Innehållsförteckning för October 2021 från Real Classic

I enjoyed the ‘Guzzi’s Best Kept Secret’ in RC208. Owning one has been a great joy, the best Guzzi I’ve owned so far. Neville Roberts in RC209 commented about his Triumph Street Cup’s 70mpg, and Guzzi claiming 58mpg. You can’t believe everything you read: on a recent run out I achieved almost 100mpg! Thanks for a great motorcycle mag. Derek Ansell, member 13,428 Only today I was compelled to share lunch with Ollie Hulme of this parish, and we spent some time gazing in awe and wonder at the Stone version of the Guzzi. Hmmm… Frank W…

If you are going to take on a Zane-built bike then you need to pay attention to the basics when purchasing and running it. As most people know, the early Laverda singles, twins and triples were built at the firm’s Breganze factory. The 1999 750 Formula twin seen here is one of the last versions to be produced at a smaller factory, located just down the road at Zane. During the 1990s Laverda went through a mixed bag of ownership after Breganze was closed, eventually ending up with Aprilia. Given the performance of the bikes built in this era, it’s such a shame that the venture did not succeed. I owned a triple for a few years which led me to the Isle of Man as a spannerman / gopher,…

Connie had a leak. OK, she’s an Enfield and they all leak oil don’t they? Well not necessarily, but this wasn’t an ordinary oil leak. It was much worse – a leaking cylinder head gasket. Or possibly two. I started noticing it late last year (or even before that if we’re being completely honest) but at the end of the riding season I put the Constellation away without doing anything about it. Then came the winter lockdown and the threat of boredom. Lacking any other project that I could progress, I decided to investigate. I took inspiration from an article in these hallowed pages by Oily Boot Bob, which involved modifying the standard copper head gaskets to improve the seal. And while we’re on the subject of these hallowed pages,…

It’s hugely ironic that Kawasaki, which ever since the 1969 creation of its H1 Mach III two-stroke triple has almost permanently led all other Japanese manufacturers in the pursuit of performance for its streetbike range, should have started out its life on two wheels in trying to build a better British bike. For that’s what the OHV parallel-twins it built from 1965 to 1974 unquestionably resembled – and even after it trumped Honda’s groundbreaking CB750 four in both capacity and performance terms with the 1972 introduction of the world’s first four-stroke hyperbike, the 903cc Z1, it still kept producing the ultimate version of its BSA A10 Super Rocket klone-with-a-K, the Kawasaki W3 650, right alongside it at its Akashi factory. For a couple of years grilled steak and beef stew…

A tip for Frank to set the ignition timing on a Sunbeam, or any other distributor ignition bike. Set the engine at the point where the points should open. Try TDC if no other setting available, you can always advance it a bit if it feels flat. Place a transistor radio (remember them?) on the seat turned on but off any station, preferably on medium AM range. Turn on bike’s ignition and rotate the distributor towards retard, then forward. At the point the points open you will hear a click on the radio. Job done! Anyone know if MBX 692 is still around? DVLA says it’s on SORN. Once much loved but sold over 50 years ago. Peter J Greig, member 9313 I enjoyed Frank’s article on his Sunbeam S8.…

FrankW is undoubtedly the top guru when it comes to AMC twins. Does the central main bearing make the engine smoother or not? I’ve read so many totally conflicting opinions on the subject that I don’t know what to believe. Is this a heresy, or does it perhaps indicate that quality control at AMC left something to be desired, so that some engines were properly balanced and others not ? I’ve always liked the look of the design but have never owned one. Bob Torrens, member It’s highly likely that the engineering and theory suggest that supporting the centre of the crank should both strengthen the bottom end, ease the stresses on the outer main bearings and reduce crank flexing, which should – should! – reduce vibrations at a given…

At the start of the 1990s, Laverda emerged from receivership as part of the Zanini group, who looked to the old 500 twins for inspiration. The Alpino / Montjuic motor was developed into a feisty, fuel-injected, oil-cooled 668cc powerplant. Paired with a superb, twin-spar aluminium chassis developed by Nico Bakker, the resulting 650 Sport was an extremely agile machine. But before production could begin in earnest, Zanini too succumbed to financial pressures. In the company’s next incarnation, manufacturing moved to Zane under new ownership. The reorganisation delayed production by two years, which means that by the time the 650 Sport was available in the shops it had stiff competition from Ducati’s twins. Even so, the 668’s performance was sufficient to spawn several spin-off models – several using a less expensive…

Is Laverda the Italian equivalent of HRD-Vincent? OK, it’s deliberately provocative to compare a long out-of-production Italian motorcycle to the paragon of British big bike design. But hopefully I’ll make this case through my experiences with two examples from this fine Latin manufacturer. Moped-riding novices in the mid-1970s were treated to a continual flow of new and exotic machinery to fire their dreams of getting a big bike. Triumph Tridents, Honda CB750s and Kawasaki 2- and 4-strokes vied for our attention and piggy-banks. The more adventurous could also lust after Italian exotica and I count myself among them. My morning walk to the train station took me past a motorcycle shop filled with the latest from Moto Guzzi and Morini. I scoured the bike press for stories about these gorgeous…

The subject of Rowena’s Members’ Enclosure with RC209 was an important one, tackled so differently by the RC community; buying, selling and riding your bikes. I’m always baffled by the folk who’ve owned more than 150 bikes; how could you possibly get to know any one of them with enough familiarity to enjoy a ride? Having owned probably less than 20 bikes in my life, I tend to hang onto them and get them right for me, for my purpose, and to be ultimately reliable for any kind of journey, but I’m probably the odd man out. Robert Murdoch, member Great question, Bob. In fact, so great a question that I’ve adopted it for this issue’s subscriber newsletter… Rowena…

Commandos are like boomerangs. Every time I dismount, pat the bike on its tank in a sad old hippy gesture of thanks and hand it back to its inevitably proud owner, I am confident that I'm unlikely to ride another. Then just like a boomerang (ish) another Commando turns up. Which in its turn tends to after my thinking, somehow, to the point where I actually do believe that the last Commando I rode was the best Commando I've ever ridden. Which is a unique mixture of tripe and nonsense, because I've ridden lots of Commandos, some bad, some superb and some actually brilliant. I ran a Mk3 Roadster of my own for centuries and expected to keep it forever, until an unwelcome change in circumstances stopped me enjoying it…

In the UK everyone knows the Laverda SFC 750 or Jota but the production numbers for the little 75s and 100s far outstrip the famous twins and triples. Approximately 38,000 of the lightweight singles were made. The 100 also has a prestigious racing history, with wins in the 1954, ’56 and ’57 Moto Giro d’Italia road races. Laverda boycotted 1955 in protest at other factories entering machines which were not derived from road bikes. Otherwise it might’ve been a clean sweep… The Laverda 100 replaced the first Laverda model, a 75cc single. The 100 was designed by Francesco Laverda and Luciano Zen and was manufactured from 1954 to 1958 in response to post-war demand for inexpensive transport. The austerity of the era means that the bikes have small amounts of…

Nige is one of my oldest friends and a very talented bike builder. A visit to his workshop is always a chance to see what else he’s been up to lately. In this case, it was a rather fetching flat-track styled Triumph he’s just finishing for a customer, Neal. The story started when Neal brought a Triumph bobber he’d bought, sight unseen, in to Nige at D&N Engineering for some fettling. As Nige says, ‘It really wasn’t a nice bike, so we had to make it into one.’With that task completed, and the relationship and bond between owner and builder created, Neal was after another project. He looked up at the T140 frame Nige had stored in the rafters. ‘Can we do something with that?’ The frame was part of…