A Rainy Monday

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October 14^th.

It was raining this Monday morning unlike last Monday that was warm and dry and sunny when we had eight visitors through the doors.  Pete was with me and he had been out and about visiting dealers that included, West London Suzuki in Bedfont,  Cooperized Dyno and Service Centre in Feltham and First Line Motorcycles in Arnos Grove handing out fliers as he went. Then I had arrived on the Valiant but this Monday I was in the car and first to arrive waiting in the drizzle. A dull day weather wise but not for us. Yesterday, Sunday, had been busy in the museum and the two Jes’s had been wall mounted near the entrance. 

 

Now that was a surprise for me as they had both been in the barn last Monday. My mission today was to find the Classic Bike Guide Magazine of April 05 and read up on an interesting AJS that I had spotted last Monday. I didn’t know that AJS had made, what looked to be a “racing” vee twin in the thirties. I thought at that time the big 50 degree twin was only side valve. So when I did find the magazine and read about it I discovered that it was not an original. It looked a bit American with the style of the handlebars and position of the footrests. 

 

The hairpin valve springs should have been a give away as the whole bike turned out to be someone’s’ brain child. Parts gathered from later models and made into a very nice special. Sadly to say it is not in our museum. More people came to see us, one guy from Spain with limited English and his girl friend interpreting. Valves are valvos and frames are chassis and she did well to pass on my descriptions of things. Among the things discussed was the influence of Art Deco on the shape of fuel tanks and mudguards of the early twenties and the 1946 GP racer. At the end of the afternoon a Velocette LE enthusiast asked me about a problem he had with his LE. I would have asked him to bring it around so I could help but he was here and the bike in Scotland! I said he needs to join the club!  Now I have the magazine and got it home to scan in the pictures and finally get around to reading it only to discover tucked in the back of the magazine is one of my favourites from my youth, a TRW. 

If I can remember it was an ex RAF model from around 1954 that was worth nothing at the time and a moped was quicker and cheaper to run. This particular one in the magazine had an excellent finish and looks very nice. I still prefer the one in the museum that has rear suspension and a slick-shift gearbox and was registered in 1972 and appears to be the only one in existence although Triumph did experiment with the TRW engine in a Trophy frame. The TRWs were used by the Royal Corps of Signals until more powerful ohv engines replaced them. Having done figures of eight at a handling skills day like the “White Helmets” it is a very interesting experience and is just as much fun to do as to watch!

An Italian Presence

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Bennelli’s Come to Town

As much as I like to get out to events and spread the word of the London Motorcycle Museum, you cannot get to them all. Last Sunday was no exception with missing out on an interesting day. It was titled  “Sand and Motorcycles” It is an annual event at the Leighton Buzzard Railway celebrating the history of the sand that was excavated for making the castings for shells in World War One and after the war the company built a narrow gauge railway to the main line. Moving on to World War Two and the pits had expanded to a vast area so some motorcycles were purchased to transport the fitters around the site doing running repairs to equipment. These bikes did sterling service in the most inhospitable conditions as sand and oil grind all the moving parts to paste very quickly. The riders must have been pretty good at off road too! I have now put this event in my diary and will try to be there to represent the Museum next year. So I’ve been busy this past week with Sunday hosting a Scalextric 2CV Grand Prix in the back garden and having to repair all the cars used to some degree over the next few days. Only just getting out to the LE club night on Tuesday to return all the Ally Pally show gear for storage with Chris. It is now Sunday and I need to touch base with the Museum and find out what has happened in the last week. There are two new arrivals to see a 1968 BSA Spitfire racer built and raced by Steve Brown who worked in the race department at BSA and a well used little C10 of 1953 vintage. So while I was there half a dozen bikes with very sporty exhausts made their presence felt and heard. Six Bennelli’s had arrived! What an array of machinery! 

One of the guys had been at the Salon Privee a few weeks ago and promised to come. They had arrived in style. The Bennelli Owners club! Most people remember the across the frame Sei or six in English and that was before the Honda Six!  We had a discussion about the effectiveness of the rear brake on one of the Bennelli’s. I muted the point that it was not necessary to work that well as the front one could stand it on end anyway. There were some nice comments about the Valiant then they disappeared into the Museum and I took a few photos of the bikes. 

They were looking at somewhere else to go today so I mention the Sand and Motorcycle event at Leighton Buzzard and it turned out that one of the guys lived quite close to it. The bit of news was that after talking to Bill about the Speedway Museum at the Paradise Wildlife Park at Broxbourne he told me about the introduction of Speedway into the UK from Australia with the first event being at Canada Heights then, of all places Greenford! In 1928 the track was built and is now no longer there. It has become a housing estate just off the A40 at the north end of Oldfield Lane South or the south end of Oldfield Lane North. Something to follow up when the weather is less hospitable.

After Ally Pally

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Out for the day on a bike ride

Thursday 12^th September 2013.

At the beginning of the week I am doing another stint at the Museum and returning the LE engine and gearbox cutaway. Sam is there to open up and he tells me that the salon Privee event has honoured the Triumph Trophy with second prize in the concourse at the show. 

Looks like the Museum has had a successful few days with the Valiant getting runner up in the Best of British. The Valiant did not run well on the way home and I did not get around to checking it over until Wednesday when on a test run out I tried out one of the mini camcorders attached to the handlebars of the bike and there is a posting on utube of the first effort. Follow this link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bstDJh4tQks&feature=youtu.be

It’s not the full journey and is only 3 minutes long. You can see how smooth the Valiant is as the camera is solidly fixed to the handlebars. This trip out was to Hayes as I needed to put some cheques into the bank and on returning to the bike one gentleman was hovering. He finally asked me if he could take some picture of the bike. I agreed and removed the tank bag and stood well back so he could have an uninterrupted view of the Valiant. He had never seen one before and wondered what it was. I took the opportunity to tell him about it and the Museum where he could see more vintage bikes. Moving on it may seem that I am the only one doing things but within the team Pete has reported back to me on what he has been up to recently. He is also frequently out to club meetings and shops spreading the word last week at Liberty Motorcycles who do training, Rose MOT centre at Sunbury on Thames and Richardson’s in the High street, Feltham who has put up a LMM poster as well as having the fliers. Now we get to Thursday and my Wey Valley Bike Club run out with the ROG’s politely this is referred to as the Retired Old Gentlemen and Thursday started a bit wet before drying up and being quite pleasant at the end of the afternoon. 

I kept my waterproof oversuit on all morning to ward off the evil rain fairy with a great deal of success as the group headed towards Eastbourne and lunch of moules et frites at the Belgian Cafe on the sea front.

All in all a very nice ride out only covering some 226 miles for the day. This was quite a small group with new faces that were not aware of the existence of the museum. So, everywhere I go I have fliers with me to hand out to the unexpected.

Ally Pally 2013 Part 2

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7^th and 8^th September 2013.

Sunday morning dawned and I was on my way to Ally Pally on the tube. It was cloudy and the sun was peeping from behind the clouds. Greenford tube station was closed, so was Hangar lane, the Central line was out of sorts until White City. I had been on my journey for almost an hour and I felt as though I had got nowhere. I got another tube to Finsbury Park and then couldn’t find the bus stop to get to Alexandra Palace. Finally I did, it was around the corner out of sight and not even a signpost to guide you. A short wait and I was on the move again. I finally arrived at the show about 10:10am. Ron was already there. He knew I might not be on time and Paul arrived a few minutes after me. That was a two hour journey compared with 40 minutes on a slow bike. No wonder public transport is not the main choice for travelling. I have been on local buses and I could have walked to my destination faster!

More visitors today and more interest in the club stand and the club. The Museum exhibit was again a centre of interest and gives me another opportunity to hand out fliers along with a few for the British Motorcycle Trust. I did another walk around and took a few more pictures of interesting bikes, a nicely restored Triumph and another version of the Monkey Bike that was homemade and for sale.

 I bought some instant glue that might just repair the horn rubber on the Valiant that had split at the ends and talked to the British Legion Bikers and the Christian Bikers. One of the guys was very keen to hand out fliers for me at the events he would be going to later in the year so I left him with a wad. More from the stunt men and more noise and burnt rubber. The day was going quickly as the pasty lunch disappeared in a few mouthfuls with a bottle of water. My voice was starting go by the end of the afternoon. Paul had persuaded a young lady who was handy out air fresheners to sit on one of the bikes. She instantly leapt on the Valiant and Paul captured it with his camera. He persuaded her to return after her trip around on a stunt bike to be photo’d on his LE.

At 4pm prizes were awarded to the best bikes in show. A beautifully restored 125 Bantam won the best British bike on show and I gained another runner up prize for the Valiant.

 The Two Stroke club had the best stand prize and the business stand that had the DKW on received a prize for the most interesting bike in the show. It was a 4.2L Kawasaki 48 pot giant! 

By the time the awards had finished all the visitors had gone and by 4:30pm wed started to dismantle the stand and Gita arrived in the car to take it all away. She left and so was a plate for the rope-cum-banner barrier. I tried phoning her but Ally Pally has no signal so Paul was left to sit on it to take it away. There was a heavy shower as we were about to leave so we all hung around until the rain stopped. We said our farewells to the Bantam club some of them I am starting to know as I have spoken to them at the Bristol Classic Bike show, Kempton Park and at Stafford. There was heavy traffic on the North Circular and the Valiant was playing up. It was not many minutes before I had filtered through the traffic and passed Gita in the car. She did catch me up as the Valiant came to a halt at Hangar lane where it refused to go any further. I messed about with plugs and after a few false starts reset the timing and managed to get home. Must be the price to pay for winning a prize I guess!