Classic Bike Guide December 2016 preview

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TRIUMPH T140 || || ENFIELD BULLET || ||

JAPANESE BIKE GUIDE INSIDE

NORTON MODEL 7 || || DUCATI SPORT CLASSIC || ||

CLASSIC BIKE GUIDE || CONTENTS

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RIDING LIFE Newsy stuff, including the best Triumph ever (possibly), ace bikes at Stafford and someone’s made a load of money by selling BSA. Strange…

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Thrills undiluted. Excitement possible

TRIUMPH T140 BONNEVILLE One handsome 750, practical pleasure as always

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DUCATI SPORT CLASSIC

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ROYAL ENFIELD BULLET

Unsung hero from the home of great engines

Surely the perfect winter wheels

NORTON MODEL 7 Gentle twin; no feather bed this

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PAUL D’ORLÉANS Shoot the grouse, then

MARK WILLIAMS Rats to the lot of you

PAUL MILES The racing line

MÜNCH MAMMUT Three extinct monsters

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YAMAHA V-MAX One great survivor

ARIEL SQUARE FOUR Two twins twinned

ZUNDAPP K800 Four flat cylinders

CLASSIC BIKE GUIDE Some Japanese classics for you

TRIUMPH THUNDERBIRD 900 Thunderbirds are Go! So they say

READER ADS Lots and lots to look at

TRITON IN THE SNOW

By Louise Limb

FRANK WESTWORTH Perfection achieved. Next!

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RIDINGLIFE NEWS || EVENTS || LETTERS || INTERVIEWS

Bonnie bobber A BRUTAL BLAST from the past, Triumph’s new Bonneville Bobber is also right on the zeitgeist in its minimalist style and its muscular stance. Stripped-back streetbike custom classics are certainly all the rage, but the 1200 twin also cleverly adopts styling cues from the iconic Speed Twin and Triumph Tiger of the 1940s.

Check out the neatly disguised monoshock on the modern bike; the frame rails that mimic the old bike’s rigid rear end; the tight radius of the rear mudguard; the profile of the engine barrel and heads, and even the appearance of a pre-unit separate

gearbox – that’s styling only, the engine is entirely modern. The Bonnie Bobber goes to show that the simple lines of classic motorcycling never go out of fashion.

However, beneath that timeless exterior lurks an entirely 21st century construct.

The Bobber uses a high-torque version of the six-speed eight-valve Bonneville engine, tuned to deliver the goods at low revs, housed in an all-new chassis and not a frame borrowed from another bike. This shows how far Triumph has come with its latest generation of Bonnevilles: most earlier Bonnie variants were, essentially,

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just the same bike with a different styling kit. The Bobber’s frame and forks were designed specifically for this particular model, and it shows.

Nor has Triumph skimped on the mod cons. The Bobber’s liquid-cooled, ride-by-wire engine offers two riding modes, ‘road’ or ‘rain’, with ABS and traction control. That stylish solo saddle incorporates 8cm of adjustment through four angles, which makes the Bobber an attractive option for riders of all sizes. The trouble with adjustable seats is that a bespoke riding position can often obscure

RIDINGLIFE || STAFFORD SHOW

Stafford show WORDS & PHOTOS BY MORGAN RUE, ROWENA HOSEASON

UNDOUBTEDLY THE MECCA for classic motorcycles, Stafford hosts two world-class shows in April and October. The autumn Carole Nash Mechanics Show leans more towards later classics, showcasing some of the best vintage Oriental machinery around, but there was plenty to please all tastes with machines dating back to 1906 on display cheek-by-jowl with ton-up Triumph twins, off-road warriors, café racers and stock-as-a-rock restorations from every decade.

Suzukis stole the spotlight with a special display

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EVENT SHOW REPORT

THE NEXT Carole Nash International Classic MotorCycle Show opens 9am on April 22/23, 2017 at Staffordshire County Showground. See classicbikeshows.com

in a dedicated marquee that featured Barry Sheene’s two world championship-winning RG500s. Fittingly, the judges decided that the Best In Show award should also go to a Suzi – Heidi Cockerton’s rare 1965 K11T, which took pride of place on the VJMC stand. Meanwhile, the National Motorcycle Museum was giving away a Norton F1 rotary roadbike in its raffle, and at the Bonhams’ auction a 1924 CroftCameron Super Eight sold for £203,100, contributing to a sale total of £1,572,712. The crowds were equally wowed by guests of honour David Aldana and Gene Romero chatting about old battles and re-living their On Any Sunday experiences. For show-goers of a practical nature, the Yamaha FS1-E Club offered expert advice in the restoration theatre, and thousands of second-hand spares and new components were up for grabs in the autojumble and from traders’ tables.

Stafford is now such a big event that it’s sometimes tricky to see everything in a single day – so if you couldn’t get there in person or missed seeing some of the displays, here’s our selection of eye-grabbing bikes.

RIDINGLIFE || TRIUMPH T140

Halfway house

The big Bonnie neatly spans the gap between modern and classic PHOTOS BY CHRIS DICKINSON Above: The debate continues about which is the best of the very many Bonnie 750s, but this one surely comes close. Late fuel tank, great seat, comfortable bars and peashooters to mark your passage 1: Interestingly, the engine number on this machine reveals that the bike started life as a T140D, or Bonneville Special.

Some previous owner has ditched the two-into-one exhaust, the cast wheels and indeed the blackness of the original 2: There’s nothing at all wrong with Triumph forks of the period; they’re strong, stable and easy to service. That single disc, however, feels marginal on modern roads, although improving it is easy 3: Later model Veglia clocks and pretty much original idiot lights, mounted by this time in a housing lifted from the T160 Trident

CONTINUING OUR THEME, Triumph’s 750 twins are an obvious choice for anyone contemplating the purchase of a first British classic bike. They don’t cost a fortune compared to the more prestigious earlier classics, so you can try an old Brit bike to see if you enjoy the experience without mortgaging the cat.

There are heaps of 750 Triumphs on the market at any time, so you have plenty to pick and choose between. Spares supply is superb: there are several specialists dedicated to these machines and their development has continued in recent years, using modern technology to improve the electrics, comfort, steering and stopping. You can personalise one of these Triumph twins to your heart’s content…

Production of the 750s started in 1973 with the twin-carb T140V Bonneville and the single-carb TR7V Tiger, direct descendants from the Speed Twin all those decades earlier. The first few 750s were actually 724cc but the vast majority were 744cc (76mm by 82mm) from 1974 onwards.

The 750 Triumphs do everything fairly well,

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although they tend not to excel at one thing in particular – apart, perhaps, from steering rather more sharply than some lumbering four-cylinder contemporaries from overseas.

The affordable Bonneville looks and sounds like a proper British bike, and makes a stab at a modern spec with five gears, indicators, disc brakes, and an electric start on ES models from 1980. T140s tend to be somewhat smoother than the preceding 650 twins, with marginally more power and a better spread of torque. In keeping with the times, the gearchange lever moved to the left-hand side so they feel faintly familiar for riders of modern machinery. The rear brake changed to a disc from a drum in 1976, when NVT marketed the 750 as “the bike that created its own legend”. The big Bonnie engine was “redesigned to cope with the extra power with new and stronger pistons, bigger oil pumps, stiffer rods, and so on.

All adding up to smooth, effortless Triumph power”.

Reassuringly, the top end still sounds like a proper Triumph: it’s not broken, they all do that, Sir. The suspension boasted “race bred forks to give

RIDINGLIFE || DUCATI GT T 1000

Captain sensible

If a radical retro café racer is too compact for comfort, Ducati built a more relaxed SportClassic for two-up touring…

WORDS BY FRANK MELLING PHOTOS BY CAROL MELLING Above: The oddly-styled red bits fail to distract from the glory of Ducati’s excellent twin engine 1: Creative mudguard stay design fails to disguise entirely adequate brakes 2: Mysterious electrical and lube leads fail to disguise the essential simplicity of the Ducati twin 3: Once upon a time, Mr Melling rode a GT1000 on the Isle of Man

DUCATI’S FIRST STAB at a mainstream retro machine, the Hailwood replica MH900E was gorgeous but eye-wateringly expensive. It was followed up by the Paul Smart-inspired 1000LE, which featured a fabulous motor – torquey, powerful and with a very anthropomorphic throb: authentically classic and yet thoroughly modern. The six-speed engine was 992cc and produced a very acceptable 92bhp at 8000rpm, as well as a just as impressive 91Nm of torque. But this wasn’t a machine for married, middle-aged riders, not with its low bars, rearsets and solo saddle.

Finally, in 2006, out came the GT1000 SportClassic, the first bike Ducati should have made in its retro range. Gone were the rather affected single-sided swinging arm of the Paul Smart rep and the café racer riding position of the Sport, to be replaced by a more traditional, twin-sided design and a much more upright riding position. The divorce-inducing single seat was replaced by a truly lovely dual saddle. Relocating the footrests and raising the bars meant that the ergonomics became instantly rider friendly.

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The new bike lacked for nothing in terms of handling or performance. The chassis was a close sibling of the café racers and featured a pair of walloping great Brembo 320mm anchors at the front and an equally impressive 245mm disc at the rear.

I rode one during Ducati’s TT celebration around the Island on closed roads, no limits. The handling is sublime at 100mph-plus speeds – all the way to unintentionally touching down the right-hand silencer at Sulby Bridge!

I was so impressed with the bike that I nearly bought one. But like many potential customers, I didn’t, as Andrew of Woods Motorcycles recalls: “We had plenty of customers test ride the Classic but they never bought them. The problem was that there were many other bikes you could get for the same money. The Sport was also uncomfortable. Your bum was stuck up in the air and the clip-ons were far too low. The saddle height was also too high. Compared to a Triumph Bonneville, this wasn’t a bike that you could imagine riding all day – for the very good reason that you couldn’t ride it all day without getting off crippled!

RIDINGLIFE || ENFIELD BULLET

Old skool

Who needs fuel injection, unit construction and electric start?

WORDS & PHOTOS BY STUART URQUHART Above: Black paint on the petrol tank and mudguards suggest this 2008 machine is a ‘Standard’ model. The Deluxe came in red and chrome – and given how well that chrome didn’t last, painted bodywork is preferable 1: Look, no oil leaks! It is entirely possible to successfully seal the primary drive and keep the cases this clean…

2: If the clutch drags and neutral is impossible to find, there’s a five-plate upgrade kit to cure the problem 3: Before fuel-injection, older Enfields were fitted with a Micarb; a Mikuni made under licence in India. It performed reasonably well in pre-ethanol days but many owners recommend replacing it with an Amal, as seen here 4: Hitchcocks offer an improved brake plate with revised cam/shoe interface that boosts the performance of an already powerful 2ls front drum. UK-made brake cables are generally recommended

AFFORDABLE AND NUMEROUS, it’s not too difficult to find a bargain Indian-built kick-start Bullet. That’s why these bikes make a great introduction to classic motorcycling. They typically haven’t clocked up many miles and can be bought for two grand or less: absurdly good value for a reliable, recent motorcycle.

You may already know that Royal Enfield of Redditch granted the Indian government a licence to manufacture Bullets in the late 1950s for the military and police forces. By the early 1960s Enfield India (Madras) was building Bullets for India’s home market. Gradually, these bikes began to be exported to the UK, initially individually and in small batches and then through a series of official importers and specialist dealers. At first the fit, finish and material quality of the Indian-built bikes came in for considerable criticism, but the machines improved significantly when Eicher took over Enfield in 1994, and then again at the turn of the 21st century when Watsonian Squire became the official importer (MotoGB took on that role in 2012). Independent specialist Hitchcocks Motorcycles provides a comprehensive source for spares and expertise, which means that Indian Bullets can be improved to the extent that today they have a loyal following.

The original Redditch Bullet was a successful

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ISDT campaigner, as well as being an accomplished commuter. Cloned from these original Redditch models, pre-millennium Indian Bullets can be identified by crankcase fining that extends below the barrel. Other distinguishing features are bulbous rubber knee grips and ludicrously upscaled Enfield logos that are slapped across the Deluxe petrol tank’s paintwork in a haphazard fashion. Grotesque mudguards, ridiculously long silencers, behemoth dualseats and cooking-pot indicators didn’t win many plaudits either. Thus early Indian Bullets were severely criticised, both for poor quality control and bizarre styling. Conversely, the post-millennium Bullets are almost handsome by comparison, thanks to improvements initiated by Watsonian.

Slim profile mudguards, scaled down indicators and the choice of a lighter profiled dual or single sprung saddle helped to turn the post-millennium machines into popular all-rounders. Later models were also fitted with better quality chrome wheel rims and petrol tanks – plating that can just about stand up to a British winter, instead of peeling at the first rattle of chattering teeth. Unfortunately, the Bullet’s zinc-plated fasteners still turn yellow with age… but most of the famous ‘Oilfield’ incontinence has been cured, although head gaskets can leak on carb bikes,

RIDINGLIFE || NORTON DOMINATOR

The underdog Above: The featured Dominator is a 1953 machine, one of the first Model 7s to be equipped with swinging arm suspension.

Until very recently it’s been owned by just one family who’ve kept it very standard and original – apart from a new front wheel rim and service items it’s very much as it left Bracebridge Street 1: Norton’s old 7in stopper isn’t exactly inspiring and from 1954 the Dominators were fitted with an improved 8in front brake. It was less prone to fading during periods of extensive use, which proved particularly handy for sidecar pilots 2: Many things were simpler back then, the handlebar layout among them 3: Designer Bert Hopwood and engineer Jack Moore drew up Norton’s postwar 497cc 360-degree parallel twin engine in 18 months. Three decades later, in developed 828cc form, it was still going strong powering the Commando

Greyhounds are great, but most folk get on better with a border collie PHOTOS BY CHRIS DICKINSON

DESPITE THE DOMINATOR name, Norton’s first stab at a sporting twin didn’t exactly rule the postwar world. Designer Bert Hopwood built a bike that was rather more robust than the sparkling Triumph speedsters, but which had little in common with Norton’s glorious prewar sporting singles. An all-new 500cc twin from the marque with 21 TT wins to its credit was expected to be exceptional – and instead the new Dominator was merely proficient, reliable, well-made and mannerly.

Consequently, the Model 7 was damned by faint praise. It “had a disappointing performance” according to marque historian Mick Woollett. “It was fast but lacked the mid-range torque that the other twins had… It was no match for the already well-established Triumph Tiger 100. The Norton was overweight at 440lb – no less than 50lb heavier than the Triumph 500 twins!”

Some of that extra mass came from the Model 7’s plunger suspension, which offered a little more comfort and better roadholding than Triumph’s

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primitive sprung hub arrangement. Even so, the new Dominator’s bend-swinging abilities didn’t live up to the marque’s ‘unapproachable’ competition credentials, as trials rider Don Morley explained: “The roadholding and handling of these bikes, frankly, were anything but good, not least because they shared exactly the same running gear as the equally-poor-steering single cylinder job… this bike’s handling left a lot to be desired.”

What’s that? Aren’t Dominators famous for being the best handling bikes of their time? With steering so superb that legions of fast lads created the first café racers by transplanting Triumph power into the Dominator chassis? Yes indeed, but that’s an entirely different Dommi to the one you see here. Don’t be misled: not all Norton Dominators use the famous featherbed frame. That chassis arrived in wideline form for export machines in 1952, but the Models 7 and 77 were never equipped with the race-developed frame. If you want a featherbed Dominator, then you need to seek out an 88, 99 or 650…

MÜNCH MAMMUT WORDS BY PHILLIP TOOTH

MONSTER MÜNCH PHOTOS BY PHILLIP TOOTH, JEAN-PIERRE PRADÈRES

Superbikes of the Seventies were big and powerful. But the Münch Mammut was in a class of its own – the most exotic, the most expensive and the heaviest motorcycle money could buy. We travel to France to test three of the beasts

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ZÜNDAPP K800, 1938

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BOXING CLEVER Radical engineering met radical style in 1930s Germany. And handsome is as handsome does…

WORDS BY ALAN CATHCART PHOTOS BY KYOICHI NAKAMURA

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INCE IT EMIGRATED to China back in 1984, Zündapp has become the forgotten brand in Germany’s two-wheeled history book. Yet, after commencing bike production in 1922, it was for many years the country’s largest motorcycle manufacturer – albeit postwar in the Western half only – and as recently as 1977 produced as many as 115,000 bikes in a single year, before sales of its, by then, predominantly two-stroke range suddenly slumped in the face of Japanese competition, sending it, just seven years, later into the hands of the liquidator.

But for more than six decades Zündapp was at the forefront of the German motorcycle industry, and it surely ranks alongside BSA, Norton, Indian, Moto Guzzi, Triumph, Gilera and Harley-Davidson, as well as its BMW rival, as one of the most significant pioneer marques in two-wheeled history.

Moreover, back in the 1930s Zündapp produced a pair of K-series models – the ‘K’ nametag denoting that they employed shaft final drive, or Kardanantrieb – with completely individual architecture, unlike their smaller-capacity brethren that shared the same broad overall flat-twin layout as BMW’s boxer models.

For 1933 saw the debut of Zündapp’s horizontally opposed sidevalve flat-fours, the K600 and its range-topping K800 sister, both designed by Richard Küchen to feature his innovative design of four-speed unit construction transmission, whereby sprockets and chains replaced the shafts and gear pinions of a more conventional gearbox. In solo form these positioned Zündapp at the top end of the market – its BMW rival never produced anything with more than two cylinders – while in sidecar guise they also allowed the company to offer models with much more power and torque than were available elsewhere.

K800 flat-fours are few and far between these

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TRADINGPOST || BUYING GUIDE

Japanese Classic Bike Guide W

hile British bikes dominated their home market and dictated motorcycle development for the first two-thirds of the 20th century, so the Japanese industry led the way from the late 1960s to the current day.

That’s why you’ll find this guide is stuffed full of terms such as ‘ground-breaking’ and ‘innovative’ (although if the phrase ‘jewel-like’ sneaks in please take us out and shoot us).

However, the revolution in two-wheeled technology which ripped up the old rule book didn’t happen overnight, and there are many – slightly dodgy, truth be told – transitional models along the way. Inevitably there are some humdrum, workaday ‘so what?’ motorcycles lurking among the genuinely astonishing trendsetters. The trick is to be able to tell them apart, and not pay Zed One money for a Z400J… The transition to Japanese classic isn’t always straightforward, not for long-term British and European bike enthusiasts or even aficionados of modern motorcycles. It’s not just a matter of the controls being in different places; engine and handling characteristics can be radically different.

Similarly, swapping to a 40-year-old machine that has led a hard life can cause considerable culture shock; riding a nearly new VFR800 today may not be adequate preparation for life with a CJ250T. Old bikes – no matter which country they come from – are snapshots from the past, encapsulating an instant in motorcycle development. For many years, Japanese powerplants out-performed their bikes’ suspension and chassis. They were a bit

lively when they were brand new and correctly maintained, so imagine what they might be like after decades of wear and tear and bodgery…

Keep in mind that the Japanese classic support industry is not as mature as the network of trade specialists that provide spares and services for old Britbikes. There are fewer marque and model specialists out there to assist you.

Also, many Japanese models appear to have extremely long production lives – like some Brits – but in fact there can be very little overlap between different incarnations of a superficially similar model. Put simply: secondhand parts from a similar bike won’t necessarily work. And

remember that old British, Italian and German motorcycles were designed at a time when most maintenance was performed at home, by chaps in flat caps with minimal toolkits.

If you intend to revitalise an old but technically sophisticated Japanese motorcycle, crafted in line with an entirely different ethos, then it would pay to make sure that your local bike shop can help out with the odd stripped thread, snapped stud and emergency helicoil.

This guide will definitely develop over the coming months: if your favourite model isn’t mentioned then do send us the details for future inclusion.

How to use the guide This guide provides an overview of Japanese classics. We focus on the marques and models that are the most popular, familiar and/or easily available in the UK. We’ll enlarge and update it as time goes by and we trawl the marketplace, and this guide will alternate with similar info covering British and European classics.

We offer you just two prices; the CBG High Price is for a topnotch, top-spec model in excellent condition. You might not win concours awards with the bike, but you’d expect to be a contender.

At that price, your target machine should have a new MoT, its tyres should sparkle, its chrome and alloy should be excellent. Its paint should not be dull, and it should run like the dream machine you’re after. Oil should not dribble from its casings, it should start

easily and readily. If it has more than one carb, then they should be balanced and the bike should tick over reliably. There should be no smoke, and although a stack of receipts is not essential, you should find evidence that whoever did the restoration work knew what they were doing.

Cables should be entirely un-frayed, the controls should fall readily to hand and foot, and the lighting system should both lighten the darkness and charge its own battery. Accept nothing less.

Also accept that if you make the increasingly astute decision to buy from a trader then you are quite likely to pay more than our High Price. Traders make a living supplying folk like us with the bikes we want, tolerate endless tyre-kicking, usually accept trade-ins, and they should provide

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decent after-sales service. All this costs them, and they need to make a profit.

The CBG Low Price is for a complete motorcycle. The bike may have the dregs of an MoT. It will certainly run and ride, although it may not be entirely sorted. Most of all, it may not be standard, the engine and frame may not have been paired in the factory, it may be cosmetically challenged, with rusty exhausts, a split seat and drooping unlubricated cables, and sundry systems may not work. It may be a less popular version of a popular model (did someone say FT500?). It may easily be what we used to refer to as a ‘working’ bike. Classic workers are less common now than they once were, but they’re plentiful among older Japanese machines.

There are two other categories

which it is entirely impossible to quote prices for. The first is the entirely original and unrestored motorcycle. These machines are – obviously – increasingly hard to find, and some folk will pay a high premium for them. Indeed, ‘barn find’ machines often fetch astonishingly high prices because they’re unrestored … although you can rarely know that for a fact.

The second category is the concours winner; the completely elegant machine which is better by far than it was when it first invaded a showroom. When these bikes change hand in the public marketplace (and many of them change hands inside clubs, advertised only by word of mouth) their prices can be very high indeed. We cannot offer guidance here; what you pay is up to you.

Happy hunting…