Innholdsfortegnelse for Issue 71 i Old Bike Australasia

Bayliss will bring his championship-winning Ducatis, while Corser will be aboard a Suzuki GSX-R1000, built by Steve Wheatman from spares and identical to the actual machine that resides in Corser’s lounge room in his UK home. Italian legend Franki Chili will also be Suzuki mounted. An innovation for 2018 will be a two-strokeonly race for Period 4 and 5 bikes from 350cc to 750cc. Jeremy McWilliams will pilot an RG500 Suzuki, one of several in the field, while former Australian champion Marty Craggill will be aboard a TZ750 Yamaha. “The interest in this race has been phenomenal,” says organiser Peter Macmillan, “in fact, we look like being over-subscribed. In addition to the 350 Yamahas that were such a staple of the ‘seventies and ‘eighties, we will have air and water-cooled…

Norton Motorcycles UK has announced the change of its Australian distributor from NF Importers Pty Ltd to Queensland based, Brisbane Motorcycles. Norton Motorcycles entered the Australian and New Zealand market with the 961 Commando range in late 2015 and have subsequently sold and delivered over 100 new Commandos to Australasian customers. The next phase for Norton in Australia is the continued sales of the Commando models and the soon-to-be-produced V4. Also effective immediately with the change are all aspects of customer service including warranty, with Brisbane Motorcycles and Norton now managing any service and warranty needs for all existing Commando 961 customers. James Mutton of Brisbane Motorcycles said “After visiting the Norton factory and witnessing first-hand the amount of passion and care that goes into building a Norton motorcycle it…

Military motorcycles conjure an image of the big German side-cars fitted with a large machine gun, Harley-Davidsons with rifle holsters and British motorcycle despatch riders from WW2 as this was the golden era of military motorcycles. The invention of the very versatile Jeep, followed by continually improving communication systems signalled the end for motorcycles as military vehicles with the quad bike being the final straw. This decline and an unclear way forward saw very out-dated single cylinder BSAs still being used by the Australian Army well after their use by date. A similar situation was experienced by all Commonwealth forces as Britain had always decided what vehicles would be purchased but with the closure of British motorcycle producers that policy became redundant. In 1980 the Australian Military Police motorcycles were…

A miraculous recreation of a never-completed Italian masterpiece, made in a small workshop in New Zealand. When Mondial joined Gilera and Moto Guzzi in withdrawing factory support for international road racing at the end of 1957, it looked like the end of the line for many a promising rider’s career. One such was Francesco Villa, then aged 24. Modenaborn Villa had achieved considerable success as a rider, becoming Italian Junior Champion in the 125cc class in 1956 on a Ducati, and significantly had joined the Bologna company as both a rider and mechanic, training under the legendary Ing. Fabio Taglioni. These dual skills attracted the attention of rivals Mondial, and at the end of the 1956 season he switched camps, becoming a senior technical member in addition to his racing…

When Yamaha trotted out the RD350LC at the Paris Motorcycle Show in 1979, it was hailed as a miracle of modern engineering – a water-cooled twin cylinder two-stroke. But it wasn’t that revolutionary, after all, Scott built the same thing more than 50 years earlier. It’s just that the ‘LC’ (the RD bit was a tilt to the now-defunct air-cooled RD range which had run up the white flag in the battle against ever-tougher emission laws) was such a complete package – the prodigal son of the racing TZ stable that had powered privateers and works riders alike since 1972, and without which, racing would have struggled to survive. Naturally, this point was not lost on legions of aspiring play racers, who saw the new RD350LC as the answer to…

Welcome to Old Bike Australasia Out’n’about – a forum of people, places, history and happenings. Wemoto establishes in Oz In April 2015, UK company Worlds End Motorcycles Ltd (www.wemoto.co.uk) set up a franchise in Australia, opening shop at Bomaderry in the Shoalhaven district of NSW. Owner Pavel Gonda says the business has the most comprehensive selection of motorcycle parts on the internet available from an Australian store. These cover motorcycles from the 1970s to present day models. As well as consumables such as cables, brake its, fork kits, bearing kits for wheels, swinging arms and linkages, Wemoto stock OEM and pattern parts from manufacturers such as DID, Gecko Clutches, Motorex, Rock Oil, EBC, JY and Kyoto amongst 1,241,398 parts currently listed, covering 13,782 models spanning 50 years. Check their stock…

Mike Pero Southern Classic • 1-3 December, 2017 – Levels Raceway, Timaru, New Zealand This meeting has to be one of the New Zealand Motorsport success stories of 2017; a combination of 350 bikes, a long list of and gorgeous, if hot weather. This year’s theme was ‘superbikes of the 1980s and ‘90s’, with two very special guests Wes Cooley and Graeme Crosby – amongst the list of ‘legends’, the majority of whom would ride in the ‘Parade of Champions’. Wes’s affable nature and generosity in making himself available for pictures and a chat, and Graeme ‘Spyda’ Staples’ informed commentary, left everyone with deserved respect for his quite remarkable racing pedigree. The fact that Croz was also present created an almost perfect ‘superbike’ synergy; in the late 70’s and early…

22nd Natureland Classic Motorcycle Club Rally • 3-5 November, 2017 – Hat Head, NSW The 22nd Natureland Rally as always, was held in the first weekend in November and thankfully the weather could not have been better. 120 riders registered with around 40 participating in the Friday afternoon ride. As Neil Parker, the co-ordinator for this jaunt said, “The Friday shakedown run has always been a good start to the weekend’s Hat Head rally, and visiting riders were champing at the bit by the 1 o’clock start time for the short ride to Smokey Cape lighthouse. The day’s trophy was awarded to Mark Shannon from the Port Macquarie club who rode his 350cc 1936 New Imperial. Our very own Sylvia Lewis, an inaugural member of the club, flagged off the…

Ross has three Bantams in road race trim, plus a scrambles version, and Motorcycling Australia owns the famous Harold Carter Special, a water-cooled version that achieved considerable success. Bantams formed the backbone of the sport in the post-war Ultra Lightweight class and home tuners like Bert Flood and Eric Walsh achieved amazing performance from the simple engines. Since the announcement that the SIBBB will feature a tribute to the Vincent-HRD marque, which celebrates its 90th anniversary this year, the organisers have been swamped with enquiries and expressions of interest. “The Vincent side will be huge,” says committee member Michael Pettifer. “There will be literally dozens of road-going Vincents, plus racers and of course the always-popular speedway outfits. We had two of these outfits, both owned by Jon Heaviside, at the…

Vee Two Australia has secured the original technical drawings for the Ducati’s 883cc 90-degree V-twin beveldrive desmo engine, as well the casting moulds, chassis drawings and technical details. “The engine used in Mike’s 900 F1 race-winning bike was a prototype engine designed by the Ducati factory in the mid to late ‘70s, of which only around eight units were ever made,” Andrew Cathcart, General Manager of Vee Two explains. “When Mike won the TT in ’78 the factory had plans for the engine to power the next series of desmo V-twin sportsbikes, but due to Ducati’s struggling financial situation, the bevel-drive format was scrapped in favour of the Pantah-type belt-drive V-Twin, which was less costly to manufacture. Picking up from where the factory left off, Vee Two Australia is now…

Brown filmed the movie himself on a 16mm camera, directed, did the voice over and editing. He borrowed $50,000 to blow up the print to 35mm to allow it to be shown in movie theatres, and it took off, grossing US$30 million over the next two decades. Surfing was his life-long passion, but in the late ‘sixties, along with a generation of Californians, he also discovered dirt bikes. It was this passion that led him to devise a script that basically documented the 1970 year in motorcycling terms. Brown, directed, filmed, and narrated On Any Sunday in 1971, which went on to become the movie that pitched leisure motorcycling to a worldwide audience and was partly responsible for the off-road boom of the ‘seventies in USA. The film made Malcolm…

Although far better known as a racing driver, with a Le Mans 24 Hour win and four Formula One Grands Prix wins to his credit, Gurney was also a keen motorcyclist and designed his own quite revolutionary motorcycle, the Alligator. This was a feet-first style with an ultra low centre of gravity. He also designed a new twin-cylinder motorcycle engine with two counter-rotating crankshafts to cancel out primary vibration, which reputedly produced 280hp at 9,000 rpm. In the 1970s, Gurney was a partner (with Kim Kimball) in the US Montesa importation firm, and became a noted two-stroke tuner. Among his many motorcycling friends Gurney included Mick Doohan, Kenny Roberts and fellow engineering whizz and revolutionary constructor John Britten.…

The advertising campaign mentioned in Geoffrey’s story is something I feel qualified to comment on, since I wrote it during my time at long-gone Sydney advertising agency Coudray Dailey. It was 1982 and my good friend Ron Kivovitch was at that time CEO of Suzuki Australia, so naturally I hammered him for a tilt at the advertising account, to which he thankfully succumbed. Our first task was to launch the new four stroke DR250 and the budget was sufficient for a television campaign to add to the print schedule. I desperately wanted to avoid stereotype motorcycle advertising and came up with a concept that I quietly nicked from a very old British movie called Once a Jolly Swagman, made in 1949. The plot for the movie (ludicrously renamed Maniacs on…

Officially known as the 100 GS, Zündapp’s little giant killer gained its showroom title following several years of success in the Olympics of motorcycling, the International Six Days Trial. In that contest, myriad small capacity classes, from 50cc up, reflected the massive buyer market for such machines in Europe. From 1963 to 1969, the six-rider East German squad collared the International Trophy six times (beaten only by West Germany in 1968). The West German victory was achieved with the entire team mounted on works-supplied Zündapps, from 75cc to 125cc. Reputedly, these motorcycles were uber-tuned and fitted with six-speed gearboxes – the 100 poked out 14 horsepower. As well as the need for outright speed, the ISDT also placed strict requirements of reliability. Motorcycles had to be street legal, their lighting…

Scooping the award for Best Post War Motorcycle at the 2017 Motorclassica in Melbourne was just reward for an Herculean effort in saving this Series B Vincent Shadow from a hurricane-plagued destruction in the Virgin Islands in the Caribbean. Saving any Vincent from oblivion is praiseworthy enough, but this one has a special provenance in that it is the only Series B Shadow produced with the engine in unpainted form. This machine was ordered from the Vincent- HRD factory in Stevenage on 22nd February, 1949 and shipped to John Esler – the Vincent dealer in Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA. Elser was a successful sidecar racer and also one of the USA’s top Triumph dealers for nearly five decades. Originally, this motorcycle, engine number F10AB/1B/1858, was ordered as a Rapide, but…

Phillip Island Classic • 26-28 January 2018 – Phillip Island GP Circuit, Vic The 25th running of the AMCN Island Classic delivered some of the best racing in the event’s history in front of a healthy crowd on a scorching hot weekend. After three years of domination by the UK team, Australia final wrestled back the MV Agusta International Challenge Trophy with a score of 685 points to 654, with the USA side totalling 465 and New Zealand 319. Hero of the day was David ‘Davo’ Johnson on Tom Dermody’s Suzuki KR69, with a freshly-built 180 horsepower Birrell GSX engine delivering the goods. Top individual scorer Johnson suffered tyre woes in the first and 4th heats, but took convincing wins in the other two, each time from the ever-consistent Jeremy…

42WLA Harley-Davidson 75th Anniversary Commemorative Ride • 27-29th October 2017 – From Albury to Canberra via Young To celebrate the 75th anniversary of the 42WLA, 78 machines assembled in Albury for a commemorative ride, meeting at Phil’s Garage in Albury for a Friday night Spit Roast. This was our first opportunity to see the roll up of 42WLAs and they came in all styles from full Military, Civilian, Chopper, Bobber, a Servicar and a couple of Sidecar Outfits, and a chance to catch up with old friends and make new ones. Once the 8.45 am Riders Briefing was completed on Saturday morning it was time to head north following a staggered start. Not a great idea to put all those motorcycles on the road at once but a steady roll…

This is approximately double the price for the same machine when it was sold to a French collector by Melbourne identity Franc Trento around four years ago and continues the trend of enormous money being paid for prime examples of the Vincent HRD brand. The Black Lightning spent the first 60 years of its life in Australia, and will now return here after Tasmanian collector Peter Bender placed the winning bid. Peter’s stable includes some mouth-watering machines, with several Brough Superiors already resident to keep the Vincent company. Another record price at the auction was achieved for a Honda RC30 that was originally sold in Sweden. The Honda was knocked down for US$92,000 (A$118,000), while a 1939 Brough Superior SS80 brought US$102,500 (A$131,400), a 1939 Indian Four US$83,950 (A$119,900) and…

Richard Scott’s introduction to the world of 500cc Grand Prix racing as a member of the illustrious Kenny Roberts Lucky Strike Yamaha team had been a painful experience – a harsh reality check on a career that had blossomed continuously since his racing debut in 1975 in his native New Zealand. His talent and enthusiasm had taken him to Australia, and to two national road racing titles, then on to England – the traditional route for aspiring antipodean racers. His introduction to two-wheeled motoring came at the tender age of 14 when he was given a pillion on a friend’s Vespa motor scooter in his home town of Wanganui. “I was hooked, totally and utterly hooked,” Richard recalls. “I got a job after school but soon announced to my parents…

Fortunately Matt is an experienced engineer, but it took him two years to get the BSA to his satisfaction. The lineage began with the A7 of 1946, but had its roots pre-war in the prototype 500cc overhead camshaft vertical twin of 1938/39, which for obvious reasons failed to progress for the next seven years. When it did, the engine followed the Triumph example, being a pushrod design that has been variously attributed to Val Page, Bert Hopwood, Herbert Perkins and David Munro. Whoever really did most of the legwork is immaterial these days, but he or they did a fine job, because the basic layout penned in the late thirties stayed in production for 17 years. Even when the pre-unit design gave way to the new unit construction A65 in…

In the case of Tony Morisset, who today has a collection of more than sixty very desirable motorcycles, there is an extra reason to fondly recall that day, 40 years ago, because his late father presented him with his first motorcycle. And this was no flimsy little moped, no Flying Flea or Bantam, but a big British twin – a 1956 Model 88 Norton Dominator – the pride of the roadsters to come out of Norton Motors in Bracebridge Street, Birmingham.‚ So what did Tony do with his luscious gift? Leap aboard and ride it far and wide? Pose at the milk bar? Plant a femme fatale upon the pillion to the envy of his mates? No. “I rode the bike for about 500 miles, and being accustomed to Japanese…

South Australian Historic Road Race Championships – Historic Motor Cycle Racing Register of SA • 30-31 December 2017 – McNamara Park, SA Christmas means State Titles at Mac Park and one great meeting run by the HMCRRSA. Titles were contested over four rounds and there were also three feature races held separate from the title events. The Register was proud to have the SA Flag Marshals come along from Adelaide in force. A good turnout of Pre-war machinery as well as Class ‘C’ saw some spirited racing all weekend. All in all over 120 bikes took to the track over the weekend, and spirit shared by all was typical of the Register’s events, professionally run with fun at the forefront. Conditions were just fantastic at low 20’s all weekend, good…

37th AJSMOC Rally • 10-12 November, 2017 – Lake Hume, Albury NSW The 2017 37th Annual Down Under Jampot Rally for AJS and Matchless enthusiasts went off without a hitch, and those on the organising committee led by George Clarke of Albury can be soundly congratulated. Final touches were handled by David deLapp, with the help of a handful of enthusiastic supporters. Early official registration on Friday was followed by the early evening Meet-N-Greet gathering. Saturday morning muster was called for 8.30am where David deLapp welcomed all entrants giving those riders a briefing of the day’s route, departing at 9.30 for Yackandandah, with the local Ulysses Motorcycle Club Members as our ‘Corner Marshals’. Morning break done with, we were on our way back to the Hume Resort headquarters for lunch…