The Vintagent

'SELLING SPEED'

2012-01-30T01:04:00.000-08:00

This article originally appeared in the Dec.2011 issue of French Café Racers magazine.

Even in 1903, the makers of this Phoenix promoted 'dropped' handlebars and a racing crouch...the first Café Racer.

The first motorcycle race started when the second motorcycle was built. And the first motorcycle advertisement was placed immediately after the finish of that first race, arm-waving about the superiority of the winning machine. Motorcycle advertising has a natural ‘hook’ in the lure of Speed, although manufacturers have had mixed feelings about selling what riders really wanted, deep down in their speed-demon souls. From the first days of the 20th Century, builders and buyers of motorcycles have played a complex and curious dance around the subject of Speed, with the Industry anxious to spread a message of respectability and docility for their noisy, horse-scaring moto-bicycles, keeping a low profile about the exhilaration of pulling the throttle lever all the way back. Customers were savvy to the game, navigating the great restrictive forces of Love and Law - parents, spouses, and the police – who could not abide an explicit celebration of the narcotic draw of competition and its handmaiden, Danger. Thus, it took many decades before it was publicly acknowledged that lurking in the puritan hearts of all potential motorcyclists was a dangerous, speed-crazed hooligan, hell-bent on going faster than anyone on the damn road.

WT Marsh in 1904 on a gargantuan single-cylinder racer, from the Age of 'Monsters'...

Strangely, while companies like Indian, Phoenix, and Mars were among the first to sell (and advertise) motorcycles built exclusively for racing, they relied on the vast support system of ancillary suppliers (of tires, chains, magnetos, etc) and especially the emerging motorcycle press, to tell the story of Speed. Magazines were desperate in fact to show what it was all about, as accounts of speed and racing were far more interesting than mileage figures and club reports. Accessory makers and magazines had no need to veil the magnetic pull of fast riding, as their audience were already motorcyclists, and few non-motorcyclists scoured trade publications. Trade and press tore the brown paper wrapper from their copy, glorifying competition and competitors in equal measure, and selling, by magical association, the adrenaline high of splitting the atmosphere at lethal velocities. Thus, we see Dunlop tires regularly advertising race wins, Lodge spark plugs documenting bold-type heroic victories, and Castrol, always Castrol, selling oil on the back of a racer flat on the tank, ‘speed whiskers’ streaming from his back.

Brooklands in 1910; a Triumph leads on an already ragged-looking race surface

In the early days of motorcycling, racing had a dual purpose; the simple thrill of competition was justified by the rapid technological development which accompanied the failures of machinery. If bikes were fast, reliable, and good-handling from the start, the industry would have evolved slowly, but early motos were far from any of those things, frequently catching fire, breaking their frames, flattening tires, and skidding off the ‘roads’ of the day. Similar to war's stimulus of new technology – though far less traumatically - endurance trials and racing kept manufacturers’ toes in the fire of continual improvement, even if they didn’t participate. When Indian swept the Isle of Man TT races in 1911, winning 1/2/3 on the new ‘Mountain’ course, the press (and Indian) made quite a fuss over their 2-speed gearboxes, which was exactly one more ‘gear’ than any other maker, beside Scott (who won two years later). Even manufacturers who never supported race teams or offered ‘TT Replicas’, knew the jig was up for the belt-drive, and started experimenting with epicyclic hub gears, twin chains, and proper gearboxes.

In 1907, this gentleman did 112mph on Daytona beach...

The motorcycling press grew hand in hand with the industry, commenting then as now on the whole wide range of Motorcycling, saying what manufacturers could not by reporting on what motorcyclists wanted to read. Given the tiny number of riders who actually prepared their machines and risked their lives on a racing track made of dirt or splintery boards, the early press devoted a huge percentage of paper to racing, and very little to boring but respectable owner’s club or technical matters, because of course, racing is damned exciting stuff. And better still when accompanied by photos…the best possible advertisement for the sport being a small, grainy image of some track hero crouched over his crudely evolved bicycle, kicking up dust from the back tire. Two paragraphs with a shorthand tale of neck-and-neck struggles were enough to stir the imagination of thousands of readers. Racing became the stuff of dreams immediately… even before motorcycles had proper races to themselves.

One of the very first 'production racers'; the 1906 Mars 'Renntypus'

The earliest days of motorcycling are beholden to the bicycle in ways not obvious; yes, we inherited two wheels from our pedaling brethren, but more significantly, the first truly visible motorcycles were used as ‘cycle pacers’, allowing bicyclists on banked tracks in the US and Europe to ‘draft’ the noisy, exhaust belching monsters, wobbly and prone to crashing in the heyday of cycle bowl racing of the late 1890s. The fascination of the press helped promote the idea of motorized two wheelers as fast and worthy of further development, independent of bicycles. Its no accident that many of the first production motorcycles were built by former bicycle racers, race team managers, or the bicycle companies themselves…they were already using ‘pacers’ on the track, and pretty soon, the pacers left the pedalers behind and raced each other, developing their machines into proper motorcycles. With competition already in their blood, it was natural they wanted to race their newfangled machines as well.

1908; Indian's Charles Gustavson giving his 'torpedo tank' some stick, and winning the race

In 1909, while Indian was selling its first ‘torpedo tank’ racing motorcycles to the public, making a name across the globe, in Italy a group of radical artists were creating a completely new approach to the romance of Speed and the impending mechanization of the world. The Italian artist Filippo Marinetti published his wild and deliberately provocative Futurist Manifesto on the front page of France’s respected newspaper, Le Figaro, on Feb. 20 1909: "We declare that the splendor of the world has been enriched by a new beauty: the beauty of speed….A roaring motor car which seems to run on machine-gun fire, is more beautiful than the Victory of Samothrace.” This from an age when automobiles and motorcycles were only recently freed from repressive 20kph speed laws on the horrid, unpaved roads of the day, and when vehicles were slow and unreliable in the extreme… the Futurists stood on the edge of a promontory, shouting about what was to come, way ahead of the curve.

Another train as symbol of change; the Futurist locomotive smashing reality itself in an unstoppable rush to modernity! Gino Severini ca. 1914

Being by self-definition an excitable bunch of Italians, the Futurists had plenty to say, and invested their artistic energy in new forms of typography and layout, attempting to capture movement via the pattern of words and images on the page. Their aesthetic impact rippled around the world, creating a new vocabulary of motion; graphic artists took note, and gradually the fussy late 1800s Beaux-Arts style of busty, corseted goddesses floating on clouds near parked two-wheelers gave way finally to ‘speed whiskers’, urgent movement, and the adrenalin romance of Speed. Big-titted goddesses would return, but not until the 1960s!

A 1909 ad for NSU, with Eddie Lingenfelder aboard, after winning several races in Los Angeles. A built-for-racing v-twin of purposeful design

By the ‘Teens, motorcycles were good enough to use as basic transport, even a strictly utilitarian object, but each country had a ‘tipping point’ when cars outnumbered motorcycles on the road, and bikes gradually evolved into pleasure objects (or even luxuries) rather than necessary transport. In the United States, that change happened earliest, thanks to Henry Ford, whose Model T - so basic, yet surprisingly complicated to drive - suddenly rendered ‘exposed transport’ semi-obsolete. Initially costing and enormous $850 (1909), by the early 20’s the price had fallen to $290, which was little more than the price of a new Harley-Davidson, and much less than the best of motorcycles, such as the Henderson 4-cylinder ($435). Motorcycles were still terribly exciting though, and the liberation of bikes from ‘labor’ or necessity was akin to casting off the yoke of a burdened horse…suddenly, it was fun to ride for its own sake. Of course, it had always been fun, the little secret amongst bikers, but with the liberation of motorcycles from work, fewer excuses were necessary. Manufacturers and advertisers were freed to tell a more true story of the pleasures of two wheels, while 'Grapes of Wrath' author John Steinbeck had a few words to say about the Model T: " Two generations of Americans knew more about the Ford [ignition] coil than about the clitoris, about the planetary system of gears than the solar system of stars.” Bikers may not know their constellations while out on a clear night, but without a roof they see can those stars twinkling on high, riding swiftly to demonstrate knowledge of their lady love’s anatomy…

Accessories suppliers were free to advertise our inclinations to race; 'Clincher' motorcycle tires of 1917

The Model T and its international cousins (the Austin 7, the Peugeot Bébe, the BMW Dixi) changed motorcycling itself, freeing two wheels to be what they are best at; delivering an erotic injection of Life to the rider, providing thrills, excitement, prestige, and danger in equal measure. Very few automobiles, no matter how sexy, deliver the all-senses stimulation of a motorbike; the nature of all but the most sporting automobiles is to insulate the driver from the assaults of Nature and the road, whereas the motorcyclist embraces all these as the essential appeal of a vulnerable, sensate Life. The mundane and inexpensive car increased the public’s desire to travel, they saw value in being taxed to improve roads and infrastructure, which of course benefitted motorcyclists as well; while smoothing the way for good citizens to drive to work, newly paved highways meant the increasingly fast bikes of the 1920s could leave long black streaks on those roads.

A 1914 NUT (Newcastle Upon Tyne) ad, after a good run at the Isle of Man TT on a 500cc v-twin

During the 1914-18 'Great War', the only advertising with speedy motorcyclists showed dispatch riders (a new feature of war) high-tailing it across shelled fields, narrowly avoiding burst bombs and certain death. Motorcyclists have always understood the rest of the world holds lethal threats – the road, the car, the dog- but in WW1, they were literal moving targets…"just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not trying to kill you!" After the madness of the Great War, the market was flooded with ex-military machines painted to civilian colors, while factories needed a moment to transition away from military production, and introduce new models to a public eager to forget the horror.

By 1921 NSU ads were aggressively modernist and nearing abstraction...but still looked fast.

In prosperous England and the US, and eventually the rest of Europe, the late ‘Teens became the ‘Roaring 20s’, which were exactly that, echoing with the blast of powerful engines from increasingly reliable motorcycles and cars. While lightweight bikes dominated European roads and much of the English market, they nearly disappeared in America, which grew its own heavy-duty branch of the motorcycle tree. Even in countries crowded with fizzy, smoky little two-strokes, all eyes were on the big machines, winning important international races and setting World Speed Records. Motorcycle advertising, which had its ear bent by the Futurists, was soon treated to a one-two punch of graphic design; Art Deco and the Bauhaus.

By 1927, Norton were in full Deco mode; the Zeppelin sidecar made by Mills-Furford, the lady's cloche hat, the gent's flat cap and generous Stormguard coat...

Art Deco began to change the ‘look’ of bikes in the 1920s, with general prosperity reflected in shiny nickel, and pressed-metal shapes of mudguards and tanks which were suddenly ‘styled’, rather than collections of well-arranged boxes. Deco also transformed the visual representation of motorcycles in advertising, as graphic artists competed to out-style each other in presenting two-wheelers as geometric, hurtling masses, slanting towards the horizon - in imitation of Jacques Henri Lartigue’s large-format camera distortions of racing cars of 1911 onwards, his accident of the lens (created by a slow horizontal shutter plus a panning camera motion) inspiring generations of designers.

Cunning use of a slow horizontal shutter and panning camera motion invented the 'oval' racing wheel distortion. Jacques Henri Lartigue, 1912

Such imagery changed how motorcycles inhabited people’s thoughts, by planting visual clues that motorcycles were now chic accessories for well-paid, or merely aspirational new owners. The very concept of advertising, which can be stretched to cover industry press coverage, is an attempt to change the perception of the public towards material goods, in order to make them appealing enough to part with hard-earned cash.

BMW brochure from 1930; roaring past obstacles at a time of economic chaos in Germany

As the 1920s progressed, the development of German Bauhaus typography and graphics integrated both the Futurist and Deco languages, codifying the ‘modern look’ of advertising, and much of the publishing world as well. The spare and balanced geometry of the Bauhaus, its love of color blocks and collaged photos and paper, led to a Golden Age of motorcycle brochures and posters. Probably the best example is closest to the source; BMW, whose very logo could have been lifted from a Bauhaus instruction book, and whose bikes rapidly evolved from their first (1923) rather pokey models, to the sleek, fast, and elegant machines of the late 1920s, as the factory grew into devotees to the cult of Speed to a degree matched by none other in the industry.

Ernst Henne on the fearsome BMW WR750 supercharged 750cc record-breaker with which he recorded 150.73mph at Tat, Hungary, in 1932

Not just fast, but Fastest; BMW obsessively pursued the World Motorcycle Speed Record with single-minded vigor, and was among the first adopters of superchargers on motorcycles, bolting on blowers a mere two years after the founding of the company in 1923; these supercharged toddlers wobbling at first, but gaining in strength and confidence over a short few years. It was BMW against the world in the ultimate speed stakes of the 1930s, opposed only by rag-tag, privateer British teams using comparatively outdated, oversized, supercharged JAP-engined v-twins, which were also surprisingly fast. After taking the Land Speed Record 6 times in 7 years, BMW was crowned with the ultimate speed laurels on both racetracks and record books…at which point they promptly declared war on the whole world. Their ads might have been a warning of certain imperialistic intentions…

Global domination, anyone? A 1938 BMW brochure depicting the soon-to-be all-conquering BMW RS255 Kompressor, with which Georg Meier would win the '39 Isle of Man TT

A parallel branch of graphic advertising was less stylized, less avant-garde, and rebelled against the geometric tendencies of modernist design, embracing the very counterpoint of abstraction, hewing closer to the Expressionist artists of the ‘Teens and Twenties, true heirs to those first attempts at capturing mechanical motion by JMW Turner and the Futurists.

The French OSA concern used Futurist painting techniques in its ads...

The Expressionist motorcycle artists, best exemplified by the fantastic French painter Geo Ham, used gouache as their medium rather than photography, and depicted romanticized motorcycles and riders hurtling through moody, multicolored fogs, towards victory, or eternity. Tension in the world of fine art, between the competing schools of disegna and colori, had been the story of Art since the Renaissance - those who loved tight design and draughtsmanship versus those who needed an emotional impact... Raphael vs Michaelangelo, Manet vs Monet, Classicism vs Romanticism.

'Rain, Steam, and Speed', 1844, JMW Turner; 23 years before the invention of the motorcycle, a train of the Great Western Railway in England crosses the Maidenhead railway bridge crossing the Thames river, out of London. A small hare can be seen running on the left side of the painting, terrified of the dark and noisy monster approaching.

The root stock of all Expressionist motorcycle painting was JMW Turner’s incredible ‘Rain, Steam, and Speed’, the first successful attempt of a Fine Artist to grapple with mechanized motion (in the form of the Great Western Railway). The entire Futurist Manifesto of 1909 might be summed up as a cocaine- and alcohol-fuelled dance around this singular painting! Credit for the ‘swoosh’ style of expressionist motorcycle advertising can be laid directly at Turner’s doorstep, not because motorcyclists are particularly fond of his painting, but the graphic artists hired to sell bikes had all been to art school and had their noses rubbed daily in the Masters. 80 years after Turner painted ‘Rain, Steam, and Speed’, his moto-acolytes were churning out homages - ‘Wheels, Smoke, and Speed’ – exhibited on posters and the pages of Moto Revue. The cat was fully out of the bag now, and the allure of Speed itself became the favored sales tool.

The Swiss Motosacoche firm used fantastically abstract and dramatic imagery in the 1920s and 30s

In this Golden Age of moto-advertising, manufacturers competed with each other to hire the finest artists and graphic designers, each giving their client a distinctive ‘look’, all of them seeking to out-Turner or out-Bauhaus each other. We are left with a body of exquisite graphic works from the period, dozens of offerings to the gods of Speed. Distinctive regional styles emerged by the late 1920s, with artists from the United States heavily influenced by the naturalistic school of American Scene Painting and the Social Realists. Advertising for Harley-Davidson motorcycles were highly romanticized, but rejected European modern art tendencies, following instead the lead of Grant Wood and Norman Rockwell. While their paintings and drawings still celebrated speed, the unwholesome, messy passion of the of the Futurists was scrubbed away, and riders are generally rosy-cheeked, squeaky clean gents in tweed suits.

Exhaust like thunder, blasting through clouds, a missile on the road.

While they still ‘split the air like a rocket’, to quote the H-D ad, the American riders weren’t possessed by demonic spirits or seeking to transform the world into tidy geometric shapes, although these were fabulous metaphors for the developing political situation in Europe in the 1930s...

The clean-cut, well dressed Harley riding fellow, still beating hell out of town on his 1930 model

The finest American moto-art almost universally depicted civilians in street attire, even when hauling ass down the road; a distinct contrast to the helmeted, square jawed, battling heroes on the cover of European catalogs. This aesthetic dialogue between the international community of motorcycle manufacturers can be read like a deck of tarot cards, portending the future, as an obliviously civilian America would shortly be drawn into militarized conflict, the madness of Fascism, and war in Europe.

RC Reyrolles' 1946 paintings, as used by HRD-Vincent in their first postwar brochures

After those 6 years of war, conscription, rationing, and fear, the immediate postwar period saw motorcycles depicted as vehicles of liberation. Freedom to roam the countryside, freedom to seduce women, freedom to blast down the road on “the fastest standard motorcycle in the world – that’s a fact, not a slogan”, or so said the Vincent HRD brochure. The first brochures and posters of the late 1940s followed the prewar patterns, although Bauhaus geometry was a painful association, and Modernist tendencies were dropped in favor of the old ally of Turner’s moody speed…but wait, the solitary knight of the prewar days has been joined by a hot girlfriend, as our hero hurtles down the road to prove he is no Model T owner…thus the Baby Boom begins in earnest.

Prototype HRD-Vincent Series B Rapide as painted in 1946 By RC Reyrolles...bobby sox and rolled jeans, although the man's petite red scarf reveals the artist to be French!

The early 1950s were a mix of, once again, the necessary yoke of utility for most machines, as much of the world struggled to rebuild lives and jobs, combined with an increasingly frantic focus on making ‘range leader’ bikes bigger and faster. America, un-bombed and un-rationed, had an insatiable hunger for fast motorcycles, and skewed the world’s production towards its peculiar landscape of vast open spaces, and blossoming competitions on the sands of Daytona, the dirt of Laconia, or the desert of California.

If you happen to be the importer of Norton Manx racers, why not put yourself on the brochure, racing one?

Brochures and advertising focused almost exclusively on racing machines, and romantic paintings were less common, increasingly replaced by photographs of racing heroes on the latest model, flat out at the Isle of Man TT or leaping dirt humps in the Catalina Island Grand Prix. Our old friends the artists were still employed at times to give an emotional push, to make bikes look faster, and when they painted, the old regional artistic tendencies still showed, with Rockwellian Americans gunning their new Sportster in blue jeans and a windbreaker, while the Brits might still morph into hurtling, helmeted hulks, at one with their fire-breathing Turner-cycles.

This 1963 ad for the Norton Atlas (showing a production racing event) definitely harks back to JMW Turner...

As the 1960s progressed, a potent mix of the Joint and the Pill meant clothing, sexual mores, and advertising went through radical changes. While ‘swinging London’ had laconic, miniskirted babes draped over Nortons and Triumphs, Harley preferred to show clean-cut, wholesome couples having fun on their bikes, and downplayed speed as a sales element. H-D was grappling with a serious image problem in the States, as the exploits of a few hundred ‘1%’ bikers in patch clubs drew media attention completely out of proportion to their actual influence. Of course, press attention being another form of advertising, tales of wild bikers fueled a craze for customization in homage to the Outlaw machines, which the crewcut squares in H-D management tried desperately to avoid.

The 1962 James Superswift needed a bit of sex appeal, although the unfortunate model on the right found herself re-touched out of this ad...

And suddenly, an entirely new gang of bike makers burst onto the global scene, from Japan and Europe. The infamous unthreatening sex-neutral ‘nicest people’ Honda advertising campaign of the 1960s brought many thousands of new riders to the fold, and mimicked the Harley philosophy of showing young, healthy riders out for some good clean fun, and not too fast please. The other Japanese makers showed not-so-nice riders actually using their bikes for what they did best, with speed whiskers and moody landscapes replaced by speed-blurred photography, capturing unfocused dragstrip launches, peripheral-vision wheelies, and moto-babes in sharp detail.

Fantastic Kawasaki MachIII ad...no more Mr. 'Nicest' Guy...

The Kawasaki Mach III did “the quarter mile in 12.6 seconds. You know what you can do with your Honda.” Ouch. The pattern was set, and hasn’t changed much in the past 40 years; colorful photography and clever by-lines touting drag strip times and top speeds, as increasingly specialized motorcycles are divided into camps; touring, naked, dirt, and sport. The motorcycle press is in love with wheelies, stoppies, smoky burnouts, and stunters, but there’s little Romance left in the selling of Speed.

Finally, after nearly 100 years, images of women who ride began appearing, the start of another thread of advertising entirely...

Back to the Future: in 1899, Motorcycles Comiot advertised its three-wheeler as suitable transport for the modern woman. Théophile Alexandre Steinlen was the artist; surely the first motorcycle ad with a woman piloting the machine and not merely décor?

JUST TODAY

2012-01-24T17:38:00.000-08:00

Just Today
we abandon
seeing and knowing and naming,
and indulge
shadows, darkness, and mystery.
What we find in those shapes
has no name,
why we are moved
has no explanation,
that we are moved
means we are alive.

Thanks for the tour, Jerry!

LAS VEGAS 2012: TRENDS...

2012-01-22T12:42:00.000-08:00

A few of the du Pont collection at Bonhams...

If you find gossip entertaining, then the Las Vegas motorcycle auction weekend of 2012 was a better show than Cirque du Soleil or Celine Dion; the forced entry of RM subsidiary Auctions America into the January calendar had tongues wagging, tempers flared, and 'flippers' happy. 2011 marked the first major change in what had been the sole province of MidAmerica Auctions, whose annual 500-machine marketplace was at the time the biggest single vintage bike auction in the world, for over 20 years. The entry of Bonhams into the weekend event last January hinted stormy weather, although only minor flurries materialized, as Bonhams discreetly tucked their 1-day auction into a Thursday daytime slot, allowing buyers taxi time for the South Point Casino, and Ron Christensen's MidAmerica dinner auction.

MidAmerica's Ron Christensen

The storm arrived this year with the decision of RM to land its schedule squarely atop MidAmerica's dates; a Thursday evening dinner sale with ~75 bikes, followed by two full days of noisily auctioning several hundred further machines. 'V' is for Vegas, and also Vendetta; rumors circulated all year of failed buyout negotiations between RM and MidAmerica, including dramatic dialogue ('if I can't buy you I'll crush you!'), wildly fluctuating 'my buddy said' estimates of buyout sums offered, whispers of Herculean pressures on Auctions America's Glenn Bator to 'perform' this year, and RM's willingness to 'spend' (ie, lose) hundreds of thousands of dollars to squash MidAmerica, and establish RM as the King of vintage motorcycle sales across the globe. Bwahaha....

Nearly 700 bikes for sale at Auctions America

2011 saw some big shifts in the motorcycle auction world, with traditionally automotive houses RM and Mecum announcing moto-intentions by adding two-wheelers to their car sales, with mixed success; Mecum Auctions had a spectacular meltdown during Pebble Beach week in August 2011, selling reputedly 'bought-in' collections at no reserve, then watching helplessly as bidders failed to materialize, and the very same fellows who'd pocketed fat Mecum checks, were seen re-purchasing choice bikes from their former collections, at significant discount. Ouch. RM entered the fray in London quietly, adding 25 bikes from a single Italian collection to their flashy Battersea Park sale last October, all of which sold.


Bikes at the RM auction in London's Battersea Park, Oct. 2011

The notion that RM are bedazzling 'Top Dog' collars for their team isn't outlandish, as that's the position they hold in the collector automobile market worldwide...but it isn't MidAmerica they'll have to displace at the top of the dogpile - it's Bonhams, who currently sell about 1300 old bikes annually in the US, England, Europe, and Australia. MidAmerica auctions, a true mom-and-pop business out of Wisconsin, has Las Vegas and another small event in St.Paul as its traditional core of vintage bike sales (with around 700 bikes annually), so the RM invasion of its turf was a cause for some worry to the Midwesterners. To put it in perspective, RM's top four cars from their London sale would eclipse MidAmerica's entire yearly gross, and RM's annual car sales in toto dwarf the entire vintage motorcycle auction world. Hence the 'David and Goliath' stories during Las Vegas, and a few indignant Vegas regulars' refusal to even set foot in cavernous halls of the Rio.

The big hall at the Rio casino; nearly 700 bikes at Auctions America/RM

As it turned out over the course of the weekend, enough buyers appeared at every auction, opened their wallets wide, and spent around $10.5 Million combined at all three auction houses. This is over 3 times the cash flow back in 2010, when MidAmerica was the sole auction house mid-Winter in the Nevada desert. Clearly, there ARE enough 'asses for (motorcycle) seats'...to whom I must include myself, as I bought a bike too!

Bonhams' CEO Malcolm Barber conducted most of the sale at the Imperial Palace

Bonhams [note: principal sponsor of The Vintagent] started the ball rolling on Thursday at the no-frills Imperial Palace hotel, in the back of their Auto Collections museum. When you eventually found the auction hall, it was clear Bonhams had consigned exactly the kind of 'rusty junk' which drives collectors cash-crazy; the time capsule DuPont collection of bikes, and more importantly, bike parts, with super-rare Indian, Harley, Ace, and Henderson bits, sold for enormous money, and bouyed the Bonhams bottom line significantly. Everything oxidized sold for several times its estimate, leading one wag to joke, 'are those estimates so low to make a good press release later?' The hall was full all day long, and a parade of fantastic original-paint bikes sold for very solid prices. No records set, but no setbacks either, especially when two Vincent Black Shadows (one 3k-mile 'barn find' Series B, one immaculate Series D), sold for $122,500 each. Bonhams had an overall excellent result, totaling around $2M in a single day, surely the most profitable of all three auctions of the weekend, as a proportion of bikes/total sales, or even total sales/time spent selling!

One of the fantastic low-mile, one-family Du Pont collection of bikes; this '51 Triumph TR5 Trophy was my favorite

Bonhams even finished a few minutes early, and bidders scurried away to make the MidAmerica dinner auction (which was well attended) or the Auctions America steak dinner (which was not so well attended, and RM's paid-for filets were reportedly being given away to anyone within earshot). Rumors began circulating immediately that it was bargain time at the Rio Hotel; as Auctions America has a 'no reserve' policy for bikes estimated under $20,000, buyers were happy to snap up inexpensive classics, and more than one acquaintance was heard 'calling home' to increase their allowance...some buyers loaded up with nine, ten, or fifteen machines to bring home, often to re-sell from their business at a profit. The spirit of Arbitrage is alive and well in Las Vegas; motorcycle gambling is fun for the whole family!

The 1915 Iver Johnson 'never started' twin which sold for $299,600

There were fewer outright bargains at MidAmerica, as even many low-price bikes held reserves, but at the end of the weekend, they could boast the most expensive sale ($299,600 for a 1915 Iver Johnson in -mostly- original paint), and very few machines remained in their 'second chance corral'; Ron Christensen looked a satisfied man on Saturday afternoon, and whatever fears of RM stealing their thunder proved unfounded; if anything, it seemed many more motorcyclist attended this year's Las Vegas sales than ever before, which can only be a good thing.

The Auctions America podium, with a couple of nice Harleys ready for the hammer...

It was more difficult to gauge the mood at RM/Auctions America by the end of Saturday; with nearly 700 bikes on sale, it was clear they'd aggressively sourced bikes to create the biggest collection of vintage motorcycles ever offered for auction at a single event. It was their first year, they'd had plenty of buyers in the halls, and over $4M changed hands. Buyers were certainly happy with their bargains, but one seller commented that Auctions America had 'set back auction prices 10 years.' Whether the overall result was profitable is a question I can't answer, but with a serious cash reserve from high-dollar car sales, RM can afford to spend money and establish their name in the global vintage motorcycle calendar.

The moto-panel at the Rio; Mark Hoyer, editor of Cycle World, Buzz Walneck, writer Doug Mitchell, collector Joe Boortz

As a final note; Auctions America hosted a panel discussion on 'the state of motorcycle collecting', which I'll summarize in another post. The success of this panel (with host Dave Despain of Speed TV, and four moto-luminaries) made me wonder if Las Vegas could become the world's first vintage motorcycle Convention...enough bike collectors, writers, investors, and enthusiasts are milling around the horror which is Sin City over four days, that a few seminars, films, and demonstrations would be a welcome and well-attended diversion. Just a thought...

LAS VEGAS 2012: AUCTIONS AMERICA (RM)

2012-01-17T17:38:00.000-08:00

Star of the show - star of the whole weekend actually - the 1895 Roper Steam Velocipede, one of the oldest motorcycles made in America, and Roper's second motorcycle; his first sits in the Smithsonian Museum, and is the oldest motorcycle in the world at 1867...a title shared with the Perraux steam cycle of France, built the same year.

The condition of the Roper is phenomenal. While it has lost its asbestos cladding of the burner box, the motorcycle is otherwise complete and original, having passed from Roper's son to a museum, then a private owner. Read the story here.

Alas, it went unsold at the auction; rumor has it that RM owns this machine, purchased for ~$500k.

The 1928 Brough Superior SS100 'Dunlop' bike attracted a lot of interest, but not enough to meet reserve...

Another favorite; an original paint 1929 Cleveland 'Tornado' 4-cylinder, a real hotrod in the day, capable of over 100mph, and beloved of police forces lucky enough to use them! Also unsold...

Racers! A 1959 AJS 7R ($39,200) and cool Norton dustbin

Auctions America consigned a large Cotton collection, this one from 1928, with a 350cc Blackburne engine'...

The Blackburne engine in question...

...plus a groovy cast-aluminum 'Cotton' silencer.

Will six be enough for you, sir? The Benelli 750 Sei..

This is not camera distortion; the largest tank ever on a '63 Cotton Conquest

1899 De Dion / Peugeot trike...just like they race them in England. That's right; never let it be said valuable old bikes are left to languish in collections - the best owners use them! Alas, unsold...

After purchase, Clay mentioned not liking the white of this Excelsior 4-cylinder..."But all the rest are blue!" I noted, and he felt better about his 'ghost' machine.

Great period details, great patina...

Auction America's Glenn Bator with an 1925 HD Board Track Racer...

The hall at the Rio casino, plenty spacious for 700 or so bikes...

Glorious 1913 Henderson Model B, an older restoration, with just enough use to give it an appealing patina.

Business end of a one-off jet bike, with an 317hp from its Allison turbine...

...this is not Allison Turbine...

Not enough dustbins these days; it was a pleasure to see this one ready for the track...

...and even better from this position! Norton Manxes with such fairings are rare...

Sweet Rickman-Triumph, already in the van...

This ex-Steve McQueen, Von Dutch pinstriped Scott Squirrel is the sister of one which sold for $276,000 and sits on my 'Top 20' at Auction list...but this one failed to sell.

Winner - best transfer. The Tehuelche 75cc ohc single-cylinder racer, from Argentina...

...with a lovely little engine, and a train of gears to the top.

A second Cleveland Tornado, this one restored. Also failed to sell...

Greg recognized what was advertised as a '61 Triumph Bonneville, to be in reality a matching-numbers 1959 model, far rarer, and felt he got a bargain at $3500...

Vicki Smith with what she knows best; Ducatis

The 1902 (or maybe '04) Whitley of Coventry, the only known example, and in original paint. Sold for $44,800

Two HD XR750 flat-trackers passed over the auction block...

Brett Robinson and the HD Panhead he felt was a bargain at $15,000...nice to see some fresh faces at Las Vegas!

LAS VEGAS 2012: MIDAMERICA

2012-01-17T15:59:00.000-08:00

MidAmerica's Ron Christensen checks out an original paint 1917 Excelsior twin, being pushed onto the podium...

Send Cliff Vaughs a royalty check for this mini-'Captain America'...

Interesting and very rare Winchester

Brought over from Germany to sell in America, but headed to Sweden! The amazing 1935 Böhmerland Langtourer...

Chantland checks Chantland...this custom Triumph uses a 1960s Chantland 750cc alloy cylinder barrel, made by Sid's father!

Quite an eyeful; classic 70s chopper, but built ca.1981

The engine of a '48 Triumph 3T Deluxe, a very rare pre-unit, iron-head 350cc

An oddball, non-factory supercharged BMW R51 racer. No provenance, no history, no build date, but interesting nonetheless

The blower and Amal carb of the R51; BMW did supercharge a few pushrod engines, ie the WR750, but not this late. They would have supercharged the R51RS production racer anyhow, and used an Amal-Fischer TT racing carb, not an ordinary Amal Type 276. Several privateers in postwar Germany added blowers to their BMWs for German national championship races (they were barred from international competition for a few years after WW2), usually 750cc R75 ex-military engines.

Beautiful BSA triple; prices for Tridents and Rocket 3s seem more robust than the twins...

Crowds seemed slightly smaller than previous years, but not by much, and overall sale rates were excellent at MidAmerica. A feared drop in sales due to the simultaneous Auctions America event proved groundless; the overall results at MidAmerica were better than last year.

Sadly, for display only! A fantastic Cyclone ohc roadster...

...which advertised the Steve McQueen bikes coming up for sale.

Sweet DB34 BSA Gold Star with a 'Penny Farthing' bicycle

Groovy little Honda 110cc café racer...

Highest sale price of the whole Las Vegas weekend was this 1915 Iver Johnson, supposedly never started and in excellent condition; $278,000

...although a very close inspection revealed a replacement chainguard; a different color, a different texture, intentionally scuffed up and with poorly matched pinstriping. The kind of detail which should be noted in an auction catalog, to dispel suspicions...

Iver Johnson, like FN and BSA, were initially known for making guns.

Always, always at a big auction you find something completely bizarre, a testament to one man's dream, or obsession...this motorcycle was built around a Lincoln V12 'Zephyr' engine.

John Stanley with his Velocette MSS; happy it sold, but 'not for enough!' The refrain of the weekend...

Hot pink Matchless G12...perhaps a non-stock color?

Plenty of variety lined up for the auction block; 90s Suzuki, 60s Lambretta, 70s Bultaco

LAS VEGAS 2012: BONHAMS

2012-01-12T09:27:00.000-08:00

Cool toys; Bonhams always has the best automobilia...this one kickstarts the bike and rumbles off!

One of a pair of Norton Manxes, this one restored

The incredible condition of the 1906 Indian Camelback has to be seen up close...

...although even from a distance, you can see how complete and correct it is. A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, for someone...

Ruffians! Restorers! Riders! Madden and Huntzinger...

Chris Carter jokes with the ex-WD BSA M21

Coventry Eagle 'Flying 8'

Ben Walker and Malcolm Barber discuss this original-paint Indian Board Track racer, owned by the Du Ponts since the 1950s; hard to get better provenance than that!

The unrestored Manx from the Du Pont collection

Merkel motor on an Indian bicycle

Late-entry Brough Superior SS100 with MX engine

And a very tasty machine it is...

Ner-a-Car, Scott, Indian

'47 Norton Inter with 1700 miles; Ben Walker wants it...

One for the history books, completely original, 65 years old

I like it too!

New York, 1951...a great place to ride your '39 Triumph Tiger 100 with a bronze head...

Matching up parts to bikes...so many spare engines and parts from the Du Pont family...

1923 Scott Squirrel in lovely condition, from the Isle of Man

Triumph Dragster; 60s supercool

1940 Indian Sport Scout front end; the rest of the bike is there too!

THE CLIFF VAUGHS STORY

2012-01-09T20:05:00.000-08:00

'Easy Rider'; Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper on the choppers built in Watts

Thanks to a bit of prompting (and a useful email contact) from a reader in New Zealand, the dormant-but-brewing story of the 'Easy Rider' motorcycles continues, following revelations in the 'Black Chrome' exhibit in Los Angeles that the designer and builders of the most famous motorcycles in the world were, in fact, black men, and further, the show implied that the 'Chopper' (extended-fork, elaborated customs) was invented by black bikers in Los Angeles.

If the chopper was indeed born in Watts, as suggested, then we are 50 years overdue for some cultural acknowledgement of the fact. The story resonates with Rock n' Roll's 'invention'; as Elvis Presley shook his way through Big Mama Thornton tunes, created a movement, and struck it rich, Big Mama got nary a nod, nor did any of the artists whose work Elvis mimicked, borrowed, or covered. Which doesn't detract from Elvis' genius, but it does bring up some nasty cultural baggage which was too uncomfortable to address, back in the day.

Elvis Presley with his H-D Panhead

Similarly, swastika-emblazoned '1%er' bikers in the 60s and 70s were flirting with or embracing the ragged edge of white supremacist ideology, and unlikely to praise the likes of Cliff Vaughs and Ben Hardy as inspiration for their choppers. It wasn't just bikers of course; the whole of the 60s Hippie counterculture has been criticized by black civil rights activists for 'dropping out' of the struggle for an end to the violence against black men in the South, or any political involvement beyond saving their own skin from being shipped to Vietnam.

From Rich Ostrander (Dr Sprocket), via Occhiolungo: two riders in LA, ca.1950; that's Lucius P. Dawkins on the Vincent. Any i.d. for the HD rider?

Many young black men were motorcyclists before the WW2, and after military service, had a similar experience to other two-wheel enthusiasts in SoCal; 'gimme a bike, and some room to ride'. The adrenaline and/or amphetamine rush of the War (with the US, Britain, Germany, and Japan handing out 'speed' like candy to their soldiers - a subject I'm working on...) could best be substituted with the physical thrill of riding a bike.

An LA rider in the late 1940s, from the 'Black Chrome' exhibit

Over time, black bikers modified their machines and formed gangs, in chronologic parallel with their Anglo counterparts. 'Bob-jobs' (whose rear fender was 'bobbed' short) were lightened for better performance, but over time, and as tastes changed, customized bikes became more elaborate and decorated, with 'raked' frames (increased steering head angle) and extended forks; the 'Chopper'. The question of 'who did it first' is interesting, and I'd like to see the photographic evidence for a proper history of Custom motorcycle development.

CLIFF VAUGHS AND 'EASY RIDER'; MORE THAN JUST THE BIKES:

The origin story of the 'Easy Rider' motorcycles, 'Captain America' and 'Billy's bike' (as they're now known), has been clouded by the very fact of their fame, the absence of their creator, and the odd, at times haphazard circumstances of the making of the film. Credit has at times been given to Dan Haggerty ('Grizzly Adams'), and many web and print stories repeat this misunderstanding; Haggerty did some repair to the machines and was their 'handler' at times, and possibly even re-created the 'ER' bikes, after they were used in most of the filming, and stolen before the movie was complete. [The Vintagent posted the story of Ben Hardy and the building of the 'ER' bikes, in March 2009.]

Cliff Vaughs today

Credit for the design of the 'Easy Rider' bikes (and other important aspects of the film, including the title!) is claimed by Cliff Vaughs, a civil rights activist, filmmaker, and biker (in the Chosen Few MC - a racially integrated club since 1960). Vaughs was a member of the SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee), a direct-action civil rights group, and a figure in many of the famous sit-ins, freedom rides, and marches in the 1960s South. He participated in, and photographed, many of the legendary civil rights confrontations of the era, although he missed the March on Washington because he was "building a chopper" in his backyard! Vaughs was also a documentary film maker, and made "What Will the Harvest Be?", about the rise of Black Power in the South, which included interviews with Martin Luther King, Stokeley Carmichael, and Julian Bond, and was aired on ABC-tv in the mid-60s. From documentaries, he moved into film production by the late 1960s. He was also, clearly, a motorcycle nut, and considered Ben Hardy his mentor in building, maintaining, and riding his machines.

Cliff Vaughs being dragged by National Guard troops at Cambridge, MD, May 2, 1964. Incredibly, this photo was taken (and c.) by photographer Danny Lyon, whose photo essay of time spent with the Chicago Outlaws MC is documented in his fantastic book 'The Bikeriders'. I look forward to exploring the story of these two 'outlaw' bikers, one black one white, in the civil rights movement of the 1960s.

When asked about his involvement with the 'Easy Riders' choppers, Cliff Vaughs sent the following statement to The Vintagent:

"I was working in the News Department at KRLA when Henry Fonda’s son, Peter, was arrested for possession of marijuana. I was mildly amused that so much interest was engendered by the incident, considering the number of citizens detained and incarcerated for smoking “pot".

Peter Fonda with his father, Henry. It must be the the late 60s; Dad has a paisley shirt.

We chatted for a while at the courthouse and I called in my story. He was interested in my hobby: designing and building motorcycles. It turned out that we lived in the same neighborhood, West Hollywood. I told him I was usually found in my back yard enjoying my hobby.

He came by a few days later accompanied by Dennis Hopper, whom I hadn’t seen since his performance in “Rebel Without A Cause” with James Dean. We talked and I learned that they [Fonda and Hopper] had been planning to develop a movie that centers on motorcycles. I agreed that the themes of the western were careworn but an American adventure with the protagonists riding motorcycles instead of horses was apt. We adlibbed a story line: two friends (not quite “bikers”), traveling across America seeking adventure. I offered the name “Easy Rider”, taken from the Mae West performance of “Where Has My Easy Rider Gone”, in the production “She Done Him Wrong”… The title had been an adornment of my house, on the wall; a tapestry with a hidden message sent to me by Susan Mansour, erstwhile friend.

We had several discussions about the project at my home in West Hollywood and agreed that we would have to develop interest in the movie outside my parlor. We were not particularly known well enough to raise interest or financing. Peter and Dennis had a long background in the industry; they would raise the money. I would design and build the motorcycles and develop the visual themes. Captain America and Bucky [Captain America's sidekick], costumes, colors: red-white-blue. I was accorded the title of Associate Producer. We named our company Pando.

Captain America and his sidekick, Bucky, the original name for Dennis Hopper's character, before it was decided that trouble with Marvel Comics was best avoided

Through Pando, I was instrumental in hiring Baird Bryant as Director of Photography and agreed to have Paul Lewis as Production Manager. Subsequently, Les Blank, Virgil Frye, Karen Black, Seymour Cassel, Francine Reid, Larry Marcus, were included. Jack Nicholson was hired after the New Orleans “shoot”. I never met Raphaelson and Snyder (?) who backed the film. Neither did I formally meet Terry Southern, credited with the screenplay. From my apercus the production proceeded admirably until the New Orleans shoot when there was a dispute about how much film was being used by the Director, Dennis Hopper. I was summarily fired from the production. The critics praised the film. Dennis was awarded “Best New Director” for ER.

There were no African Americans in the film as actors or participants in the production.

I didn’t have any contact with the production long after 'ER' was released. The casualty rates on motorcycle accidents were so high that I asked Peter Fonda for a letter of intent to use to fund “Not So Easy”[1973], an educational film on how to ride a motorcycle safely. Filmfair financed the film with full support of Harley Davidson. Harley Davidson provided Evel Knievel, who was under contract to them at the time. I had Evel Knievel’s Coliseum jump on film, and a performance by the LAPD motorcycle drill team. Two of my cronies from Hollywood Chosen Few appeared on film: "Rabbit", and “Billy Diamond” (deceased). It was required viewing at judicial traffic school for quite some time.

The motorcycles were designed and built by me in my back yard. My longtime friend and mentor Mr. Ben Hardy assisted me wholeheartedly. We had met when he taught me how to wire my first motorcycle, a 1947 “knucklehead” in 1961. He had contacts developed over years of repairing motorcycles in his shop on West Florence Ave. Jim Magnera of MC Supply was a valuable asset. He had arranged to act as my agent when Harley Davidson sold me an unnumbered engine (shovel head) which required a new law from the California Legislature. Mr. Magnera was also active in financing the burgeoning black motorcycle enterprise in South Central Los Angeles. Mr. Magnera and Mr.Hardy were instrumental in my relationships with motorcycle specialists in Los Angeles.

The 'Captain America' bike, designed out by Cliff Vaughs, built by Ben Hardy

In the creation I had: Buchanan for frame fabrication, Dean Lanza, art work, Larry Hooper, upholstery, LAPD junk yard engines: rebuilt by Mr. Hardy. I don’t remember the chrome shop. Mr. Hardy also designed and constructed one of the fine points on the motorcycles. I had wanted something unique and he built the curved tail light brackets. I don’t remember the shop that tailored the leathers for ER.
After I had completed the construction of the machines, the registration (pink slip) was in the name of Pando Company. I asked Mr. Hardy to assemble the two disposable motorcycles in his shop. I was simply too busy with the daily task production of 'ER' at the time to complete them at home.

Ben Hardy on his H-D Panhead

I have never actually seen 'Easy Rider'. It represented only a few months out of my 74 years. I had a lot of fun with the bikes and with the talented people I met while working on the film. I have special regard for Mr. James Magnera a man with foresight, who personally helped aspiring entrepreneurs in South Central Los Angeles. Mr. Ben Hardy who worked for me as a mentor and skillful craftsman on a dozen designs of my own motorcycles. Mr. Buchanan, the man to go to for excellent frame modification.
Mr. Dean Lanza, The Artist: Brilliantly designed my marijuana plant on candy-apple petrol tank. Mr. Larry Hooper, ever a fugitive…the best leather craftsman ever.
Mr. Larry Marcus knows more about tools than anyone.
Mr. Dennis Hopper, Director, underlined my contribution to the production of “Easy Rider”.
There has been a remarkable marketing of “custom motorcycles” since ER.
Items and modifications I worked out with Mr. Hardy et al are now manufactured on a production line. Harley Davidson had “Low Rider“. Innumerable entrepreneurs have made a good living popularizing and promoting the so called “chopper“.
I missed my fifteen minutes of fame…..

Clifford A. Vaughs
Tuesday 29 March, 2011
Portobelo, Panama

PS: As an addendum to ER:

The fiery ending is an example of art imitating life. I was riding my "chopper" on the highway between Pine Bluff and Little Rock; pursuing an assignment for SNCC to initiate a school boycott there. I had with me a staff member of the Arkansas Project, a Miss Iris Greenberg. A pickup truck passed us going in the opposite direction; stopped and turned around. They took a shot at us from behind and missed. They didn't pursue us any further...so I lived to tell this tale.

The genesis of Captain America theme may be found in comics of WW II. Captain America had a sidekick named Bucky. Captain America's ride was a motorcycle."

'Choppers' from May 1969

In an interview with writer Bob Garcia from Ed Roth's Choppers magazine in 1968, before 'Easy Rider' was released; Vaughs gave these views on film and motorcycling:

'WHAT IS YOUR RELATIONSHIP TO THE WORLD OF CYCLING?
“In terms of my own relation with my own motorcycle, it’s the final romantic expression that is left in this country. Obviously the frontier is gone. The cycle is the one thing that you can build from nothing—just a basket, and make something very, very beautiful and really put yourself into it. This goes from a simple question of chrome, to developing new designs, sissy bars, new ways of riding and things like that.”

Cliff Vaughs in 1968

HOW DID YOU FIRST BECOME INVOLVED WITH A CHOPPER?
“Certainly bikes attract a great deal of people who have basically been frustrated in their life. I haven’t been frustrated but I do view my bike as another way of relieving a lot of tension from myself. I have been riding since 1962. I even missed the March on Washington because I was building a chopper. I like my bike and I like Choppers and I’m very concerned about the restrictive legislation that is coming out from most states against the rider. Laws that are trying to keep Choppers off the road, and I think that a Chopper is a typically American expression.”

Vaughs' motorcycle in '68, from the Choppers mag interview

WHAT IS THE ROLE OF THE CHOPPER IN YOUR NEW FILM?
In “Easy Riders” the cycle is just a vehicle to get around on. It’s like the horse from the old days. What we are basically doing is psychological western. We have two guys who have problems and are into their own bag. They are good friends, they’ve made one big score and are off to Miami to retire. Now in the course of the film a number of things happen to them on their trip. These are things that could happen to a guy if he were driving a car, flying in an airplane or riding on a train—except for the fact that being on a bike—they are more vulnerable to what’s going on.”

Bikers as modern-day cowboys

Chopper asked Vaughs if the movie was going to say the same thing its predecessors from American International have said again and again.

“This is not what we are into. I think we can change the image of the cyclist, and make a significant contribution to changing the development of the cycle image. I don’t feel that Hollywood today is producing anything of much significance. And I think that this is the time to make the change, because the western has been the major success in this country. If we can change the vehicle from a horse to a cycle—and still develop good stories and good concepts then I think we have made a significant and artistic contribution to bikes and films.”
We asked Vaughs if any fulltime chopper rider could be trained by Hollywood into a Fonda role:
“No Peter and Dennis are very heavy into a lot of cultural things. They are in a position to be very, very socially aware of what’s going on. A lot of bikers just don’t know what’s going on because the whole weight of having to deal with everyday situations or hustling to live precludes any awareness of other problems. I mean, theirs is a hunting and gathering culture. You must remember that most bikers are not in a medium where they can project anything. Even if an average rider went on ”Meet the Press,” he would give the same rap about oppressed bike riders, patriotism, etc.”
He stated that before the film was started he indicated that one of the main things “Easy Riders” should do was break down the whole idea of black and white motorcycle clubs. “Because my investigation showed that white clubs had restrictive clauses and it’s only the blacks that are integrating. The Chosen Few has been integrated for a long period of time.”

The Chosen Few MC in the late 1960s

“In this film", said Vaughs "we have a situation where the two main characters are riding across country. Their bikes break down and they run into about 50 black cyclists. They are very, very up-tight, scared and shaken up. But, it works out very well because the black cats just say, “Can we help you get some gas?” Everything is very groovy. And that to me seems a real situation.”“I maintain if that situation can happen and it does in real life there is still some hope. There are many, many people that maintain that it can happen. “But I’ve seen it happen this way.”
Does Vaughs feel this situation is only confined to the cycle world? Naturally he answers in the negative.
“The cities are still going to burn despite the fact that these black cats stopped to help these white cyclists on the road.”
That baby is reality.'

JEAN DEPARA

2012-01-06T21:32:00.000-08:00

Sharp dressed man on a Vespa 180 Sprint

There's been a recent shift in Fine Art photography with African subject matter; instead of being wholly photos OF Africa by outside professionals, several photographers FROM Africa have finally gotten their due. The most famous of these is Malick Sidibé, who worked in Mali from the 1960s onwards, documenting street life and capturing the fashions and moods of Mali in his portrait studio (Studio Malick). Included in his many portraits are a few props from his subject's lives, which often meant small motorcycles and mopeds, with sharp-suited young men or whole families draped over their hard-earned mounts.

Jean Depara in a self-portrait

Congolese photographer Jean Depara (1928-97) is having his first full retrospective, at Maison Revue Noir in Paris, until Feb. 18, 2012. While his ouevre is similar to Sidibé, although his 'Jean Whiskey Depara photo studio shots were less interesting than photographs of the world he preferred to inhabit; the happening nightclubs and bars of Leopoldville (later, Kinshasa). Depara bought a camera (an Adox 6cmx6cm) in 1950 to document his wedding, but he became enthralled with image-making, and the interaction of photographer and subject.

Young woman on a Velosolex moped

Leopoldville was named after nightmare King Leopold II of Belgium - his mother Louise Marie d'Orléans may be a distant relation of mine - who used the famous explorer Henry Stanley (the inspiration for Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness', and Coppola's 'Apocalypse Now') to lay claim to the Congo as his private property, brutalizing and killing millions of Congolese in the process of extracting valuable rubber. The Democratic Republic of Congo gained independence in 1960, and in 1966 Leopoldville was renamed Kinshasa (after a local tribe who inhabited the area when Stanley established his settlement in 1881), an 'Africanization' process common in formerly colonized countries after liberation. [Only Brazzaville retains the name of a European founder - for more on that, read my article from Men's File #4.]

Late night ramblings around a moped...

Depara was in the thick of a cultural explosion in the mid-60s, as the country experienced an exhilarating wave of energy after independence. Kinshasa was musically the heart of Africa in the 60s, and Depara spent much of his time around the hot bands and night clubs, where his talents were noted by the famous Franco (Francois Makiadi Luambo), who needed an official photographer. This suited Depara, who by this time had honed his technique with the camera as an image-maker, and as a tool for seduction of women!

Jean Depara captured an era of curious integration of American culture as well, as local sapeurs (sharp dressers) sometimes wore cowboy outfits - the 'Bills' - and these make an interesting contrast with the work of Swiss photographer Karlheinz Weinberger and his 'Halbstarke'. Mods and cowboys, women in (or out of) gorgeous dresses, Vespas and mopeds, Depara gives us a glimpse of a very hip world we in 'the rest of the world' didn't have a clue existed.

The 'Bills', as in Buffalo Bill, with rolled-up jeans and flannel shirts, near the equator!

In the mid-1970s, as revolutions, coups, and communist takeovers swept Africa, Depara was offered a secure position as official photographer of the Congolese parliament, which he held until retirement in 1989. Uninterested in color photography or the declining profitability of the genre, he hung up his camera afterwards, and lived a comfortable existence with his 'villa and a convertible'. His work was published outside Congo only after his death in 1996, and is now appreciated by a global audience.

Electrified African music; Kinshasan 'mother of invention' amplification created a completely new genre - Congotronics!

BENELLI FOUR-CYLINDER RACERS

2012-01-02T20:41:00.000-08:00

The supercharged, water-cooled, four-cylinder Benelli 250cc racer of 1940

As the technological high points of 1920s motorcycle racing began to look, and perform, like the antiques they'd become by the 1930s, the Benelli brothers took stock of the obvious trends of Grand Prix racing; chiefly, more power from multi-cylinder, supercharged engines. Moto Guzzi, Gilera, BMW, DKW, NSU, and even AJS and Velocette in England were racing or developing such engines by 1938. As champions in the 250cc racing class, Benelli set about designing a new 250cc racer, with four cylinders, twin overhead camshafts, a supercharger, and watercooling. Trends in chassis development were also attended, and as sketched, the new machine would retain the hydraulic-damped girder forks and rear swingarm suspension of their singles, plus large-diameter alloy brakes to manage the inevitable blistering speeds to come from such an engine, given Benelli's expertise with tuning small engines, especially in cam design, intake porting, and carburation.

The 1940 Benelli 250-4 as it exists today

The gem of an engine designed by Giovanni Benelli produced in 1939 had a short stroke (42mm stroke x 45mm bore), with 12:1 compression pistons, and spun to 10,000rpm, at which point it cranked out 52.5hp, enough for 146mph on test runs - the fastest 250cc racer by a long shot, fully 16mph faster than their nearest rival, the brilliant supercharged 250cc flat-single from Moto Guzzi. With such devastating performance (exceeding by 20mph the factory 500s of Norton and Velocette!), Benelli were confident of another European Championship, but the little 'four' wasn't ready for the 1939 racing season. By the time the 'engine bugs' were sorted, it was 1940, and the competition was no longer playing nice.

The new 250cc double-overhead-camshaft four-cylinder Benelli racing engine, introduced in 1960

Lacking martial confidence in their native Italy, Benelli race chief Vincenzo Clementi stashed the entire racing fleet in rural areas away from Pesaro; purportedly their precious new 250cc 'four' had its engine hidden at the bottom of a dry well, while the chassis slept under a haystack, inside a barn. Their decision proved wise, as during 1940 and '41, Pesaro was bombed heavily; the Benelli factory had been converted to aero engine production (Daimler-Benz and Alfa Romeo types), and when the Allies advanced northward in Italy, all the precision machine tools were moved by the German army to more secure territory inside Austria and Germany.

The new Benelli '4' racer at the press launch in 1960

While the company returned to single-cylinder racers postwar (netting them a World Championship in 1950), by 1960 Benelli's line of small-capacity motorcycles was selling very well, and funds were allocated for the design of a new four-cylinder racer. Race chief Ing. Savelli and Giovanni Benelli designed an entirely new engine which bore resemblance to the 1938 design, but in truth, by 1960 a DOHC four with gear-driven cams had become the accepted pattern for a racing engine, having been developed by Gilera (from the original CNA/Rondine 'fours' dating back to 1926!), copied by MV Agusta, and then again by Honda, who won the 250cc World Championship title in 1961. The new 'four' used a short stroke (40.6mm stroke x 44mm bore), a 6-speed gearbox, weighed 264lbs, and gave 40hp at 13,000rpm (oh, how supercharging was missed! This was 12.6hp less than the blown 1939 design). The completed machine was revealed with great publicity in June of 1960, but wasn't ready to race until 1962, and Silvio Grassetti had only one 'win' that year, at Cesenatico, but it sounded a bell at Honda, as both Jim Redman and Tom Phillis were bested on their Factory Honda 4s. MV had withdrawn from 250cc racing the year before, to concentrate on retaining their 350cc and 500cc dominance.

Tarquinio Provini on the 250cc Benelli 4 in 1965; note the 7" dual disc brakes. These are American Airheart brakes from Go-Kart racers, and were possibly a first in GP racing, but proved inadequate on at 143mph, especially in the wet. While the concept was sound, the brake pads hadn't yet evolved for serious high-speed use. Benelli used them only in '65, retreating to reliable racing drums...

Tarquinio Provini, a veteran racing star with two World Championships, joined Benelli in 1963 to develop and race the new 'four'. He shortly increased power to 52hp at 16,000rpm, with a 7-speed gearbox, and 141mph top speed. A new frame lowered the center of gravity and pared weight down to 247lbs. Years of ignition troubles with the high-revving engine were finally cured by fitting an American racing magneto...from a Mercury two-stroke boat engine. Provini won every race in the Italian championship in '64. Benelli shocked the world by out-running the Japanese opposition at the super-fast Monza GP in 1965.

Provini hard at it in 1966

By '66, the Four had 8 gears, and a larger version with 322cc was introduced to compete in the 350cc GP events, going head to head with the 'big boys', MV Agusta, Honda, and Yamaha. Provini had a bad crash at the Isle of Man TT that year, and injured his spine enough to retire from racing. Benelli had never fielded a 'team' of professional riders who came and went with lucrative contacts; the family business had close bonds with the one or two racers they supported, and Provini's injury took the steam out of Benelli's race dep't for over a year.

The immortal 'Paso'; Renzo Pasolini

Benelli re-entered the racing fray with rider Renzo Pasolini, who won second place in both the 350cc and 250cc classes at the 1968 Isle of Man TTs, and dominated the Italian Championship in both classes the rest of '68, giving Giacomo Agostini and his MV and excellent view of the Benelli's tailpipes all year long. In 1969, Kel Carruthers joined Pasolini, and the pair made an unbeatable team, each winning three GP victories that year, giving Benelli their second World Championship title.

Pasolini leaping Ballagh Bridge at the 1968 Isle of Man TT

Kel Carruthers joined Yamaha in 1970, but Pasolini took third place in the World Championship that year. The Benelli family sold the factory and name to Alejandro de Tomaso, more famous for his automotive exploits than two-wheeled savvy, and support for developing the racers waned. Still, Jarno Saarinen was hired in '72, and won his début races at Pesaro in both 350cc and 500cc classes.

Renzo Pasolini with Kel Carruthers

Both Saarinen and Pasolini left Benelli for '73 (for Yamaha and H-D, respectively), and Walter Villa became their #1 rider. With horrific irony, Villa's 350cc Benelli was blamed for leaving a trail of oil during his race at Monza, which was then not cleaned up for the 250cc race, in which a multi-machine crash killed both Saarinen and Pasolini. The details of the accident have been debated ever since, although it seems a catastrophic seizure of Saarinen's Yamaha (not an uncommon occurrence) may have led to the chain-reaction melée.

Kel Carruthers at the 1970 Isle of Man TT

Benellis interest in racing plummeted when new FIM rules limited 250cc racers to two cylinders and six speeds, which guaranteed an unstoppable rise of two-stroke racers, as their double-time combustion could only be opposed by outrageously sophisticated four-stroke engines, such as the Honda 6-cylinder, and the Benelli 250cc V-8 which was under development...which would certainly have put Benelli on par with Moto Guzzi as masterful creators of racing exotica. The FIM, in their wisdom, preferred the crackle of two-strokes to a technical war of miniaturized-miracle racers, a decision which eventually killed Grand Prix motorcycle racing, and led to the birth of MotoGP.

Jarno Saarinen...with wife Soeli giving pit signals

Bonhams is selling a replica 350cc four-valve Benelli four-cylinder, of the type Kel Carruthers took to the World Championship in 1969, at their Jan 12 sale in Las Vegas.

COMING EVENTS IN 2012

2011-12-31T12:46:00.000-08:00

SHOWDOWN in Las Vegas (Jan 12-15):

Alain de Cadenet and Malcolm Barber sold a Velocette Thruxton at the Bonhams Las Vegas auction in 2011

Three major auction companies are duking it out for top spot on the global auction calendar - Bonhams, MidAmerica, and Auctions America (RM). While MidAmerica has hosted a 3-day auction for many years (the world's largest vintage motorcycle auction already with 500 machines annually), in 2011 Bonhams joined the fun, and slipped 150 bikes into a Thursday daytime slot, giving attendees a chance to head to MidAmerica's Thursday evening dinner auction. Awfully polite, really, and they brought some amazing machines to the party. By contrast, RM (owner of Auctions America) descends on Sin City in 2012 like the Mother Ship, squatting directly over MidAmerica's time slot, in a gloves-off bid for a KO. RM has moved aggressively this year to establish themselves in the motorcycle auction world, including bikes in many of their glossy 'car' sales abroad. By contrast, Bonhams has built their motorcycle division in the US slowly, hoping to expand on their auction hegemony in England [note; Bonhams is the principal sponsor of the Vintagent].

You never know what will turn up in Las Vegas; this genuine 1950 Vincent Black Lightning is one example, which I later rode at the Grossglockner Hillclimb!

This confluence of the 'Big 3' of global motorcycle auctions makes Las Vegas 2012 an incomparable vintage motorcycle showplace...there is simply nothing like this event anywhere else. If you like vintage bikes, you'd have a hard time finding this many on display in any museum or show... and they're all for sale. Questions remain whether enough buyers will support such a mega-sale of old motorcycles, or whether an excess of machinery will leave all 3 houses limping home Jan 16th. Certainly, Mecum Auctions learned a bitter lesson at Pebble Beach in 2011, when their massive sale of bought-in motorcycles lost them something like $700k, by my calculations... I doubt we'll see them play with motorcycles anytime soon. Will the same fate befall RM? Bonhams? MidAmerica? One thing is certain; the Las Vegas auctions will be anything but dull. Be there!

BMW Goes Moto-Public at Villa d'Este (May 25-27):

The Villa d'Este is a gem beside the already picturesque Lake Como in Italy, and their Concorso di Eleganza is considered the most exclusive automotive event on the planet. No, you can't go, unless your car is on display (or you're a lucky journalist; see my story of 2011 here), but event sponsor BMW made a bold move with a parallel motorcycle Concorso at the open-to-the-public Villa Erba, and hit a home run with their fantastic display of machines. They didn't advertise this event, in a bid for a quiet entry into the pantheon of great motorcycle shows, but the setting, organization, display, and motorcycles were peerless, and an excellent excuse to visit the most beautiful spot in Italy.

For 2012, BMW is spreading the word, the Concorso di Motociclette is back, and you're invited. Visit their website for more details.

Year 4 at the Quail Motorcycle Gathering (May 5, 2012), and a special offer:

The Quail, already well established during Pebble Beach Week as the most exclusive and enjoyable automotive show of all, is slowly building momentum with their Quail Motorcycle Gathering, bringing a more diverse audience from further afield, better bikes on the grass, and a bigger Quail Ride on the Friday preceding the show. Its a great excuse to come to California and enjoy the spectacular riding roads, weather, food, and a selection of great bikes.

They're offering discounted tickets (and free entry for under-15s) through Jan. 15th, on their website.

HAPPY KRAMPUS!

2011-12-24T12:06:00.000-08:00

Have a great holiday, whether with Krampus or St.Nick, or a little of both!

FRATELLI BENELLI RACING

2011-12-20T23:18:00.000-08:00

Fratelli Benelli: Antonio ('Tonino'), Francesco, Giovanni, Guiseppe, Filippo, Domenico

While glamorous rivals captured collective racing memory, the Benelli firm has a sterling history of race successes dating back to the 1920s, and a family of rider/manufacturer/racers who catapulted the little factory to the top echelons of racing. Now known more for its bicycles (due to on again/off again production of motorcycles in recent years), there was a time when Benelli was synonymous with racing and World Championships, and that special Italian devotion to supercharged multi-cylinder racing exotica immediately prior to WW2.

The first Benelli of 1920, a 98cc two-stroke engine mounted at the rear of a bicycle

The factory's story begins with Teresa Benelli, recently widowed in 1911, who sold a bit of family property and invested the proceeds in machine tools, establishing a business at which her 6 sons could make a living. The Benelli Garage of Pesaro employed 5 of the 6 boys, who repaired guns, cars, and motorcycles; while the youngest, Antonio ('Tonino') was too young to work, his impact would perhaps be greatest of all, as a championship rider for the family business. At this early date, factory spares for cars and motorcycles could be difficult to obtain quickly, and the Garage was fully equipped to fabricate any parts necessary for repairs.

Tonino Benelli, four time Italian 175cc Champion, on one of the early 175cc OHC racers, in a beautiful period portrait

By 1918, the brothers' facility at making parts begged the question - why not make our own motorcycle? - and in 1919 they indeed built a 75cc two-stroke single-cylinder engine for attachment to a bicycle. By 1920 they built the first motorcycle, with a larger 98cc engine attached by outrigger tubes to the rear of a bicycle. The awkward engine position equated to poor handling, and the first machine wasn't a success, so by 1921 the engine was moved to the 'normal' position within the frame, and the engine capacity increased gradually to 150cc, with a two-speed gearbox and all-chain drive.

Tonino in 1924 on the 175cc two-stroke racer, at Pesaro's Foglia track

Young Tonino 'The Terror' pressured his brothers for more power, with the intention of racing. They obliged, and in his very first race, Tonino placed second Gino Moretti riding a 500cc Moto Guzzi, proving both his skill, and the potential of the little machine. The little Benelli failed to win a race in 1922 or '23, but Tonino honed his skills as a rider, while his brothers learned valuable lessons from breakage and failure. Wins began in 1924, and continued, while the Italian public took note of the little machine; the increased sales meant the brothers could buy new machine tools to create a new motorcycle - a four stroke of advanced specification.

Tonino Benelli on the new 175cc OHC racer, in 1927

Giuseppi Benelli designed a new machine of 175cc for 1927, with a stack of delicate gears driving an overhead camshaft; it was an impressive lightweight roadster, and a natural candidate for the race track. The overhead camshaft engine proved reliable and fast, and Tonino gathered a string of wins, including Benelli's first 'international' win at the Monza GP, culminating in the Italian 175cc Championship in both '27 and '28. Now with a proper racing team, Benelli continued to rack up wins in 1929, and Tonino won the Italian Championship again in 1930.

The factory team of double-OHC racers, in 1934

In the search for more power, another camshaft was added 'up top', and the new double-overhead-camshaft 175cc racer debuted in 1931, a very advanced machine and the technical equal of any racer of the day. The engine still had an iron cylinder head and barrel, and initially a hand-shift with 3-speed gearbox, but by '32 a four-speed 'box with footshift brought the little Benelli bang up to date. The Benelli race team ventured across Europe in a bid for increased export sales, winning GPs in France, Belgium, Holland, and Switzerland, effectively dominating the 175cc class through 1934 with their cracking little double-knocker lightweight.

The last (1934) version of the 'iron' engine, with an oil radiator built into the oil tank

The FIM abolished the 175cc racing class in 1934, and suddenly Benelli had racers without a category. Rather than immediately enlarge their racer to the 250cc class, they spent the next few years consolidating their roadsters, and capitalizing on their new visibility across Europe. By 1936 their model range were all single-cylinder, overhead-camshaft machines of 175cc, 250cc, and 500cc. These roadsters were all fast, reliable, and popular, and Benelli became the fifth-largest motorcycle manufacturer in Italy. By 1938, their '250 Sport S' roadster was good for 93mph, a figure not bettered by a production '250' until the 1960s.

The '500 Sport' roadster of 1936

But racing beckoned; Benelli could not rest on its laurels forever, and while the production range was consolidated, the race shop designed a completely new 250cc racing engine in 1938, again DOHC, but all-alloy, and with rear suspsension (a swingarm with plunger springboxes, and friction damping). The new engine could be revved to 9000rpm, and proved nearly bomb-proof, even at 110mph. The competition had changed dramatically though, as GP racing gained international sporting significance, and much larger companies were prepared to invest heavily in new technology and very advanced racing machines. In the 250cc field, Benelli's most significant competition came from Moto Guzzi, with their supercharged flat single, and DKW, with their supercharged two-stroke. Even with their blowers, these machines had trouble shaking off the solid and good-handling Benelli, which could be every bit as fast as its rivals, and definitely more reliable.

The new 250cc racer with swingarm rear suspension and huge brakes

A 1-2-3 at the 1938 Italian GP was an eye-opener for all concerned, especially riders in the 350cc class, whose race averages were slower than the winning 250! Englishman Ted Mellors took note, as his own 350cc Velocette MkVIII KTT had been outclassed by the winning Benelli of Francisci Bruno. Mellors approached Benelli about a ride for the 1939 Isle of Man Lightweight TT; this was an excellent opportunity for the factory; an experienced and successful Island rider riding -free!- for the most difficult and prestigious road race in the world.

Ted Mellors at the 1939 Isle of Man Lightweight TT (note bronze-head Velo mk4KTT in the background, in road trim)

In that tense year of 1939, great forces stood poised on the brink of armed conflict, and every international sporting contest became a proxy war between nations. The Isle of Man TT had been the private playground of English motorcycle companies since the wakeup of a 1-2-3 Indian victory of 1911, with only occasional losses to the 'foreign menace'. The lineup of racers at the 1939 TT showed a glaring technological gap between Continental and English machines, as well-developed supercharged, multi-cylinder bikes from Europe had become reliable enough to seriously challenge the solid, good-handling English single-cylinders. In the 250cc race, the blown Moto Guzzis and DKWs were fastest, but the Benelli was no slouch, and its reliability proved the decisive asset which assured a win for Ted Mellors.

Mellors in '39; wet conditions at the Isle of Man dampened speeds

Benelli had seen the future in 1938, and begun experimenting with a supercharger on their 250cc single, which gave 45hp and 125mph. This was good, but better would be a four-cylinder engine of their own; a 250cc with a supercharger and twin overhead cams. Giovanni Benelli designed the new 'four' in 1938, it was built in '39, proving incredibly fast; pumping out 52.5hp at 10,000rpm, it rocketed to 146mph; 16mph faster than their nearest rival, the Moto Guzzi. The machine was ready by 1940, but international racing was strictly between bullets by then, and the brothers Benelli, fearing the worst, hid their four-cylinder engine in a dry well in the countryside, and scattered their racing singles in barns and cellar across northern Italy.

The incredibly fast 250cc four-cylinder supercharged Benelli racer of 1940...146mph!

The factory was completely destroyed in the war, and their machine tools stolen by retreating German forces. When the smoke cleared, it was the sons of fratelli Benelli who had the energy to begin again, tracked down some of their tooling in Germany and Austria. Their first post-war machines were modified ex-military Harleys, Matchlesses, and BSAs, to which they fit swingarm rear suspension. Within two years, Benelli were again making their own motorcycles, mostly utilitarian lightweights. And racing! Enough of their prewar racing singles survived to form a Works team, and rider Dario Ambrosini chalked up win after win in 1948 and '49. The FIM created the first World Championship series in 1949, and Benelli decided to invest in a bid to win for 1950, sending Ambrosini abroad to battle rival Moto Guzzi, who shared their ambition.

Dario Ambrosini on the 1950 version of the Benelli 250cc single cylinder racer

Dario Ambrosini had never raced at the Isle of Man TT, but proved a fast learner, shaving 66 seconds from his lap time between rounds 2 and 3, during the race! His win at the 1950 Lightweight, plus Monza and the Swiss GP, gave Benelli their first World Championship. Hopes for a repeat in '51 were dashed when Ambrosini was killed during practice at the Albi GP in France. Stunned by their victor's death, and with no other rider in their team, Benelli withdrew from racing for a few years.

Dario Ambrosini's 1951 250cc machine, now with telescopic front forks and a swingarm rear suspension

They returned to racing in 1959, building just four machines, a fresh design of unit construction short-stroke 250cc DOHC singles. Benelli's rivals, Ducati and MV Agusta, used high-revving twin-cylinder racers in the 250cc class, and while Geoff Duke won the Swiss GP in '59, his was the only victory for these last single-cylinder racers. [One of these four machines, serial # GPX1003, is coming up for auction at the Bonhams Las Vegas sale]. The new racer was fast and reliable, but as with 1939, it was clear more cylinders held the key to GP victory, and having once tasted a World Championship, Benelli was in it for the big prize.

Beauty is as beauty does; the sculptural timing gear case is indeed a thing to behold.I

In 1960, Benelli's Ingeniere Savelli took inspiration from the 1940 four-cylinder racer, and created a new 250cc 'four'. More about these in the next post....

The 1959 250cc last-series Benelli racer at the Team Obsolete HQ; this machine is coming up for sale Jan.12, 2012, at the Bonhams Las Vegas auction.

DU PONT COLLECTION AT VEGAS

2011-12-18T20:54:00.000-08:00

Éleuthére Paul du Pont in the late 1930s with his 1908 Indian 'Camelback'

Éleuthère Irénée du Pont de Nemours was born a Parisian in 1771, of a family soon to be granted a noble title by Louis XVI (in 1784). The du Ponts, especially father Pierre Samuel, had close ties to the government of France but were advocates of reform to the country's finances, which were heading rapidly towards bankruptcy after the French, to spite the English, heavily funded the American colonists' rebellion. The French Revolution of 1789 saw many reform-minded aristocrats such as the du Ponts (many of whom were members of Masonic clubs advocating democratic change) elevated to important positions. Pierre Samuel was even President of the National Constituent Assembly, and added 'de Nemours' to the family name to distinguish himself from other du Ponts in the new government.

Éleuthére Irénée du Pont de Nemours

Tension between radical Jacobins and moderate aristocrats, both seekers of change, became increasingly focused on class distinction, and many nobles lost the titular d' or du or de appending their surname, bowing to the fashion for 'egalité', and an increasingly hostile atmosphere towards inherited titles. For Pierre Samuel, his physical defense of King Louis and Marie Antoinette from a bloodthirsty mob in 1792 culminated in imprisonment by 1794, which meant the guillotine for any aristocrat, and thousands of others put to a defense-less trial, or no trial at all. But, as 'revolutions eat their heroes', the beheading of Maximilian Robespierre later that year meant du Pont and his family survived, but the continuing political and economic turmoil of the Directoire period (1795-99), plus the sacking of their home by a mob, saw the du Ponts sailing for America in 1799.

Groundbreaking French chemist Antoine Lavoisier and his wife Marie-Ann, as painted in 1788 by Jacques-Louis David...who posed no objection in the French Convention as his friend Antoine was condemned and executed in 1794.

Éleuthére had worked with the renowned French chemist Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier (before he was condemned with "The Republic needs neither scientists nor chemists", and beheaded in 1794) at the Paris Arsenal, gaining expertise in gunpowder and nitrate extraction/manufacture, which would play a huge role in the family's development of nitrocellulose lacquers, and 'smokeless' gunpowder, in the US. The family intended to create a French cultural community in Maine, but a hunting trip with a US military gunpowder procurer (and former French officer, Louis de Tousard) demonstrated the inferior quality of American black powder. Éleuthére's expertise in the manufacture of gunpowder led the family to invest heavily ($84,000 in 1802) in the creation of E.I.du Pont de Nemours and Co., or simply DuPont, in the Brandywine Valley of Delaware.

The Delaware DuPont plant ca.1850

Subsequent generations of du Ponts arranged inter-marriage to cousins, keeping their rapidly expanding wealth, and family control of their business, close at hand. The Du Pont corporation grew into the world's third largest chemical company, inventing things like nylon and kevlar and neoprene. As their wealth exploded, du Pont family members invested in many other areas, including, for a time, automobile (Pierre du Pont was president of General Motors in 1920) and motorcycle manufacture.

A 1929 DuPont Motors Model 'G' Merrimack at Pebble Beach

The family dabbled in making DuPont automobiles of their own starting in 1919, when E.Paul du Pont, a lifelong tinkerer and 'gearhead', grew from making marine engines for the US WW1 effort, to full automobiles. As only around 600 DuPonts were made in the 12 years of the company's existence, it was clearly never going to be an enormous success, especially after the stock market crash of 1929. E.Paul's brother Frances had invested $300,000 (in 1923) in the Hendee Mf'g Co., makers of Indian motocycles, and Indian's near-bankruptcy in 1930 meant the family was likely to lose a substantial investment. E.Paul merged DuPont Motors with Hendee in 1930, deciding in '31 to drop autos completely, and concentrate on making Indians.

E.Paul was instrumental in creating the Indian '841' for the US military in WW2; with vibrationless 90degree v-twin motor, hydraulic suspension, large brakes, and a shaft drive, less than 1000 were ultimately built. This is his personal machine, on which du Pont rode many thousands of miles, pronouncing it his 'favorite motorcycle'.

As the new president of Indian, E.Paul made significant changes; as a lifelong motorcyclist (having built his first clip-on moped as a teen, then owned an early Indian 'Camelback'), he felt the days of motorcycles as utilitarian vehicles were over, and embraced the idea of a motorcycle as 'leisure object'. To support this view, the company focused on three areas: the new production-based 'Class C' racing in the US, the DuPont Company's huge automotive paint color palette, and the styling of Briggs Weaver. DuPont pioneered fast-drying nitrocellulose lacquer auto paint in the early 1920s, and suddenly brilliant colors were no longer a hindrance to manufacture, as previously only black paint would dry quickly enough for economical manufacture (Henry Ford's famous 'any color as long as it's black' was a practical dictum - only black paint dried quickly). Thus, Indian motocycles were shortly available in 24 different, brilliant colors, while their sheet metal grew more elaborate and Art Deco-inspired, and their racing team grew increasingly successful (E.Paul's son Steven was an engineer and helped developed the 'Big Base' racing Scout).

E.Paul du Pont, an inveterate tinkerer, with one of his lathes at the Indian factory

By 1938, Indian had gone from losing hundreds of thousand of dollars per year, to amassing huge profits with their beautiful and iconic motorcycles - the Chief and Scout. Briggs Weaver's styling of these models remains emblematic of Indian's identity; the deeply skirted Deco fenders and Indian-head motifs are still our first image of Indians today, and the brand identity of every subsequent revival of the Indian marque in modern times. As WW2 approached, riders smelling an upcoming war bought out the company's production, before civilian production stopped, and the factory concentrated on building motorcycles for the US military. The immediate pre-war period was the peak of Indian's profitability, but E.Paul Du Pont's health was declining, and the profitable Indian factory was very attractive to investors. In 1945 Indian was sold to an investment group headed by Ralph B. Rogers.

The du Pont collection in the hangar/museum in Pennsylvania

The family maintained an interest in motorcycles even after selling Indian, and E.Paul's son Jacques du Pont became an avid motorcycle racer in the 1950's, doing well in the AMA and competing for several years at the Isle of Man TT. The 3 generations of du Pont motorcycle enthusiasts amassed an interesting collection of machines which it occasionally displayed at a small museum. As the elder generation of du Ponts has died, family interest in the motorcycles waned, and they've decided to sell the collection of nearly 50 interesting machines, which encompass their years of riding and owning Indians (notably E.Paul's personal Camelback single and twin-cylinders) as well as their post-Indian years of riding and competing on other marques. All the machines are coming up for auction at the Bonhams Las Vegas sale on Jan. 12, 2012.

Unrestored 1903 Indian Camelback from E.Paul's personal collection

The collection includes an unrestored 1903 Indian 'Camelback', plus 1908 Camelback single and twins, a 1915 Board Track Racer, an original paint 1909 Pope single, and what may be the last Indian Chief supplied to a dealer. The sale represents a rare opportunity to own motorcycles with a connection to the fascinating du Pont family, who played a very important role in American motorcycling.

GRAYSON PERRY AT THE BRITISH MUSEUM

2011-12-15T21:03:00.000-08:00

The 'Kenilworth AM1' in the British Museum atrium

To the pantheon of gender-bending motorcyclists - the infamous, notorious, or hidden - we must add Grayson Perry, multi-talented artist, transvestite, Turner Prize winner, and dedicated biker. I was lucky to catch Perry's show at the British Museum in London last week, 'Tomb of the Unknown Craftsman', and began smiling the moment I spotted the 'Kenilworth AM1', his custom Harley-Davidson Knucklehead, at the head of the grand curved staircase in the museum's atrium.

Grayson Perry with his H-D Knucklehead-based custom motorcycle

The smile never left; Perry's exhibit of selected Museum artifacts beside his sculptures, paintings, and quilts, weaves a thread of humor and unexpected meaning between the old and new artworks, as if all art ever created were, in his words, "the material culture of a bohemian diaspora, a global tribe whose merchants and witch doctors bartered with a wider population by selling artefacts invested with a special quality; the quality of art."

'Humility' and an air-cleaner wing-nut of Alan Measles' head

The 'Kenilworth AM1' is Perry's two-wheeled 'popemobile', a performance-art prop created to carry Alan Measles (Perry's 50 year old teddy bear/muse/alter ego/totem) on a pilgrimage to Germany, in a glass-sided reliquary mounted, naturally, on the 'sissy bar' of his custom Harley. The AM1 is built and painted up much like Perry's trademark 'drag' outfits, using highly saturated colors and shapes reminiscent of 'Outsider' art. The elongated pink-and-blue petrol tank is painted either side with 'humility' and 'patience', which Perry notes are the "opposite of rocker lifestyle texts."

'Patience' and 'Doubt'...

With a matched riding suit of bright yellow boots, an outrageous lavender Peter-Pan-collar jumpsuit, and spring-green helmet, Perry's riding ensemble creates a motorcycling image which borrows nothing from anyone or anything...there's simply nobody else on the road with the cojones to wear THAT outfit while riding THAT bike. While custom shops, tattoo parlors, and clothing outlets are busy selling 'individuality', Perry has taken a brave and lonely path, to BE an individual.

Perry at a fair in Germany; the country was chosen for his 'pilgrimage' to atone for years of childhood fantasies casting Germans as evil enemies...

"One fact that every transvestite has to come to terms with is that a person dressed up in the clothes of the opposite sex is somehow inherently funny. I feel it has profoundly shaped my own outlook on life. I regard humour as an important and necessary aspect of art." Grayson Perry explores, via humor and an 'innocent' surrogate, a whole range of difficult subjects; religion, violence, sexual politics, poverty, and the encroaching i-vapidity of our gadget-dominated culture.

Leather Alan Measles-head saddle, with 'Chastity' logo

Perry began as an art-world 'outsider' himself, as a self-described 'transvestite potter' and unlikely candidate for the prestigious Turner Prize; ceramics have rarely been considered worthy of inclusion in major museums, and like motorcycles, are dismissed as 'craft'. While Perry honed his skills as a ceramicist, he explored deliberately provocative imagery with his glazes, and gained a following for the brilliance of this juxtaposition - difficult subject matter with masterful craftsmanship.

Perry and his 'Cerne Abbas' leathers (Chris Scott photo)

Grayson Perry has always been motorcyclist; "I’ve never owned a car. I love motorbikes. I’ve got a Harley, which is perfect for summer when you want to go slow, pose and enjoy the scenery, and a KTM, which is brilliant for getting from A to B fast when it’s wet and cold and you want to feel safe. In 1989 my wife Philippa bought me a set of motorbike leathers – the first thing I ever had made for me. I designed them to be like the Cerne Abbas giant [see link - ed]. I used to wear them to art openings so I could go there on the bike but still feel dressed up.... Motorbikes aren’t manly. Look at mine. If a bloke has to prove his machismo with a motorbike, then he isn’t very macho.”"

Perry as his alter-ego 'Claire', his folk-art outfit, and a Kalashnikov...

Motorcycling, masculinity, and a therapeutic exploration of his childhood (Perry's wife Philippa is, incidentally, a psychotherapist) are clues to Perry's art at the British Museum. His father, who left while Perry was very young, was an engineer and masculine amateur wrestler, and a biker. After he left, young Perry's teddy bear - Alan Measles, a gift on his first birthday - became a complex and psychologically loaded fantasy figure, the centerpiece of his play, the hero all his masculine fantasies; undefeated race car driver, fighter pilot, war hero. The tour de force of Perry's new art is the elevation of Measles to the status of a God-in-the-Making, the centerpiece of a new cult, a future Deity to an uncreated religion. The childhood stories of the bear's battles, injuries, and ultimate triumphs, have been transformed into a narrative arc of a fictional Prophet Hero, an immediately sympathetic character (who doesn't love a teddy bear?) imbued with the magical realism of childhood - that combination of keen observation with fantastic invention.

An early sketch of the 'AM1', taken from the exhibition catalog, available from the British Museum

The 'Kenilworth AM1' was sketched out by Perry, and built by 'chopper shop' Battistini's UK (who, curiously, don't claim credit for their work online, but do link to the exhibit in their blog); the project builders were Nigel Green, Anthony Foy, Adam Smith, Alan Smith, Dan Smith, and Tom Fuller.

'Pedestrian slicer' sculpture of Alan Measles as pilgrim on horseback

Note the stylized stainless steel 'Brooklands can' exhaust

'The Tomb of the Unknown Craftsman' runs through Feb. 19, 2011

A LA MODE, IN THE MUD

2011-12-14T18:22:00.000-08:00

The title of the GQ spread...will Enduro become chic again? It was in the 1970s...

While on the Eurostar from London to Paris last week, I was delighted to discover a 12-page spread of classic dirt bikes flinging mud in the pages of French GQ (the December 2011 issue). And who should be the photographer but Dimitri Coste, whose own adventures on his racing Triumph have been covered previously on The Vintagent.

Sam with his Bultaco Mk10 Frontera

When queried on the magazine feature, Dimitri explained, "I was asked by French GQ to shoot a "Biker" fashion story back in October. As I was kinda fed-up with the usual "biker" fashion story, I told GQ I wanted to shoot in the mud, with off-road vintage bikes, and they were down for it."

Tearing up a perfectly good field...

"So I called Franck (Chatokhine) with his pre-unit Triumph Tiger 100 Rickman Metisse, Stephane and his cute B50MX and Sam, Franck's brother-in-law, with his killer face and cool Bultaco. We shot at our off-road paradise in Beauval-en-Caux, hosted by famous Fabrice & Marion Bazire, and had lots of fun. They were allowed to get dirty, and went full throttle all day long."

Franck Chatokhine, a demon rider on tarmac and mud

The photos are a breath of fresh outdoor air tanged with exhaust, and a healthy change from groan-worthy 'model in the pool' fashion shoots...plus, this is probably the best advertisement for vintage dirt riding I've seen since the infamous Steve McQueen Honda commercial...

Stephane with his BSA B50MX

Yes, we're selling clothes here

Dimitri Coste, in his competition Ruby outfit

'MOTO BELLISSIMA' AT SFO

2011-12-04T04:53:00.000-08:00

The San Francisco Arts Commission is mandated by political brokering to include art and exhibitions in public spaces in SF; a small percentage of all large real estate deals is earmarked thus, and SF Int'l Airport, being one of the largest pieces of real estate in town, has a huge collection of art on the walls of its terminals, with the best at the International Terminal. Each gate has a huge painting (Squeak Carnwath, Enrique Chagoya), and the walkways are dotted with sculptures by the likes of radical ceramicist Peter Voulkos and detritus/horse sculptor Deborah Butterfield.

Among the rotating collections in the pre-boarding area, I was delighted to bump into 'Moto Bellissima', a small collection of Italian postwar lightweight motorcycles, from Bay Area collectors, all of whom have been featured in The Vintagent.

The motorcycle names may not all be 'familiar', as each manufacturer has long since disappeared from the land of the living, but they represent a period when a youngster could aspire to owning an exquisite piece of functional sculpture. There is simply no equivalent today for an aspiring rider to lay awake at night, fantasizing over the ownership of such a beautiful little machine, and how it would change their life forever. Because they did, and do still.

1968 Mondial 'Record Sport' 48cc; surely among the loveliest of all lightweights?

The Italians spared no detail on their small machines; note Campagnolo manual disc front brake.

1959 Giulietta Super Sport 50cc; Fratelli Peripoli made mopeds and lightweights

Big name, little bike; Maserati 125cc GTS of 1957

The Giulietta's distinctive tail section

Beautiful lines, lyrical paint job

1965 Moto Morini 50cc 'Corsarino' ('Little Pirate' - Dennis the Menace with a sword!)

1961 Capriolo Turismo, 100cc

1959 Atala Freccia d'Oro ('Golden Arrow'), using a distinctive twistgrip shifter (like a scooter). Atala had been making motorcycles since 1923!

1969 Itom Astor Super Sport 50cc

Leo Tartarini's ItalJet Mustang Veloce of 1969; good for over 60mph from a 50cc engine

A DAY WITH 'AGO'

2011-11-28T22:40:00.000-08:00

Just in time for Xmas...Bench and Loom are offering a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to ride with Giacomo Agostini, just you and him. I can't afford it, but some lucky bugger can...why have a Steve McQueen replica whatever, when you can ride with a living treasure, one of the greatest motorcycling champions in history?
From the Bench and Loom website:

"Description
Giacomo Agostini is one of the greatest names in the history of competitive motorcycling.

He is the longest reigning champion of grand prix racing to have ever lived. For an astounding 30 years he held the title of the most successful racer of all time until the record fell to fellow Italian Valentino Rossi. With 122 GP wins (including 10 Isle of Man TTs) and 15 World Championships, Agostini’s name is synonymous with victory.

His celebrity status obliges his presence at various international racing celebrations each year, and an admiring crowd is found everywhere he goes. Yet despite his demand, this legend of motorsport does not coach race teams or teach riding courses. Instead, Ago (as he is affectionately known by his legion of fans) chooses to spend his time in privacy with his family in Europe.

Available through Bench & Loom is an exclusive, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to spend a day privately riding with Agostini. Choose between a racetrack or quiet back roads in either California or Spain. The day can be spent one-on-one or with up to four of your friends. The choice is yours.

Price
$30,000 Spanish back roads
$50,000 Spanish racetrack (Jerez, pending availability)
$35,000 California back roads
$55,000 California racetrack (Monterey, pending availability)"

'ARE MOTORCYCLES OVER?'

2011-11-25T13:40:00.000-08:00

From the New York Times, Nov. 6, 2011, by poet (and motorcyclist) Frederick Seidel (and I encourage your comments on his article...):

The image accompanying this NYT article is 'Crossing the Ohio River', Danny Lyon's iconic photo of a Chicago Outlaw, from his seminal 1966 masterpiece 'The Bikeriders', which is still available in reprints.

"ARE motorcycles passé? Are they sort of over? I ask as a rider of two-wheel Italian beauties that go very fast, gracefully streamlined subsonic technology from the Ducati factory in Bologna. I own two sport bikes and two racers. I ride racing motorcycles on the street. One of my motorcycles is capable of nearly 200 miles an hour. I write prose about motorcycles. I write poems about motorcycles.

So I ask with some authority. Are motorcycles — even superb and lovely Italian motorcycles from the land of Donatello and Bertolucci — being replaced as love objects, as arm candy, by other more contemporary show-off desirables?

Electronic ones. Mostly made by Apple.

The iPhone 4S, the iPad 2, the 11-inch and 13-inch thin, light MacBook Air computers — these are the sleek gorgeousness young people go on about, have to have, and do have, in the millions. These machines, famous for the svelte dignity of their designs — and of course, far less expensive than a motorcycle — are a lens to see the world through and to do your work on. It’s their operating speeds that thrill. Young people cut a bella figura on their electronic devices.

Now, of course, it is not just the young who buy Apple products. I lay emphasis on the young, particularly young men, because they are the ones who might otherwise be buying motorcycles, and aren’t, at least not at all in the numbers they did before the economic downturn. The great recession was disastrous for motorcycle sales around the country, especially, it seems, for sport bikes, the ones that perform with brio but have no practical point to make. In other words, they are not bikes to tour on, they are not a comfortable way for you and a companion — wife or partner or friend — to travel to work or to a distant campground. You can do it, but it’s not ideal. Young riders were not buying motorcycles of any kind, and especially, it seems, not sport bikes.

Or, to say it another way, it’s as if the recession induced a coma in all the potential new motorcyclists, and in so many of the already experienced motorcyclists, from which they woke changed, changed utterly, and found themselves standing in line outside an Apple store, patiently waiting to buy the latest greatness.

They are buying a slice of what Apple does — and how it does it — and how it looks doing it. They are buying function but, just as important, they are buying glamour. The device enhances the buyer’s sense of self. It helps the person think and at the same time not think. Once, not so long ago, motorcycles did the same thing.

The 2012 1198cc Ducati Panigale, with 195hp; the most powerful twin-cylinder production engine, almost approaching NSU's 200hp/litre of the 1956 Rennmax, the first motorcycle to reach this lofty output, over 50 years ago, with another twin-cylinder engine (250cc).

In a few days, at the International Motorcycle Show in Milan, Ducati will introduce a radically new sport bike called the Panigale, after Borgo Panigale, the neighborhood on the outskirts of Bologna where the Ducati factory is. The Ducati people are being secretive about how the Panigale will look and how it will perform. But there have been spy photos of the bike being tested on the Mugello circuit, with the former World Superbike champion Troy Bayliss aboard, and plenty of rumors and speculation about the tech specs.

We know this much. It will make brave hearts beat faster. It will weigh less than its predecessor. It will have a new sort of frame. It will have an ingenious new exhaust system. It will handle. It will be fast. It will be beautiful. How many Ducati followers — the Ducatisti — will have to have one? Some.

Oh, for the days — not so long ago — when a boy’s world would have fallen to its knees before a new Ducati design.

In Dallas, at Advanced Motorsports, his motorcycle dealership, Jeff Nash, a gentleman and one of the great Ducati racebike tuners in America, and a racer himself, deplores the passivity of the young who would rather be home with their iPads playing computer games than astride the red-meat lightning of an 1198 Superbike blazing down a Texas highway making that unmistakable growling deep Ducati sound. Mr. Nash would go further.

Better to be out in the air astride just about any motorcycle alive!"

Frederick Seidel is the author of the poetry collections “Ooga-Booga” and, most recently, “Poems, 1959-2009."

'SELLING SPEED' IN 'CAFE RACERS' MAG

2011-11-24T12:12:00.000-08:00

I don't generally publicize my work in print here at The Vintagent, but I should, as I write regularly for Mens' File, Cycle World, Café Racers, etc...so if you're able to grab a copy of Café Racers (France), the latest issue (on newsstands now) contains a beautifully laid out exploration of the use of Speed imagery in motorcycle advertising, from 1900 to the 1970s. I was able to document much of this history with the help of friends, with excellent collections of moto ephemera - many thanks, and you know who you are!

I'll publish a version in English here on The Vintagent, in a few weeks.

5 YEARS OF 'THE VINTAGENT'

2011-11-17T22:11:00.000-08:00

Dig it. Thanks for reading the 700 posts thus far; there's plenty more - better, even - to come...

BUDDY HOLLY'S ARIEL CYCLONE

2011-11-15T07:49:00.000-08:00

The Crickets and their new Britbikes; Joe B.Mauldin on this Thunderbird, Jerry Allison on his TR6A Trophy, Holly on his Cyclone

I hadn't seen this home movie of Buddy Holly and his band the Crickets with their new motorcycles. It's long been known that Holly and his musician pals were motorcyclists, including the tale of how he came to purchase an Ariel twin in Dallas, Texas, in 1958. The band were experienced motorcyclists, Holly having owned a Triumph previously (and received a citation for riding without a muffler!), and while their hometown was Lubbock, TX, the boys decided that Dallas would have a much bigger selection of machines.

Jerry Allison's receipt for his TR6A Trophy, engine #011972...who has it now?

After being snubbed as 'bothersome teens' at several motorcycle dealerships along Main and Elm Streets - the dealers not realizing these were wealthy musicians, with a #1 hit on the charts ('That'll be the Day') - they lads were actually kicked out of the Harley dealership (you can imagine their horseplay from the film), and took a cab to Ray Miller's Triumph and Ariel dealership at 3600 W. Davis St, out in the Dallas suburbs on old Highway 80.

Jack McCormack from importer Johnson Motors congratulates Ray Miller on the opening of his new Triumph/Ariel dealership. McCormack's story is worth retelling; he left Johnson two years later to become Honda's sole importer in 1961, selling a phenomenal 17,000 units, after spending literally half the combined ad budget of the entire US bike industry ($150k) on a series of pages in Life magazine. Honda refused to raise his salary after making them a household name, so he set up Suzuki US in '63. In 1967 he founded American Eagle, which offered a wide range of re-badged Laverda, Kawasaki, Italjet, and Sprites.

Ray Miller had only opened his shop the previous year, in the summer of 1957, having moved from El Centro CA; he and his wife must have watched the Ed Sullivan Show, for they recognized the lanky boys (Holly was just under 6' and weighed 145lbs), and gave them the red carpet treatment. While Holly chose the rare 650cc Ariel Cyclone (only 21 were noted in factory record - it was the high-compression, 40hp version of the more sedate Huntmaster), bassist Joe B. Mauldin chose a Triumph Thunderbird, and drummer Jerry Allison bought a Triumph TR6A Trophy...all paid with cash on the spot. They each bought the 'biker' hats shown in the photo, too!

Later in 1958, Holly 'went solo' and moved to NYC, and played under his own name with Tommy Allsup, Carl Bunch, and Waylon Jennings, who purchased Holly's Ariel after the 'day the music died' plane crash. The Jennings family still owns the Ariel; what became of the two Triumphs is a mystery.

Holly's 1958 Ariel Cyclone, in Waylon Jennings' home

FIRST DEPICTION OF A MOTORCYCLE?

2011-11-14T10:37:00.000-08:00

The Science Museum print from 1818, depicting a German 'Vélocipédraisiavaporianna'

While researching the history of early motorcycle advertising (subject of an upcoming article in the French Café Racers magazine), I ran across this 1818 sketch of a powered two-wheeler in the London Science Museum, the first such depiction of a proto-motorcycle I've come across. Called, cheekily, the 'Velocipedraisiavaporianna', the pictured machine is a conjunction of the world's first steerable two-wheeler, the 'Laufsmachine' (or 'Draisine' in France), and a small steam engine with a small army of stokers and fuel-carriers following behind. Parsing the title, a 'Velocipede/Draisia' meets the 'vaporianna', or steam engine. If the 1818 attribution of this French print is correct, this vehicle was remarkably conceived only a year after the two-wheeler was invented, in a world with no electronic media. A close look reveals two pipes with shut-off valves leading from the large boiler box, one to each wheel.

The steam petcocks and pipes are clear, as is the implication of a hub-drive steam turbine...

While the wheels are insufficiently detailed, steam leading to the wheel hubs would imply a pair of small turbines in the hubs...which would not have sufficient torque to move a heavy machine from a standstill, but would give a useful boost once moving, perhaps even enough to propel the machine without assistance. The principles of steam boilers and turbines were well known by 1818, and the first powered vehicle, Cugnot's steam tricycle, had been demonstrated 60 years earlier.

The idea is clear; an engine could power two wheels, and even if this sketch is notional, the concept of the motorcycle was born.

An 1820 version of the Laufmaschine, with steerable front wheel

Karl Drais invented his 'Laufmaschine' (running machine) in Mannheim, Germany, in 1817, and word (plus copies) of his invention spread rapidly, with the new machine called the 'Draisine' in France, the 'Velocipede' in England, and the 'Dandy Horse' (likely due to 'riders' being the well-heeled sort; new technology is always expensive...). Drais may have been inspired to refine a 'horse substitute' as a result of a serious famine in Europe in 1816, the 'Year Without a Summer', in which disastrous climatic changes from the largest volcanic eruption in 1300 years, of Mount Tambora in Indonesia, spelled doom for expendable livestock, which included horses. Necessity is the mother of invention, and Europe's hunger planted the root stock of all two-wheelers to come.

Hats off to Karl; we're nearing the 200th birthday of his invention.

BENCH AND LOOM

2011-11-07T08:13:00.000-08:00

In the three years since the last Legend of the Motorcycles Concours, anyone lucky enough to have attended or participated has asked the same questions; 'will there be another' and 'what are Jared Zaugg and Brooke Roner going to do next?'

You can buy a new Brough Superior SS101 Pendine with the click of a button...

They've been working hard as always, and now the fruits of their effort are revealed, in the online concept store Bench and Loom. Alongside a continuing selection of excellent menswear and cool gear, a 'Specialty Shop' will rotate bi-monthly with a particular theme, and a curated selection of goods related to that theme. The first Specialty is the 'Motoring Shop', on which one can buy a $250,000 Brough Superior Pendine, a pair of deerskin riding gloves for $52, a Ruby helmet, or a Conrad Leach print. The website isn't a typical online store, as it has interesting content besides stuff for sale, and is worth a look, even if you can't whip out your Amex platinum for the Brough...

A selection from the Specialty Motoring Shop, through December 31st...

Jared and Brooke are part of the reason I started The Vintagent 5 years ago, and I wish them all luck and prosperity in their new endeavor.

A SHORT HISTORY OF WANKEL MOTORCYCLES

2011-11-03T10:48:00.000-07:00

Dr. Felix Wankel with the first prototype of his rotary engine in 1957, which had a rotating inner chamber, unlike all later Wankels

Dr Felix Wankel (born 1902 in Lahr, Germany) had the vision for his remarkable rotary engine at the age of 17, began working on prototypes 5 years later, and gained his first patent for this remarkable engine in 1929. His work on the motor was slow in the following two decades as he developed rotary-valve applications for piston engines. By 1957, working in conjunction with NSU, he had a fully functional rotary engine prototype, and immediately began licensing the engine, which had many theoretical advantages over a typical piston motor. First to take up this new design was aircraft engine builder Curtiss-Wright, who licensed the design on Oct.21, 1958. Curtiss-Wright has a long and deep motorcycle connection, via founder Glenn Curtiss, but their Wankel engines were mostly used in aircraft. The first motorcycle applications for this promising engine appeared shortly after the first rotary-powered automobiles, the Mazda Cosmo and NSU Spider of 1964. [A more in-depth story of Felix Wankel and his Lindau research institute will be told shortly]

The world's first Wankel-engined motorcycle, the 1960 IFA/MZ 'KKM 175W'

Motorrad Zschopau (MZ)/ IFA:
The first motorcycle application of the Wankel engine emerged from the IFA/MZ factory, from 1960. MZ took out a license from NSU in 1960, to develop Wankel engines as possible replacements for their two-stroke engines in both motorcycles and the 'Trabant' 3-cylinder two-stroke car. Within 3 months, a single-rotor, watercooled engine (using the thermosyphon principle rather than a water pump?) of 175cc, was installed in an IFA chassis (the 'BK 351' of 1959) which formerly housed a flat-twin two-stroke engine. The development team included engineer Anton Lupei, designer Erich Machus, research engineer Roland Schuster, plus machinists Hans Hofer and Walter Ehnert, who deserve credit as the first to build a Wankel motorcycle.

Details of the water-cooled MZ engine; twin spark plugs, single (tiny) carb, radiator, neatly mated gearbox.

The Wankel motor is neatly mated to the existing IFA gearbox (with shaft drive - similar to the BMW R25 gearbox), and developed 24hp, twice that of the comparable 175cc MZ two-stroke engine. The prototype appears to have been extensively tested, and currently has over 38,000km on the odometer. It lay in obscurity for years, before a 1994 exhibit of MZ history at Neckarsulm brought it back to light.

The second prototype MZ, using an air-cooled 175cc Wankel motor; the KKM 175 L

A second prototype was built in 1965, using a new 175cc air-cooled, single-rotor engine, also producing 25hp, considerably more than the ES250 'Trophy' engine normally installed in this chassis. This engine appears very much based on the Fitchel and Sachs engine, which was well-developed by 1965 and being sold under license worldwide. Despite the success of both MZ engines, inevitable problems with rotor tip seal failure and high engine/exhaust temperatures meant lots of development money would have been required to replace their reliable two-strokes... money which MZ didn't have. Their incredibly successful race program (all two-strokes, designed by the genius engineer Walter Kaaden) was practically created out from the factory scrapheap, with little help from the Socialist functionaries controlling industry in the GDR.

The KKM 175L used an extremely compact Wankel engine.

The idea of a simple, robust, and compact rotary engine was very appealing in the early days of Wankel development, but the dream proved unrealistic, as it became clear production machines required terrible complexity for acceptable road use. East German engineers created several prototype engines for the Trabant and Wartburg autos, but none were developed beyond the prototype stage, and the NSU license was allowed to expire in 1969.

The 1972 Yamaha RZ201

Yamaha:
Yamaha licensed the Wankel design in 1972 and quickly built a prototype, showing the 'RZ201' at that year's Tokyo Motor Show. With a 660cc twin-rotor water-cooled engine, it gave a respectable 66hp @6,000rpm, and weighed 220kg. While the prototype looks clean and tidy, the lack of heat shielding on the exhaust reveals the Yamaha was nowhere near production-ready, given the searing heat of the Wankel exhaust gases, and subsequent huge, double-skinned, and shielded exhaust systems on production rotaries.

The Yamaha rotary in exposed display

During this period, Yamaha was looking for alternatives to its small-capacity two-strokes, developing large rotary, two-stroke, and four-stroke engines. With 'shades of George Brough' (ie, showing prototypes to 'wow' show-goers), another never-manufactured Yamaha design was shown in 1972, a 4-cylinder two-stroke - the TL750.

The original 1974 RE5, with futuristic touches

Suzuki:
One year after Yamaha introduced, but never manufactured, their rotary, Suzuki introduced the RE5 Rotary at the 1973 Tokyo Motor Show. Suzuki licensed the Wankel engine on Nov.24, 1970, and spent 3 years developing their own 497cc single-rotor, water-cooled engine, which pumped out 62hp @ 6500rpm. Styling of the machine was reportedly entrusted to Giorgietto Guigiaro, a celebrated automotive stylist and advocate of the 'wedge' trend in cars, who leaked into the motorcycle world via several projects, notoriously the 1975 Ducati 860GT. Guigiaro's touch extended only to the cylindrical taillamp and special instrument binnacle for the RE5; a cylindrical case with novel sliding cover, meant to echo the futuristic rotary engine... the rest of the machine looked nearly the same as Suzuki's GT750 'Water Buffalo'.

The more 'conventional' 1975 RE5

The modest power output of the engine, combined with the 550lb wet weight, meant performance wasn't exciting, with a top speed of 110mph; no better than the two-stroke T500 series it was meant to displace, and far more complex, heavy, and expensive. Unfortunately, the release of the RE5 coincided with the Oil Crisis of '73, and customers suddenly became wary of the rotary's reputation for poor fuel economy. This combined with motorcyclists' typical skepticism of anything too new, meant sales of the RE5 were far lower than required to recoup their investment. With millions at stake in the project, Suzuki were determined to carry on production. Blaming Giugiaro's binnacle, in 1975 the styling was more conventional, but sales didn't improve, and by 1976 Suzuki had swallowed their losses, and shut production. Around 6,300 were built.

The 1974 Hercules W-2000

Hercules / DKW:
Fitchel and Sachs were the second licensee of the Wankel engine, on Dec 29, 1960, and the first with a motorcycle connection, with 'Sachs' the largest European maker of two-stroke engines. Sachs built their rotary as a small, light accessory motor for applications as diverse as lawnmowers, chainsaws, and personal watercraft.

The W-2000 Sachs air-cooled engine

The first two-wheeled mass-production of the Wankel engine was the 'Hercules' W-2000 of 1974, with a 294cc/20hp (later 32hp) air-cooled engine, with a single-rotor, which had previously been used in a snowmobile. The prototype machine used a BMW R26 gearbox and shaft drive, but production W-2000s used a 5-speed gearbox and chain final drive.

Hercules also built an Enduro using a rotary engine

The Hercules was good for 82mph (later 94mph), and was the first production motorcycle using a Wankel motor. The first models used a two-stroke mix in the petrol to lubricate the engine, which was later upgraded to an oil injector; smoky in either case! About 1800 were sold under both Hercules and DKW badges between 1974-76. In 1977 they sold all their production tooling to Norton...

The original BSA test mule, with A65 cycle parts; note the compact motor, and doubled-up 'cigar' silencers - rotaries are Loud!

BSA / Norton:
BSA felt, in common with most of the automotive industry, that the Wankel was the engine of the future, and in 1969, hired David Garside, a gifted young engineer, to begin exploration of Wankel engines for a motorcycle. Market research indicated the motorcycling public would accept the Wankel engine on fast sports machines, and Garside's small team began experimenting with a Fitchel and Sachs single-rotor engine, and with significant changes to the intake system, gained a staggering 85% more power, to 32hp. Suddenly the experimental engine looked appealing. Economic catastrophe at BSA meant development was immediately stalled. 1973 was the end of BSA, as the British gov't formed NVT - Norton-Villiers-Triumph...BSA was dropped from the title, even though it had owned Triumph since 1951! Still, under Dennis Poore's thoughtful leadership, the rotary project continued, and it was Norton who licensed the Wankel design on July 25, 1972.

Fan-cooled Sachs motor in BSA Starfire running gear

David Garside and his team began physical research with the installation of a Sachs fan-cooled single-rotor motor in a BSA 'Starfire' chassis; this was the first of a long line which led to the famous Norton rotaries. The 294cc engine gave 32hp at 5500rpm, and evidenced significant problems with heat - with twice the combustion events per revolution compared with a piston engine, and a physically much smaller engine unit, heat is a significant issue with Wankels. Sachs dealt with heat by routing the incoming air through the rotor itself, but this heated up the incoming mix, which reduces power. Garside redesigned the intake route, so that it still cooled the rotor, but then passed into a plenum chamber to cool off again. Air passing through the engine entered the plenum at 100ºC, but was cooled to 50º by the chamber and atomized petrol.

Norton-built twin-rotor, air-cooled engine, installed in a Triumph 'Bandit' chassis

In this work, Garside was helped by Bert Hopwood, retired BSA and Triumph designer (a protogé of Edward Turner, and author of the excellent 'Whatever Happened to the British Motorcycle Industry'), and the pair added a second rotor to the Sachs engine (giving 588cc), with many times the original finning area, plus that redesigned intake. The engine was installed in several chassis over the years, from a Triumph 'Bandit' to a Norton Commando, but eventually an entirely new chassis was developed, as the engine showed considerable promise during development.

Norton rotary, Norton Commando chassis...the compact rotary engine looks tiny compared to the original 750cc vertical twin. Note plenum chamber above the engine.

The first twin-rotor engine was installed in a Triumph 'Bandit' chassis in 1973, which was never shown to the public. With nearly 70hp, about twice the 'spec' of the original dohc Bandit twin-cylinder piston engine, this prototype must have been a lively ride!

The 1973 'spine' frame with Triumph Trident tank; this machine has been restored, and can be found at the Hockenheim Motorsport Museum

It was clear a new chassis was needed, and later in 1973 the Wankel appeared in a new frame, with a large spine tube which held oil; various iterations can be seen with Norton or Triumph tanks, as the engine was developed, in 1973/4: these were code named the 'P39'.

The Norton 'P42' prototype of 1978

After the merger of Norton and BSA/Triumph in 1973, another chassis was created for the rotary Norton, with box-section frame tubes - still holding oil - and an integrated airbox; the 1978 'P42'. With a Triumph T140 5-speed gearbox, this wholly new Norton was intended for production, and enough material collected for a first batch of 25 machines, but the project was halted suddenly, even after brochures were printed and journalists (notoriously, Cook Nielsen of Cycle World) invited to test it.

The Norton Interpol II police motorcycle

It took until 1984 for Norton to gear up production, but the 'P42' model was never sold to the public; it became the 'Interpol II', a police motorcycle; Norton had a long history of supplying the police, with the original Interpol Commando built from 1970-77. The Interpol II used Norton's well-developed 588cc air-cooled twin-rotor engine gave 85hp, and was in production from 1984-89, with around 350 built.

The 'Classic' of 1987, air-cooled, a naked Interpol II.

The first Norton civilian rotary was the 'Classic', built as a limited edition of around 100 machines in 1987, which sold out quickly. It was essentially an Interpol II in civilian garb, with a traditional Norton silver-and-black paint scheme. With all the bodywork removed, the 85hp engine gave sporting and smooth performance, very reliably, having been de-bugged using feedback from police agencies. The engine weight was low, making for easy handling.

The water-cooled Commander tourer, with Krauser bags

As Norton continued to develop their rotary, water-cooling was a natural next step to deal with heat issues, and in 1988, an Interpol II with a radiator was introduced, the 'P52'. The civilian version, essentially a re-painted Interpol, was the p53 'Commander', produced from 1989, with 85hp on tap. Norton hoped to repeat the success of the Classic, but the machine was criticized for using merely adequate Yamaha wheels and suspension, and not the sporting items one might expect of the Norton marque. Around 300 Commanders were built.

The discreet Norton F1 ad campaign...

Such disappointments were rectified in 1990, when Norton finally lived up to its heritage and introduced the lovely 'F1' ('P55'), based on their RC588 racers, then in the midst of a terrific run of success on the racetrack; in 1989 they won the British F1 championship. Only one color scheme was offered, in race sponsor 'John Player' livery of black and gold. Power was bumped to 95hp@9500rpm, from the water-cooled engine. The F1 had issues with heat buildup, as the bodywork almost sealed the engine unit within plastic, and lost quite a few hp when ridden hard. Around 145 F1s were built. Built with a Spondon aluminum twin-spar frame, White Power upside-down forks, a Yamaha 5-speed gearbox, and stainless exhaust, the F1 sold for an expensive £12,000.

The last Norton F1 Sport of 1992, in rare blue

In 1991, Norton rectified the heat issues by introducing the F1 Sport ('P55B'), which was effectively a F1 Replica, using the same bodywork as the racers, with more air flow possible around an open fairing, which resulted, curiously, in a less expensive sportsbike. Some consider the F1 Sport the finest of all the rotary Nortons. 66 were built, before Norton's eternal financial troubles put an end to rotary production...for now.

Henk van Veen with his OCR 1000

Van Veen:
In 1976, Henk vanVeen, the Dutch Kriedler importer, saw potential in the new rotary Comotor engines, which were compact and developed good power. Comotor was a joint venture of NSU and Citroen, who invested huge sums developing a new Wankel engine for the Citroen GS Birotor. The prototype of this engine had been extensively tested between 1969 and '71 in the Citroen M35, which was never officially sold, but 267 were given to loyal customers for beta-testing. The M35 engine used a single rotor rated at 47hp, whereas the later GS engine had two rotors, and produced 107hp from a 1,000cc. Van Veen saw this powerful and compact engine as the basis of a new superbike, and created the VanVeen OCR 1000.

The Comotor twin-rotor, watercooled rotary, rated at 107hp

The OCR was a heavy machine at over 320kg, but had good performance, with a top speed of over 135mph, and could hit 125mph in under 16 seconds. The water-cooled engine was housed in a Moto Guzzi chassis, used a gearbox designed by Porsche, and sold for $15,000, the same price as a Lotus Elite! 38 VanVeen OCRs were built before Comotor went into liquidation, as the GS Birotor was an utter flop, a gas-guzzler appearing exactly during the 1973 oil crisis, and worse, it was more expensive than the venerable Citroen DS, and slower. Citroen even tried to recall and destroy all examples, but a few survive. The VanVeen OCR, on the other hand, has always been a coveted and expensive collector's motorcycle.

Honda:
Housed in a CB125 chassis, with a 125cc air-cooled single-rotor Wankel engine. Clearly a test-bed to see if Honda was missing out on the Next Big Thing, this prototype looks to have been built between 1971-73, given the paint job and spec of the CB125 'mule'. Honda never bought a license to build Wankels, and also never 'bought in' engines, so this little motor is curious indeed...

Kawasaki:
The 'X99' prototype had a twin-rotor engine, water-cooled, which purportedly developed 85hp. Kawasaki Heavy Industries, Ltd, purchased a license to built Wankels on Oct. 4, 1971; the chassis of the X99 appears to be based on Kawasaki's Z650, introduced in 1976, which suggests the date of this prototype.

The Motoprom RD501B, with Sachs-derived fan-cooled rotary in the venerable BMW R71-clone chassis

VNII-Motoprom:
The Soviets are coming! The city of Serpukhov, 100km from Moscow, was one of many 'secret' towns in the Soviet Union, where research into new technology was conducted (plus manufacture of the AK-47), far from prying eyes. VNII-Motoprom was an auto and motorcycle research institute, which created quite a few interesting machines, most notably Soviet racers such as the Vostok-4, and a few Wankel-engined bikes, completely unlicensed. The story of the Soviet motorcycle industry is little known in the West (and the East!), and deserves exploration...

The fan-cooled engine of the RD-501B

In 1974, the RD501B used the ubiquitous BMW R71-based chassis (from a Dnepr MT-9), with a fan-cooled engine, clearly a copy of the Sachs rotary. With 495cc, it developed 38hp @6300rpm, and used shaft drive. It is claimed two were built.

The RD-660 with air-cooled twin-rotor engine

The RD-660 prototype was built in 1985, using a 660cc air-cooled twin-rotor engine, with chain drive. The engine is very similar to the BSA/Triumph/Norton prototypes built since 1973...a little Cold War industrial espionage not doubt, but methinks the Soviets bit off more than they could chew with the Wankel motor, as none were produced in series, in cars or motorcycles.

The RD-515 with a water-cooled version of the Sachs engine

The RD-515 of 1987 used a water-cooled twin-rotor engine, driving through a Dneper gearbox and shaft drive.

IZH:
Little-known outside the Eastern Bloc, Izh is the oldest Soviet/Russian motorcycle manufacturer, founded in 1929 in Izhevsk (on the banks of the Izh river) as part of Stalin's enforced industrialization of the agrarian economy, begun in 1927 with the rejection of Lenin's 'New Economic Policy', which allowed producers of grain or goods to sell their surplus at a profit - very similar to China's first moves toward Capitalism in the 1990s. Stalin's successful effort at creating an industrial power, where none existed previously, actually decreased the standard of living, caused widespread famine, and meant imprisonment or death for millions...although it did create an automotive and motorcycle industry. Not that 95% of Soviet citizens could afford it in those early days, although Izh sold something like 11 Million motorcycles before 1990.

One of the last hurrahs for Soviet-era Izh was this Wankel-engined prototype of surprisingly contemporary, if clunky, aesthetics. The 'Rotor Super' was under development at the end of the Soviet era, and shown just after the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989, when the Russian economy was in relative chaos. Suddenly without the state business subsidies and guaranteed incomes of potential customers, all Soviet-era businesses were suddenly faced with the need to make a profit, and rash ventures such as Wankel superbikes were out of the question. Izh is still in business, making inexpensive small-capacity motorcycles.

[If any reader has more information or photos of these obscure machines, please contact me!]
Some of my sources:
http://www.wolfgang-dingeldein.de/wankelig/historie/hist-mzwankel.htm
http://www.gvongehr.homepage.t-online.de/sonder/wankel/wankel.htm

NATIONAL MOTORCYCLE MUSEUM, ENGLAND

2011-10-27T16:34:00.000-07:00

It's a pilgrimage to a messy shrine, the quintessential English shed grown wild with money, but the shed-mind remains, and the hallowed relics within overwhelm visitors in a nearly-stacked jumble. The National Motorcycle Museum, phoenix risen from its own-damn-fault ashes, warehouse of glistening talismans, entombing shrine of Speed and a glorious, vanished industry.

Can you spot the...? Neither can I.

Anyone who loves British motorcycles simply must make the trip to Birmingham, and spend a few hours soaking in the oily ambience...not that the pyramidal halls are anything but clean, and their 'NMM'-logo carpet well vac'd. The bikes are fantastic, some of the most historic British prototypes, racers, and roadsters anywhere, a cornucopia really of the stuff you want to see, because the collection is just amazing.

Double Trouble Twins; Brough SS100 with JAP and MX engines

As with every time I've stopped in, the halls were nearly pedestrian-free when I visited this week, which is shameful for such a fantastic collection of machinery. But, some basic rules of museum management are roundly ignored at the NMM... imagine if MOMA or the Tate stuffed every artwork in their collection to their walls in a vertical paintstorm, some pressed into corners, far away from their roped-off viewers. Things may have been done that way in the 1800s, but in the century since, Museum Studies has emerged as a discipline, and people get advanced college degrees in curation and display, studying ways for museums to attract viewers, and properly display their wares.

The Triumph zone was better accessible than other areas...

The NMM ignores most of this accumulated wisdom and pursues a used-moto-lot aesthetic, bikes jostling handlebars in long lines, with terrible sightlines and an utter impossibility to gain any detailed visual information from most of the displays. A few sit on plinths, arranged so timing and primary sides can be examined close-up, but these are the exception, and if you're interested in figuring out how a 1908 Humber sorts out its magneto position, you'll have x-ray through several similar-era Triumphs and Rexes...in other words, impossible.

Collection as a numbers game; a lineup of the Norton rotary racers

Because the motorcycles themselves matter, it would be a revelation if we were actually able to see them in the round, well lit and fully visible. I reckon that if the NMM held back part of its collection to give breathing space, and rotated themed 'blockbuster' exhibits like any other museum, visitors would find reasons to return, and the halls wouldn't be empty. Better still, we'd be able to actually see these fantastic machines.

'Nero' and 'Super Nero' Vincent sprinters (one supercharged, one not)...would that I could have taken decent photos of the whole machines...

The incredible AJS ohc 1000cc v-twin one-off record breaker, which never really set records, but was stuck at around 130mph. Note long induction tube from the blower, with blowoff valve at the top, and super large magnesium cam chain (and magneto chain) covers...

Second primary chain drives the blower, atop the gearbox. Bronze heads, hairpin valve springs, that crazy teardrop tank; simply stunning.

The placard claimed this BSA Rocket 3 with Gold Star bodywork was a suggestion from a US dealer for a potential big seller...I want one too!

Vincents don't look so bad now...this is the TRUE plumber's nightmare!

Bronze head on a semi-radial valve Rudge TT Replica racer

A short row of Brough Superiors of all varieties; an early MAG-engined Mk1 in front

Now those are Brooklands cans...on the back of a McEvoy 1000cc racer

Cutaway Triumph cylinder head

Italian sauce, English-style. Lovely home-built 125cc dohc racer, the 'LCH', built by Leonard Clifford Harfield of Hampshire. Gear-driven double overhead camshafts, he based the engine on Rudge 250cc crankcases, and cast up the rest. The engine would reliably rev to 11,000rpm, making 18hp, good enough for 95mph, and first privateer home in the 1957 Ultra-Lightweight TT.

The front brake of a 1950 Douglas 90+ racer

A much earlier Douglas, this is Freddie Dixon's 1928 Isle of Man TT racer, with wet sump under the engine, and an oil pressure gauge just behind the oil filler. He made 18th in the Junior TT that year, and fell off in the Senior (same bike apparently, with different cylinders and heads), injuring his hands and ending his bike racing career. Dixon, a gifted development engineer, switched to racing cars, and won the 1935 and '36 TT Auto races...the only man to have won TTs on two (1927 Junior TT), three (1923 Sidecar TT), and four wheels!

The Brough Superior 'Dream', with 4-cylinder flat-4 engine, shaft drive, and groovy gold paint job. Basically two Triumph twins on a common crankcase, it never ran properly as GB didn't have the cash for development work, and realized the market for such a machine was too small to justify the expense...

The 'Dream' cylinder head and exhaust manifold...grace in alloy. The cylinder barrels were cast into the crankcases - one less joint to leak. As far as I know, only Wooler and Brough attempted an ohv "H-four" motorcycle of this configuration.

New Imperial v-twin 500cc racer

Martynside v-twin, with their own-make engine

The McEvoy with big JAP KTOR racing engine, fed by a Binks 'Mousetrap' carb

Were they ever really like that? Montgomery 4-pipe big Anzani twin with lots and lots of nickel...

Morgan 'Beetleback' Sports with big Matchless MX engine

Another failed Norton revival...the Nemesis, with special V8 engine

More successful were the Norton John Player-sponsored racers of the 1970s

Lovely old Norton 16H racer from the early 20s. Note the AMAC sports carb.

CTS (Chris Tattersal St.Annes) sits protected from English weather...

Lots of prototypes at NMM; this Royal Enfield triple is 3 cylinders from their 220cc two-strokes on a common crankcase

Another gem; the one-off Rudge 250cc v-twin prototype racer

LONDON ROAD TEST: 1936 BROUGH SUPERIOR SS80

2011-10-25T06:51:00.000-07:00

Too much clak, clak clak on the mac, not enough wrist-turning brrum brrum, makes Jack a dull lad. So, at the end of the northern hemisphere's riding season, on a cool but clear morning in London's Chelsea district, the offer of a road test on a nice old Brough Superior was like a cup of warm tea in cold hands; a very good idea.

The machine in question wouldn't win a Concours d'Elegance, as it has clearly been - whisper it - ridden quite a lot, and shows the inevitable road chips, cable rubs, and modest oxidation which grows unbidden even in the mildest of climates. Not to say it isn't a beautiful machine in lovely condition; this 1936 Brough Superior SS80 was restored 3000 miles ago by BS-guru Tony Cripps, and kept by a careful owner, to whom proper function was paramount. The result is a motorcycle which starts easily, doesn't drag its clutch in traffic, and is smooth as pudding.

The big finned covers hide the valve stems, and are quickly removed to adjust the valves

The 'Rolls Royce of Motorcycles', as Broughs are famously called (mostly by George Brough - "vide The Motor Cycle"- on every piece of their advertising from 1926), is a slightly inaccurate comparison, as Rolls never had the sporting pretensions (in terms of racing) that Bentley was famous for, although the esteemed quality of finish and envy-able flashiness of a vintage Rolls is very Brough-like. Their prestige, and ever-high price, has ensured few Broughs ever met the scrap-man, evidenced by a remarkable 72percent survival rate for late SS80s...

Twin tank fillers, long levers, wide 'bars, Monarch forks, Lucas Magdyno (which worked), 8" Enfield front brake (which didn't), big 8" Lucas headlamp

As George Brough hitched his star to the RR name, that star dragged Broughs right out of their sporting pretensions by the early 1930s, and into the realm of the luxurious Grand Tourer. By the time our test machine was built, 1936, Brough had ceased using JA Prestwich's racing v-twins, as they had never successfully evolved from their hairy racing heyday of the 1920s, and were simply too crude to install in a luxury machine. Matchless/AJS had developed a pair of powerful, smooth, mechanically quiet, reliable, and relatively oil-tight engines - a sidevalver and overhead-valve, the 'MX' models, both of 990cc - and while they weren't racing engines (with a difficult-to-tune 3-lobe camshaft), they fitted the bill for a touring machine perfectly.

The evolution of Brough Superiors reflected the life and personality of the man who made them; George Brough in the 1920s was a demon rider and serious moto-dandy, building the motorcycles he most wanted, which couldn't be found elsewhere in 1919, when he embarked on Superiority. Until other makers began copying the B-S pattern (bulbous-nose saddle tanks, long chassis, big v-twin engine), the Brough was alone at the top of the heap, and in terms of its quality of finish, remained there until the end of production (nominally 1940, although a very few Broughs were assembled during the war, and after, from broken machines or old stock). But, after a few nasty spills in his sprinting days (51 wins out of 52 starts, plus FTD in his last race while sliding on his backside, requiring skin grafts and 8 months in hospital), George fully supported other's efforts at taking major speed records with very special Broughs, but the motorcycles he sold lost their athletic edge... and began to gain weight.

The cast-alloy primary case dripped a little oil, but not on my shoes. Note the Harold 'Oily' Karslake-designed prop stand

This 1936 SS80 has, as mentioned, a 990cc 'square' (85.5x85.5mm) engine sourced from Matchless, which also saw service in their own 'Model X' (fantastic name; cape and mask included?), although GB specified knife-and-fork connecting rods, where the 'X' used them side-by-side. George ditched the SS80's original JAP sv sports engine in 1935, and in five years, 460 MX-engined SS80s were sold (another 626 used the JAP engine, 1923-'34). All SS80's were famously guaranteed capable of 80mph (these late ones more like 85mph), although a timing certificate from Brooklands might cost you an extra £10 over the £90 purchase price...which was already enough to buy a small house outside of London.

Big Burgess silencer, twin leather-front toolboxes, long pivoting footrests and sprung saddle for a friend. The postwar Lucas taillamp replaces the original 'MT110' type, but is visible in traffic, and includes a stop light.

Starting the big and surprisingly wide machine was simplicity itself; turn on the tap, a dab at the 'tickler' on the carb, and put your weight on the long kick lever. Boom, first time. And every time. No valve lifter required, no knocking back the magneto timing - it never spat or kicked back or sneezed, just rumbled into life with a very pleasant rolling basso voice, and very little clickety-clack from the timing chest, more a rustle actually.

Pull in the very light clutch lever, snick the Sturmey-Archer/Norton gearbox into 1st, without a clunk or other drama (try that on your new BMW...), and the engine rumbles and give off hints at hidden power, while staying pleasantly smooth, and building up speed quickly. Broughs use close-ratio gears (same as a Norton Inter, actually), which means a low 1st, a big gap to second, and the other two not far off. On a big twin with plenty of torque, this doesn't make sense, as there's no need to play 'tunes' on a Brough gearbox, just stick it in a high gear and let the engine do the talking. But, it was the best gearbox available (just ask any Vincent 'A' twin owner their opinion of the Burman 'box and clutch), and had a very 'sporty' spec.

Having ignored the mag and valve levers to start the beast, it was possible to ignore a third, while running - the front brake, which was, like all Broughs with 'Castle' or 'Monarch' leading-link forks, almost useless. As the brake anchor must move with the front wheel, braking power is transmitted through two 'link' pivots, which takes out all the bite. Brough owners have gone to great lengths at times to improve the situation, but dramatic braking brings other problems, ie, very bent forks, as their tubing, while lovely, is hollow and thin-walled. Luckily the rear brake is excellent, but its best to plan your riding lines carefully to avoid the need for panic stops.

Yes, its possible to ride a Brough in modern London traffic

The Brough sits low, with a very modest saddle height (27"), and a very long chassis (and 58"wheelbase). That grand 4.5gal fuel tank with twin filler caps is imposing and implies gravity, but the bicycle is surprisingly light for a big 'un, at around 430lbs. It certainly feels light when pushing it around, although with a very limited steering lock (a necessity with that bulbous chrome tank) tight turnarounds mean a lot of to-and-fro. Once the engine is warm, the lubricant return is checked in the oil tank (via a handy return line just below the filler cap on the 6 pint tank), and the clutch is let go, the Brough feels tiny compared to a new touring machine, because it is. And, while a sidevalve engine is cherished by some for a soft, woolly power delivery, the old girl still picks up her skirts and hustles down the road. The gap between first and second gear is so great, you might think you'd skipped a couple and landed in top, as an upshift has the engine barely ticking over at 30mph. As the chassis is so long, bumps don't throw the bike airborne, and the ride is surprisingly comfortable in that extra-wide sprung Lycett saddle.

The Brampton-built 'Monarch' forks do their job well, and that looong frame makes a very stable ride, without compromising smooth cornering. Not that you'll be scratching around corners...well actually you Will be before you know it, especially on left-handers, as the patented prop-stand bolted under the left footrest will dig into tarmac at fairly tame angles of lean. Banking right is a little better, but the low ground clearance (5" from ground to frame tubes), combined with a hefty lug for the raised footrest hangers, mean you're grinding away valuable metal before you expect, if you're used to a true sporting bike, even from the era. The cornering limitations enforce a gentlemanly riding style, fast yes but no corner heroics, just a well-planned line (those brakes) around the bends, all very graceful and relaxed. With a little practice, you'll be Broughing it in style in no time.

Its easy to scoff at the whole Brough 'thing'; decades of embellishing tales (mostly from GB himself) turned some off even in the day, and the current high prices/ego purchases can be eye-rolling, but sweep the rubbish away, and what you have is a beautiful old motorcycle, built to be the best it could be by a demanding rider/designer/manufacturer, which was indeed better than its peers. Superior even.

This motorcycle was kindly loaned by the Gauntlett Gallery, and is currently for sale; check here for details.

STAFFORD SHOW, OCT 2011

2011-10-19T15:49:00.000-07:00

Attracting 50,000 or so punters daily, twice a year, Stafford is the big gun of motorcycle autojumble/show/auctions in England. Run over 3 days, it takes two to cover all the stalls, club stands, vendors, and demonstrations, and then there's the Bonhams auction, which sets the benchmark for motorcycle prices around the world, with always a few super-rare gems to attract press attention.

Malcolm Barber auctions 'Moby Dick' at the Bonhams Stafford sale

This year's star was 'Moby Dick', the 1929 Brough Superior SS100 which was developed into the world's fastest road-going motorcycle in it heyday. With a solid gold provenance, and absolute documentation of every stage of the machine's life, it was clearly going to sell well, and it did, at £210,000 inclusive, landing it at #6 on my 'Top 20' auction sales. Two years ago, of course, it may have set a world record, but things have changed.

A Brough Superior '680' basket case with Bentley and Draper frame brought £40k

As obvious examples; at Stafford, good Vincent Rapides sold at around £30k, good Shadows about half that again...which is about half what they were selling for two years ago. Around 11,000 post-war Vincents came out of Stevenage, which disqualifies them as rare, but makes them the perfect 'bubble' indicator, being an obvious target for beginning collectors, and long-time wannabes with full pockets, gripped with desire as the market hype for Shadows is rising, and despair as prices inevitably crash with bad economic news. The Vincent market was in exactly this place in 2001... and 1990.

Plenty of bidders at the Stafford sale

While Moby Dick isn't a good 'comparable' for Brough SS100s, being unique, the sale of a good '31 BS SS100 at Stafford last May for £130k indicates the frenzy for investor-bikes seems to have cooled, and the 'car guys' haven't skewed the bike market, as some feared. Still, an exquisite, original condition JAP-engined SS80, perhaps the most original in the world, sold for £100k last weekend, which may mean la créme de la créme is holding value...and the rumored post-auction sale of the AJS 'Porcupine' for an undisclosed sum (somewhere between $650-$700k I would guess) seems to support this. Bottom line; World-class motorcycles may be worth a bit less than last year, but will still fetch good money. And its a great time to buy a 'normal' bike, as prices have dropped significantly since 2008.

Decent weather meant large crowds

Fantastic AJS 'Big Port' with Binks 'Mousetrap' carb...

The Benelli O/C stand

Reliving youth (1)...a BSA B33

Invacar...

BSA 'Daytona' Gold Star project in the autojumble

Another BSA...this one a triple, with A10 timing case, and double-overhead-cam conversion. See the factory version in my post on the London Motorcycle Museum.

'Norton' George Cohen brought a lot of flat-tanks, plus a new Manx

Douglas 90+ racer...

The 50cc racing club stand

Need an engine?

The Yamaha FS1E 'Fizzy' club stand

New Amal carbs...and an extra-large demonstrator model

Yummy Gitane-Testi café lightweight

An interesting Honda special, using a modern CBR250RR watercooled motor

A trio of Isle of Man TT 'Replica' trophies (for riders within 10% of the winning race time) went for £563

Drool-worthy Bianchi DOHC twin (designed by Guissepe Pattoni, who later developed this design as the Paton) and MV Agusta triple racers

'Norton' George's personal flat-tanker...complete with pipe!

Oozing oil and character in equal amounts

Considering a Norton 650SS in the autojumble...

...and a pair of unusual hybrids too.

Possibly the best ever towing outfit for a Scott; color-coordinated Citroen 2CV

If 'so obviously superior', why the distress call?

The SOS intake and exhaust

Have you come to haggle?

Ivan Rhodes brought a lovely Velocette Mk8 KTT with 'Huntley and Palmer' ex-Works cylinder head

Reliving youth (2); HD Sportster...

Triumph engine, Weslake 8-valve cylinder head, racing oufit

The Fox family Wall of Death