Features

Tommy Robb hitches a lift In 1964 he simply retired in the 125cc race. He was out of luck in the 250cc race too; though he set off at a flying pace on a year old works Yamaha, he was forced into repeated stops when the plugs fouled up and he had to call it…

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Regne with suspender belts! Though he wasn’t competing, the fastest man on two wheels, BMW star Ernst Henne (who has the title at 134.68mph) was on hand to see what his competitors could do, with the list headed by Joe Wright (supercharged OEC–Temple–JAP) and Owen Baldwin (unblown ohc AJS V-twin), with local interest provided by…

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1918 Indian Powerplus classic motorcycle 996cc (pdf) FOREWORD: From across the Atlantic, last October, came the dismal news that the demolition men had flattened the old Indian factory in Springfield, Massachusetts — though in fact it was just a shell; having been gutted by fire some years before. Peak year of Indian production had been…

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1908 Bat 9hp "We’ve decided not to sell you the BAT. My wife doesn’t think you can afford it while you’ve a young family to bring up.” Hmm. You can just imagine Sid Moore's panic as the prospect of owning a possibly unique and historic veteran began to recede from his grasp. But he perked…

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Lawrie Watts – prince of draughtsmen (pdf) Lawrie Watts, 'Loll' to his intimates, so shunned the limelight, (or "…been shunned from the limelight" as he's likely to remark) tongue in cheek, is a back room boy about whom relatively little is public – indeed, this is his first interview. Yet without him, a vital dimension…

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Norton-JAP ‘Thor’ Legendary Norse hammer-carrier Thor lends his name to this machine (and incidentally also to the ‘new’ JAP V-twin powered beastie built by Alec Card and Cameron Engineering) – it’s an apt title for a thundering V-twin. The original Thor (the one featured here) was built by sprint star Francis Williams using a 1952-54…

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1960 Moto Guzzi Lodola (pdf) Dave Hunter's Lodola (all the vowels pronounced short) is a 235cc four-stroke with that unmis­takable Italian look Not hard to find, they can be bought at very reasonable cost — less than £1000. A concours example would obviously fetch more. Dave loves the lived in 1960 GT (Gran Turismo) pictured…

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BSA Bantam D1 – back to basics Although originally of German conception ‘DKW RT 125’ this pre-war advanced design impressed the British who took it as war reparations – since then the Bantam has become quintessentially British. After the austere war years a simple and economical commuting motorcycle was ideal and became very popular. Two-stroke…

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1930 BSA B30-4 Living close to the North Devon Coast, Mike Dixon knows something about close-knit communities. The 53-year old looks after severely disabled young adults in a Leonard Cheshire care home, but he also mixes a love of surfing with an inherited preference for BSA motorcycles. “If somebody’s in trouble, you help out,” he…

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