speed, power and handling which eventually led Ake Jonsson to win the AMA Supercross…

With attention being elsewhere in the workshop recently the IT465 has been pushed this way and the other way to make room. I’ve not ignored it but rather it’s become a source of frustration in the exhaust area. So frustrating in fact I’m going to have to physically go and look at another IT465 to try and determine what the solution to the problem actually is. When the bike was checked over after buying it, it was clear it had been binned in a big way. Initial thoughts were ‘oh, no, we’ve bought a scrapper’ but further investigation – also called ‘asking people who know more than me’ – revealed a lot of IT465s have the damage ours has. In fact the person we asked described the damage almost perfectly…

There’s little doubt the twinshock scene has caught the attention of the next generation in the same way the Pre65 class did a few years ago. It helps of course there’s a bigger choice of affordable machines available to the aspiring MXer looking at the twinshock and Evo eras. Why? Well by the Seventies the manufacturing world had tapped into the leisure aspect of the sporting world and embraced it. Where the British factories grudgingly produced a few competition mounts to appease the sports enthusiast, while bemoaning such small runs took resources away from their road machine production, the European and Japanese makers realised the potential of the market. The papers of the day were full of what was to come, what will be on the track and what new…

Who would have thought it! Scorching temperatures and blue sky greeted riders heading to the North East for the Rockshocks Classic Trials Championship round in the County Durham village of Edmundbyers. Yes, we know it was July and there is a sort of expectation of good weather but this is high up in the fells around the Consett area… Starting at The Baa on the edge of the village, this traditional-style trial features a couple of long laps each day taking in typical northern terrain and 15 sections a lap on day one with 20 sections a lap on day two. Each day’s scores were added together and the winner worked out from there. With classes for air-cooled mono, twinshock and Pre75 Britshock with expert and clubman in each class,…

Three of the biggest names in Seventies MX were together at Galloway MCC’s Drumlanrig Offroad Motorsport Festival in June, as you’ll probably have read on pages 56-67. Maybe you are already aware the three racers were top of the MX world in 1978 and finished one, two and three in the 500cc world championship – but at the time Nick Nicholls took this pic of Roger De Coster at the opening round in Switzerland, the series was wide open with all sorts of speculation on who would win. There were favourites, of which De Coster was certainly one as he’d five titles under his belt and showed no signs of slowing up despite a near-fatal crash two months before the start of this season. Another favourite was the rider who’d…