From Last Year

Missing The AMCA Southeast National Denton Swap Meet Sweet Triumph Drag Bike From Last Year

Story n hotos y Al n Dockery

his is a tough Spring for us old

bikers. Canceled events mean we are missing our friends and their machines. One event that so many folks from all over the country are missing is the Antique Motorcycle Club of America’s Southeast National Meet at Denton Farm Park.

To help y’all with those old bike withdrawals, check out this really sweet machine I photographed last year as Saturday wound down at Denton.

Tim Overcash, lives close to Denton in Salisbury, NC. He brought one of the coolest old machines last year that certainly got my attention. Yes, I’m a drag racing junkie too. His 1953 Triumph 650 Bonneville is absolutely beautiful and has logged most of its miles on the strip.

Like most of us old guys, Tim has all kinds of bikes. During his life he has owned mostlyTriumphs and Nortons, some Harleys and Japanese bikes too. His only real job in

the motorcycle business was as a service writer at Peidmont Honda in Salisbury way back when his son was racing for them.

I know lots of y’all started out like Tim with a minibike. His was not just any small flathead motored minibike. His first ride was a Hodaka Bonanza Minbike from Doc’s Cycle in Kannapolis a long time ago. That was a scary minibike since it had a Hodaka motorcycle engine. That means 90cc two stroke and five speed transmission. Real fast.

“I was the only kid on the block who could do burnouts,” Tim said. Soon he moved up to 1966 CB 160 Honda. “It was a Street bike but all we had was dirt roads around here,” he said. “The farmer’s daughter down the road had a Yamaha enduro. I rode a street bike in the dirt.”

“They had a race over on the other side of Kannapolis. My buddies who had drivers licenses told me I need to go over there and race in that thing. It was an enduro race. So I took that durn 160 over there and raced it. Well the first lap at the finish line I forgot to check in at the barrels. (Logging Tim for making that lap.) The next time I came through they flagged me on in there.

“At the end of the race these guys who had been watching me do the hillclimb and everything on that street bike, saw me finish the race on it, came over to talk. They asked me how I finished. Well I thought I finished last cause I didn’t check in at the barrels the first lap.

“Well they said I finished ahead of all those other guys who

crashed out and burned. I raced that Honda 160 street bike through the mud and everything with a street tire,” he said.

Tim was that guy in high school who the rest of us were jealous of when it came to the parking lot. While small Jap Bikes were cool, some guys had a big British or American bike. Most of us knew a Fonzie with the coolest bike in school.

“When I turned 16 I put the Honda 160 on the road and tagged it,” he said. “But a neighbor had a 1969 Triumph Bonneville. He had just bought it the year before and done everything to it. Chromed it and had extra parts for it. Well his wife was pregnant and he decided to get rid of the motorcycle. So I ended up buying it.

“I had a 1969 Triumph 650cc Bonneville. Twin cylinder, dual carb. The Bonneville name came from setting world speed records at the Salt Flats.

That’s what I rode to school and everything for years. Didn’t even have a car.”

In 1970 Yamaha came out with the XS 650. It was on the covers of the motorcycle magazines and great stories inside about that machine. Y’all know the bikes, they looked a whole lot like the British Triumph only the Japanese machines were much more rideable and reliable.

Those British bikes had all kinds of maintenance needs and problems. With that Yamaha you you could put gas in it and ride across the country. With no problems. Tim said he didn’t get one then since he had his Triumph. I think he has an XS

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650 in the garage now.

“I was riding back from Happy’s Lake and my shirt was unbuttoned. So I took my hands off the handle bars to button up my shirt. Hit a bump. The front end went up and the handlebars turned sideways. That bike slug my butt all up and down that tar and gravel road. Ya know. Fixed that bike, but didn’t like it anymore so sold it,” Tim said.

Soon Tim was old enough to enlist and joined the U.S. Navy from 1973 to 1977. He served his enlistment on the USS Franklin D. Roosevelt (CV-42) Aircraft Carrier. Yeah one of the old ones. He was a Personnelman taking care of things for sailors. During those years he bought a 1974 Honda CB 350. When he got out rebuilt it, but another bike not really thrilled with so sold it.

“One of my buddies had a 1967 Triumph that came from his brother who had run off the road and crashed it. Messed the front end up on it. Then my other buddy had a 1964 Triumph with a kinda shot motor. Both were Bonnevilles. So I put the 67 motor in the 64 frame and rode that bike for years,” Tim, said. “I was married and me and my wife were riding down Mt.

Pleasant Road. Had been riding with a Navy buddy. We hit an oil slick where a farmer’s tractor was on the highway with a busted oil line. It sprayed the curve with oil.”

“I disassembled everything on the crashed bike and started a new project. Anyway, it ended up in a bunch of boxes. We made a few moves over the years.”

“Well my son was interested in motorcycles. He ended up picking up the boxes and taking on the project. He had Buddy Brown at Port City Cycles do much of the work to get that bike back on the road,” Tim said.

Then he started telling me about another favorite bike he revived, a 1975 Norton 850 Commando, he got from a scared owner who crashed it. But I was interested in the Drag Bike I saw at Denton last year.

The Drag Bike

Some of us old guys fixate on machines from certain years in our lives. Usually the year we were born or graduated. Tim was born in 1953. He bought this bike off of E-Bay. It was not running. Had a race history but the last time raced was 1962 at the famous Lions Drag Strip in Los Angeles.

This bike was bought in England in 1953. Tim has the original owner title to that thing. The Pink Slip. As well as folks can figure it has spent most of its life as a drag bike. May have been ridden on the street when new in England. And the owner got a California title when he brought it to the Colonies.

By 1960 Dave (who sold it to Tim) and his buddy got a hold of it. They were into drag racing. To make this machine even more collectible, Tim has the original Bell Star Helmet they raced with and photos from Lions Drag Strip the last times it raced in 1962.

“At the race in 62 they hung a piston in the thing. Well they got out of racing that bike. They put it in the corner of their motorcycle shop. They got into racing Kawasakis. The guys had planned to get back to that bike someday when they

retired from professional racing.”

Dave moved around and worked on the oil rigs and settled down in the Gulfport, MS, area. And he brought this bike with him. And then his buddy retired and moved to Gulfport. They got back to working on it. Even bought a bike in Florida with a 1954 engine. The 54 engine is more buildable than the 53.

And the engine in Tim’s bike as he showed it at Denton is built. It’s a T and M race engine.

“I have the book on tuning it,” Tim said. “The guys who made the race parts for this motor are out of Georgia. Only way you could get these cams and parts was to be a Triumph dealer. The book gives you all the specs on things like cutting the flywheels down. Which cams you would order for different types of racing, whether it was an oval track, drag race, or scrambler type bike. I have that book and a whole bunch of stuff with the bike. Even have the 1953 original engine with the matching numbers. The engine they hung a piston in.”

To this old gear head that is a pretty motor. Mostly original Triumph parts that have been machined and massaged for performance. Has a special cam. Those 1954 engine aluminum heads cap off Wellworthy cylinders on the motor. This is a pre-unit motor meaning the engine and transmission are separate parts with their own cases. It has a belt drive primary and race clutch. Still basically a 650 cc probably just one over bore. Tim uses a modern battery ignition instead of the magneto. Drag race set up with no generator.

The previous owner had mostly rebuilt the bike but never fired it up. When Tim got it the bike was really nice but not finished. The 1954 motor was loose fitted and there were lots of things not torqued down tight. The seller was getting older and eventually lost interest in this and other bikes and sold things. The Triumph drag bike was the last thing to go since it was so dear to Dave who raced it back in the early 1960’s.

Tim credits Dave for doing most of the original build and

restoration since he was a fabricator and worked fiberglass too. The gas tank is an old British Wassell style peanut tank. The front brake is a Triumph special race type with a couple cooling vents. It was most likely a road race type but would stop this bike well at a drag strip.

Tim got this bike in 2015 and was determined to have it roaring again. “To get it running I took it to Frank Deal in Georgetown, SC. Frank used to race Triumphs in his younger days. He is 80 something now,” Tim said.

“Frank has a shop at the house specializing in English bikes. He has helped me for years with my Norton. When I got this Triumph I knew I was gonna let him do it. His old race buddies like the drag bike. Frank had never played with a T and M race engine either.”

Denton in 2019 was the first time it had been out to show. I sure am looking forward to the next time we can gather with friends and old motorcycles in the Farm Park. Maybe we can block off a little pavement and see what this old Triumph can do.