More on the Ormonde

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Work on the Ormonde

Unusually I am at the Museum on a Sunday because everyone is away at the Beezumph Rally and are not due back until later in the day. Not much is happening and I take the opportunity to see what was going on with the Ormonde. It is not on display but languishing in the little barn with the engine out. 

The Antoine engine is in pieces and the owner is sitting on one of the benches in the sun patiently removing the remains of red hermatite from the threads in the crankcase. The barrel is screwed into it. It all looks so flimsy. Each part of the engine is being worked on in turn and nothing is disassembled until then. The crankcase walls seem paper thin and most of the metal is around the crankcase bolt bosses. There is a string seal that is compressed into a recess in each of the crankcase halves.

This will be replaced on assembly. Holes have been patched where threads have stripped but for 113 years old it is still hanging in there. The crankshaft looks a fairly substantial item and the piston has 3 solid 6mm rings. There is a little burning past the rings. One ring is missing and the other has been removed to use as a pattern for a replacement.

 There has been some conjecture about the actual capacity of the engine and now, having measured the bore and stroke it comes out to 402cc. While this patient work was in progress I wondered how many they would have had to make to turn a profit? At that time (1902) the Ormonde and depending on model was selling for £42 to £45 and a good wage that would give you a very comfortable life style was £1 a week. Bicycles were selling for about £5. I estimated that the motorcycle would have about £20 of parts. Premises would probably have been £1 a week with other overheads similarly. So for a year the overheads would have been £100, wages for 3 people, at 3 on £1 each per week each £150 that equates to 10 motorcycles per year! It is no wonder that everyone seemed to be building motorcycles. Consider how rich they would have been if they sold 100? Much of what is known about the Ormonde is lost but if you want to spend a little time on a visit reading its history it is surprising it has survived so long. This is not the only Ormonde around with 8 more survivors ranging in years of 1900 to 1904. We do not know how many were built. After 1904 Johanas Guttman went off to make bicycles. I wonder what happened to the other two?

Later that day the bike return in the van and I have a chance to have a good look around them before they go back on display, they are all triples, the P1, Egli framed OHC racer and Gary's bike that he raced. 

A Closer look

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Ducati Close up.

Peter who does “Tales from the Tarmac”, a long term Ducati fan, rider and racer has added his knowledge about the Ducati's I photoed at the bike shop in Winnipeg as follows:

“…..... from the picture I could identify only 2 with any certainty.

Nearest the camera is a Mach 1 250cc. It is the model my cousin rode to success in the T.T. I raced one myself and collected a few trophies.

The next one seems to be a bit of a mongrel. The engine is Ducati (possibly 350cc.) It has an early GT tank held on with bungees and Ceriani style front forks and off road tyres.

The third is a Diana Mark 3 250cc. similar to the Mach 1 but with a black frame and fork shrouds.

These were made for American export but are not that common. In the 60s American Ducati imports were being handled by The Berliner Corp. They also sold Norton motorcycles.

Norton wanted to sell the new Commando to the Americans but Berliner had a consignment of Ducati Mark 3s coming from Italy and hadn’t room for the Commandos. Bill Hanna a dealer in Liverpool was persuaded by Norton to accept the Berliner Mark 3s so that Commandos could be bought by Berliner.

So a consignment of Ducatis' went from Italy to the U.S.A. where they were stuck in the docks for about a year and then sent to Liverpool.

Hanna distributed his consignment among several dealers with no pre sale checks or instructions. Many of the bikes were run with insufficient oil in the sump which produced a number of big end and camshaft failures.

Vic Camp the Ducati concessionaire in London was really mad. Not only had they damaged the reliable reputation of the Ducatis he was responsible for but he had to find the resources to do the repairs.

Next on the shelf looks like it may be an early 150cc. Monza Junior. I always thought the Junior would make a nice pre-65 trials bike.

The last one seems to have a black GT style tank. From there on your guess is as good as mine.( The label says its a scrambler).

So, Ducatis from the 60s. By 1968 a new range of singles with wider crankcases were introduced and they became the Desmo’s.

Picture shows cousin Mike on my Mach 1, his own having crashed at Brands Hatch 2 weeks earlier.”

Latest Ducati Scrambler

Sadly I didn't get to Croxley Green this year on account of the rain however the Sunday of the16^th August waste Brackley Festival of Bikes with thousands turning out to fill the town. Geoff was there to see what it was like with representatives from the main manufacturers, bike clubs and trade stands and stunt bikes for entertainment. I will have to put that on the calendar for next year. Up and coming event that the Museum will be at is Kop Hill. We will have something to show and perhaps something taking part. It should be a good event to attend.

Back to Toronto

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Back to Toronto

After leaving the Yamaha at the hire shop we were collected and taken back to our friends house out on the south side of Winnipeg and on the way along Pembina highway I spotted another motorcycle shop that was a multi dealership. I thought it would be a place not to miss, but as it was late in the day I thought I could fit in a visit in the morning. This was arranged and we did. It turned out to be an exceptional place.

Wildwood is a Triumph, Ducati, Honda, Yamaha and any thing else you can think of type of dealer. Just in the door there was a well restored Triumph T120 in pride of place on a plinth and as I walked around more gems met the eye.

There were half a dozen Ducati 250 pre-desmos on a shelf. It would have been a real treat for Pete (of Tales from the Tarmac) to see them but he will have to make do with just the photos.

I was privileged to be able to see a BSA Rocket Gold Star just restored in the workshop. It looked magnificent! It turned that the boss of the place liked old British bikes in particular BSAs and he was not there to talk to as he was out racing his Gold Star!

I spent a long time there, not only looking at the bikes, I do like the new Ducati Scrambler, and trying on some different bike gear. I have a Joe Rocket Phantom 4 jacket that is mainly mesh and I was looking for a replacement I also have the Apollo pants that have a zip out air vent. I found a jacket replacement in the Olympia Airflow 4. They have an Airflow pants too but not with a short leg. Olympia is an American company that don't do short legs! What a shame because other than that it would have been a great summer riding set up. I know I should have bought them but I didn't. Looks like I'll have the Rocket gear for a bit longer. Another time perhaps, we flew out of Winnipeg that afternoon and back to Toronto arriving late that night. The next day was fun as I sampled more Canadian beer and found a brewery not far where we were staying. I did enjoy the product of the Steam Whistle Brewery! There are 18 micro breweries around Toronto making a variety of ales, pilsners and ciders. Something for everyone!

Back at the Museum on Monday and we had some 23 visitors from Canada, Finland, France and the Surrey AJS and Matchless Owners club to help fill the day.

Winnipeg

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It Rains here too!

I have arrived in Winnipeg and staying with friends. Winnipeg is so much quieter than Toronto. Much more laid back and I have no rush to do things. I am taking the opportunity to lay in bed and do some reading. I have finished Zoe Cano’s book “Bonneville-Go or Bust”. It is an enjoyable book to read, well written and Zoe is honest with her feelings. It is a book to inspire. I am now reading Graham Field’s “In Search of Greener Grass” and it is a different style of writing altogether. I’ll tell you more when I have finished it. Looking through the Winnipeg Free Press, the local paper, to see what was on there is a report on a motorcycle race meeting at Gimli. It is a small 1.3km track with a drag strip and events take place there about every month. It is one of the few places for people to race outside Ontario. I had missed the event by a week.

 I tend to do that. I don’t seem to get the timings right. Have acquired a few maps to do some exploring in the countryside around Winnipeg and now I’d discovering that most of the roads are so straight a cruiser suits that well. I track down a motorcycle hire shop River City Motorcycles 286 King Street and organise to collect a bike on the Tuesday evening after the thunder storms have passed.

On the Tuesday day time there are reports of tornados in the e nearby town of Branston. The bike that is ready for me is a 650 Yamaha  V Star a little cruiser with a big screen( to keep the bugs off) and the rain too!.Not used to the rake of the forks I wobble off with Gita on the back to return to our friends for an early start in the morning. We just managed to get there in the dry before the rain set in. Our early start was a failure but by about 10:30 the rain had cleared and we were left with cloud. The roads were dry and we had an ambient temperature of 20C.

 The previous few days had been in the mid 30’s and it fried your brains. Canada was in the middle of a heat wave with near record temperatures and with that come mossies that exanguinate you. Cool was better. I had a plan to go east to the Whiteshell Provincial Park and some bendy roads then north to Victoria beach. The late start would curtail that and we just went for the park. As we entered the park it started to drizzle. Bendy roads in the wet were fun and after exiting the park it stopped raining some 40 miles later.

Me and the Highway.

 We had covered some 120 miles and still had to get back to return the bike by 5pm. It was nearly 3pm and we still had over 80 miles to go. Going west we avoided some big black rain clouds by going a southern route and we were back in the sun but it was windy they said gusts of over 50 mph were recorded in that area. We know the wind was strong as Gita had to hold on to her shades to stop them being blown away. We got back just on 5 and clocked 218 miles for the day. In spite of the rain it was a great day out on that little  cruiser. I had some nice conservations with people at the bike shop, one guy has been to Northampton. I left fliers behind that were welcome. I didn’t manage to get to a local bike club meeting that was a few miles away at a Tim Horton’s’ coffee shop on Main street but never mind perhaps another time.