Theme?

And it also wouldn't pull the skin off the proverbial lightly cooked rice pudding. The earlier 150 cc ones were even more gutless :-(

Various reasons for them becoming history, but by 1966 the whole infrastructure of the British bike industry was collapsing. The last of the Velo's had battery/coil ignition , as magnetos were no longer made, and also I believe that the decision by Burman to stop making gearboxes/transmission components also played a major role, certainly it caused the eventual demise of Panther singles. The last of their bikes were made under the auspices of the receiver out of existing stock.

*Sigh*. When I think of all the old brit bikes I rode until they broke and then got rid of them..... Such oddities as the Norton Electra and the Meteor Minor, Matchless G80C (alloy barrel, huge GP carb, and Lucas racing mag.) and a lovely little Bantam Bushman.

Regards

Philip T-E

I don't know what the respective power to weight ratios are, but I don't imagine that the 50/70/90cc Honda Cub is exactly a ball of fire. But it will still haul the average Asian plus produce to and from the local market town reliably and cheaply. Worldwide production since its introduction in 1958 topped 35 million units last year, must be doing something right!

I do remember 30 + years ago when I was going 20 miles every day to work on various two stroke mopeds. Then I bought a Honda 50 CC moped & it changed my life. No more cleaning plugs in the rain on a dark road. On the rare occasions that something went wrong it usually managed to get me home to correct the problem in decent conditions.

-- Dave Croft Warrington England

Map Map

Having commissioned (PDI'd) a great number of C series Hondas when a bike mechanic in the '70's, I have nothing but the highest respect for the curious little beasts.

The 50 & 70 are very similar and have only one flaw. After extended mileage, the automatic clutch rollers dig themselves a groove at the top of their ramps and the clutch will not disengage when the engine is running unless you manually hold the clutch out by stepping on the gearchange. The C70 in particular was very difficult to stall and I have a number of hilarious tales about this aspect of their design. ;o))

They all came with a couple of tablespoonsful of a special oil in the engine which was only there to collect water so it could be removed during the PDI. I remember one C50 that was released onto the street with only this oil in it. It was not me that PDI'd it, but it was me that got it for its first service and ALL the oil had evaporated! I took the sump plug out and nothing happened ...........

Being a dismissible offence and not wanting to get young John in the poo, I covered it and kept a careful eye on the bike thereafter. After two years and 10,000 plus miles, it changed hands and I lost track of it, but it never showed any signs of distress or undue wear. So, C50's don't need oil for their first 500 miles!

The C90 was quite different. Although appearing superficially the same, it had a lot more in common with the CB 100/125cc range of "proper" bikes.

All of them would need reboring from time to time - usually from rings breaking up - but big end failures were uncommon.

35 million units? Gosh ..............

Regards,

Kim Siddorn

Why would you say that a model (in 3 marks) which remained in production for

23 years was a failure? Any others manufacturers come within cooee of this?

In 1971 Veloce Ltd, like many other famous bike makes, closed down. Some say that the change over to the LE model sent them broke, requiring entirely new production machinery, the capital outlay being beyond the resources of a family business, but the fact is that most British motorcycle factories closed down in the 60's and 70's.

Veloce lasted longer than many.

And not only British machines shut down - NSU in Europe was larger than all British Motorcycle manufacturers combined, and they no longer exist. In the USA, Indian and Harley Davidson collapsed. Harleys reappeared in a new guise only with huge financial backing and reconstruction.

Some say that the Japanese succeeded because they had an electric starter, but I believe it was part of a global change "My opinion is that the LE was the best lightweight motorcycle we ever had. They outlived the Ariel leaders, BSA Fleet Stars and Matchless GI5's. They were liked by riders and the mechanics who maintained them.

The Government should have bought the firm in order to supply all Constabularies with a machine ideally suited for their purpose"

As for the Mr. Whippy venture, on the contrary, this was a short-lived disaster. Cost Veloce a packet, as they were committed to support warranties on engines running hour upon hour day after day, logging hours far and away beyond motorcycle type usage which normal time-limited warranty is expected to cover.

BTW, a whole lot of old LE engines (in Oz, at least) ended up in motor boats. Ideal for the job - water cooled & prop on end of shaft drive, pull-handle starter, etc.

JW² Norton AntiVirus 2003 installed

"J K Siddorn" wrote (snip):-

"The most popular (powered) vehicle on the planet" see:-

dear we've gone all OT again!

They were still overly complicated for what they were IMHO. The Honda C series were better machines.

Ariel Leader. Smooth, smoky, handled well, but that curious leading link front fork gave a strange sensation when braking!! Its a shame the American market wouldn't accept them with the monocoque frame. In retrospect perhaps it was a mistake for Ariel to put all their eggs in one basket with this machine. Is a great shame the Val Page designed 400 cc in line four never came to anything ,the result of another canceled Government contract (anyone remember the TSR2??)

The Fleet Star was a low compression Starfire. 'Nuff said. I had a Starfire and the conrod came out for a breath of fresh of air at about 50 mph.....

Matchless G15. Heavy, under powered etc. Looked like a unit construction engine but was a separate engine/gearbox cunningly disguised

Of all the British 250's a good Enfield Continental took some beating I reckon. Its a shame that the quality could be variable....

OTOH I always lusted after an early BSA Rocket Three, in that lurid green paint, and with raygun silencers, so don't take too much notice of what I say :-))

Regards

Philip T-E

It is quite true the LE was in production for 23 years, but it was expensive to get right in the first place and whilst it filled its niche market very well, it was never (as I understand it ) the money spinner that they had hoped.

Interesting about the Mr Whippy engines (the stationary engine thread that keeps this vaguely on topic) . I'd not heard that before, but it certainly makes sense.

Nonetheless, my point was that if they had stuck to the outmoded single in its MSS and Venom derivatives and not diversified into other things that could best be described as "a very good idea at the time", they might still be in production today - 20/20 hind sight is clear sighted ;o))

Wrecking the industrial base of the Axis nations removed a lot of old fashioned machinery from the equation and the loan-supported re-equipping of their engineering industries meant that the old lathes that were still in common use in Britain when I was an apprentice in the late fifties (I started off on a Herbert made in 1903!) no longer existed in Germany and Japan. Jig borers were an esoteric machine here in the '60's but not there and it is difficult indeed to make a horizontally split pair of crankcases without a line of them!

Regards,

Kim Siddorn

The two nicest bikes I had and rode in the 1960's were an Ariel Red Hunter 350cc and a Norton ES2 (non-diesel!)

The BMW's 4 altogether)that came in the 1980's were an altogether different animal.

Kind regards,

Peter

Peter Forbes Prepair Ltd Luton, UK email: snipped-for-privacy@easynet.co.uk home: snipped-for-privacy@easynet.co.uk

I remember looking at the LE industrial engine and the Reliant

4-cylinder sidevalve at Tonibell in the late 1960's as a power unit to replace the AJ Onan single and the CCK flat twins.

Neither company was really equipped to sort anything out, although we did get a set of drawings from Reliant.

Kind regards,

Peter

Peter Forbes Prepair Ltd Luton, UK email: snipped-for-privacy@easynet.co.uk home: snipped-for-privacy@easynet.co.uk

Posting my previous comments took my memory back to 1966 when my wife & I as newlyweds (Not the honeymoon) had a weeks holiday on the Isle of Man. We did the TT course on the Honda & watched England win the World cup on the TV in the hotel. See

actually let her ride my new bike. (It must have been true love) Happy Days.

-- Dave Croft Warrington England

Map Map

I'll second Kims thoughts on these mini rice burners. When you compare what they were up against as regards home grown product like the raleigh Wisp, The BSA Dandy etc they were a breath of fresh air. Automated production helped no end as regards quality and engineering.

My brother had a C70 he used to thrash unmercifully to work and back with a lead wrist. One day this complained and bent a valve, hardly any wonder as it was that worn that it would go faster flat out in second than it would top. So he pulled the head off, drifted the bent valve out and bought a new one and fitted it. I asked if he had any trouble grinding in or adjusting the tappets only to be faced with a blank stare.....................

This machine then went on to take him to work for another 9 months until a newer 250 wet dream came on the scene. This wet dream gave exactly the same premium service the C70 had before it and is still residing in a nice dry part of the storage sheds as I write. ___

Duct tape is like the Force. It has a light side and a dark side, and it holds the universe together.

"Philip THornton-Evison" wrote

My first bike was a G2CS 250. It did 15000 miles in 18 months going from Coventry to Bolton most weekends. Apart from the three sets of drive side main bearings it was a nice little bike and handled surprisingly well.

I think the Val Page 4 was 700cc not 400cc, would have been a nice bike.

Paul

-- ____________________________________

Internal Fire, Museum of Power, Wales

I was in the IOM at the same time, but I CYCLED around the course! (well, I walked from Ramsey to the top and coasted all the way back down to Ramsey - Creg-ne-barr is quite alarming when you're doing what felt like 50 on a hired cycle.............)

I actually went for the MER and the horse trams - it was the year the steam railway was closed.

Brian L Dominic

NB Rumpus

Web Sites: NB Rumpus:

Friends of the Cromford Canal: Mid-Derbyshire Light Railway:

The other bike I was more or less in charge of at Gray's in Bristol was the Triumph Bonneville. No-one else was interested and I'd always liked Triumphs (my first and second bikes were a '52 Speed Twin in 1959 and a '55 Tiger 110 in 1961), so I gradually took over anything to do with them from spares and warranty to PDI and customer relations. I had a great time !

In general, they were pretty reliable and leak free and it was no kind of chore to keep the "fleet" (we had perhaps thirty bikes in the warranty period at any one time) in service and out of the shop.

There were three Triumph X75 Hurricanes in the window upstairs and they took so long to shift that on the last one the paint was visibly a different colour on one side than the other! They were absolutely dreadful: the fibre glass cracked, heavy braking (such as it was) would reset the legs in the yokes, the steering was just dangerous and - well, you name it, it went wrong. I persuaded the boss to sell the last one at a special price with PDI & number plates, but without any kind of warranty.

Not that Tridents or Rocket Threes were much better, but at least they went round corners after a fashion and would probably get you home if you went out of town! If you were dim enough to use the then much hyped multigrades as recommended but failed to change the oil at 1,500 miles, the long-chain polymers would degrade with the high head temperatures and the middle big end used to get sloppy. I could hear it as they came up the side of the shop and used to change the shells through the sump plate hole on a service! It usually went OK, but sometimes you just COULDN'T get the cutaway to locate in the slot in the rod eye and the whole thing had to come to bits. Bloody things ............

But they were as nothing to the utterly appalling Norton Commando about which I could not nor can find anything to say in their favour. How they have attracted a following today, I cannot begin to imagine. I'll not start, for this is already much longer than I'd intended and is, after all, very off topic.

Regards,

Kim Siddorn

"J K Siddorn" wrote

MkIII Interstate in the shed here belonging to a friend, I was supposed to be doing it but can't bring myself to start.

I did a couple of laps of practice on an 850 at the Manx in 86 and it was very quick and handled incredibly well. But both chassis and engine were a long way from the road bike. Ate crankcases though.

One of our helpers last Christmas for the start up of the museum has just closed his shop in Maidenhead, 20+ years specialising in Triumphs. He went all over Europe on his T140, nothing wrong with them when put together properly. In the late 70s we used to get cranks in from Meriden and hold the van while we miked the journals - 50% usually went back in the van. No quality control whatsoever. You were better off going in to Coventry and buying a new running engine for £50 in a pub from someone who worked at the co-op.

Paul

-- ____________________________________

Internal Fire, Museum of Power, Wales

(under construction)