Sam Hewitt

Only Bounders Ride Motorcycles

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Sam Hewitt

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28th October 2017

By Pete Kelly I sometimes think that Yorkshiremen are born with dry humour – and it simply falls from the pages of Ken Mellor’s self-published book, Only Bounders Ride Motorcycles, 100 Years of Family Motorcycling. It’s the story of the pleasure derived from man’s basic conception of the internal combustion engine by a father and…
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Great revival gathers pace

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Sam Hewitt

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28th October 2017

It’s strange how bikes seem to get heavier as we become older, and with the debate about retro-styled bikes from the Far East still raging, we thought some readers might like an idea about what the best of such machines are really like to ride. There appears to be an abundance of relatively low-priced 125cc…
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A ‘time warp’ Ariel Huntmaster engine

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Sam Hewitt

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28th October 2017

When you buy a spare engine for a classic bike, you’re never sure about its internal condition – but when Mark Hiscox of Cambridge pulled from his garage shelf a 1954 Ariel Huntmaster engine that he’d bought last year, he found a rolled-up piece of paper telling exactly what work had been done to it…
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Service with a salute!

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Sam Hewitt

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28th October 2017

Once upon a time, breakdown help was more of a club affair than merely an insurance scheme with multiple marketing spin-offs run by giant companies. Photos from the Mortons Archive tell the story of the good old days, when the sidecar-mounted patrolmen of the RAC and AA were seen as the knights of the road.…
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A Vindec at 14, then Triumphs all my life

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Sam Hewitt

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28th October 2017

Graham Overd tells of a lifetime of motorcycling memories, from keeping a stock of box sidecars for sixteeners taking the bigger bike, three-wheel ‘L’ plate option to building off-road specials and proudly riding a succession of Triumphs on the road. In February, Old Bike Mart ran a story about a reader who bought his first…
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A covered bike in Germany

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Sam Hewitt

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28th October 2017

Hello to the editorial team, and it was very interesting to read about all the covered bikes built in the UK in the last issue. In 1934 the Victoria factory in Nurnberg (1886-1958) built a covered bike called the KR8 Fahrmeister (Driving Master), and this was one of the first such bikes to be built…
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Schmoozing the Met for LE Velo orders

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Sam Hewitt

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26th October 2017

I thoroughly enjoyed Triumph Tiger Cub and Terrier expert Mike Estall’s fascinating letter ‘Police evaluation Terriers recalled’ (OBM September). With typical attention to detail, Mike describes the Metropolitan Police’s evaluation in summer 1955 of competing lightweight motorcycles for beat patrol work. By the mid-1950s the Met was facing a manpower shortage, and the prospect of…
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Ariel FH Sports outfit memories evoked

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Sam Hewitt

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26th October 2017

The recent OBM article about the Ariel FH Sports took me back to my days as an apprentice compositor at McCorquodales (Printers) in Euston. I left school at the age of 15 on Thursday, July 24, 1958 and began a six-year apprenticeship the next day, so there was no holiday that year! In 1959 a…
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Happy Dayton Albatross holiday

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Sam Hewitt

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26th October 2017

I’ve managed to rustle up all the old photos I have of my Villiers 2T-engined Dayton Albatross scooter from the 1960s. I know there’s not much of the scooter to see, because the purpose was to picture my late wife Maureen on holiday in France and at Calella, near Barcelona in Spain. I repeated the…
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No ramps required! Motolug ingenuity makes motorcycle trailer-loading a doddle

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Sam Hewitt

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26th October 2017

Ingenious, versatile and affordable, Motolug collapsible motorcycle trailers are designed and manufactured at the Cotswold Business Village at Moreton in Marsh, Gloucestershire. Founded in 2007, the business offers a unique range of UK and internationally patented EC Whole Vehicle Type-Approved trailers whose key design criteria have resulted in products that can be easily and quickly…
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Sam Hewitt

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