Sam Hewitt

Triumph 350/500 unit construction twins bible 1957-1974

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Sam Hewitt

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1st October 2019

Books about classic bikes tend to come in three forms – those about racing, those of a very general spread of content and those that are specific in their focus. It is the latter that most of us use as a reference tool and, coincidentally, just what this book is. By Peter Henshaw and Justin…
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Cadwell pics parte the seventh

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Sam Hewitt

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1st October 2019

When Colin’s nephew gave me this batch when we worked for a Lincoln company in the 1980s, he had a huge pile of the card-backed prints. I just wonder what happened to them all if they are gems like these! Maybe they will surface sometime. In Part 7 we have a rigid framed Norton Inter,…
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Suzuki TM400

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Sam Hewitt

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29th September 2019

Was Suzuki’s big TM the final frontier? Steve Cooper goes where no man has gone before to reveal the truth. In late 1969 or early 1970 someone at Suzuki’s Hamamatsu HQ came up with the bright idea of creating a big-bore scrambler that could beat the likes of Yamaha and Kawasaki on the dirt. Moto-X…
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Hello…

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Sam Hewitt

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29th September 2019

What a great cover photo on your July 2019 issue: London’s Metropolitan police officers on the Noddy Course. When the Met put hundreds of officers on two wheels in the late 1950s, many of them had no motorcycling experience. The two-week Noddy Course at the police’s Hendon Driving School taught them the tips of motorcycling…
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Darlo dreams

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Sam Hewitt

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28th September 2019

This picture (left) could have been taken in 1948 but was actually taken last month. It shows my 1951 BSA C11 next to Tornado, which was the first steam locomotive built in Britain for 50 years in 2008. Both machines have a connection with Darlington. Tornado, a Peppercorn class loco, was built by enthusiasts in…
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No TARDIS? Carry on regardless!

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Sam Hewitt

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28th September 2019

What a great paper OBM is. I look forward to its arrival on my doormat each month. It offers some wonderful insights into what we fringe motorcyclists love doing best: riding, tinkering and occasionally restoring: which brings me neatly on to that subject… I’ve been restoring a wonderful Velocette MAC for a few months now.…
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Reunion fun at Big Bike Sunday

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Sam Hewitt

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27th September 2019

More than 1200 motorcycling enthusiasts gathered in Skipton on June 30 to enjoy the show put on by The Girder Fork and Classic Motorcycle Club. At least 100 classic and modern motorcycles were polished and prepared by their owners in an attempt to win the best in their class or even best in show. The…
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It was ‘The Best of Times’: The racing career of Charlie Williams

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Sam Hewitt

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25th September 2019

Launched at the Carole Nash Classic Motorcycle Show at Stafford in April, this is Charlie Williams’ personal biography (is there any other type?), covering his racing career that featured not only a significant number of very successful years at the Isle of Man TT, but also racing in Grand Prix on the continent against the…
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Hail to you, classics of Glamis

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Sam Hewitt

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23rd September 2019

This year’s Scottish Transport Extravaganza, held at Glamis Castle in Forfar on July 13 and 14, saw temperamental weather, as is usually the case in those parts, but the Sunday cleared up and allowed the 15,000 attendees to enjoy the sunshine, writes Francis Lee. From my point of view as a classic motorcycle enthusiast, it…
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Boxing clever

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Sam Hewitt

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21st September 2019

The sidecar has become more of a leisure item in recent years although, as Mick Payne knows, there are still plenty of enthusiasts using them on a daily basis. In the past, sidecar outfits were often considered a workhorse with the bike, frequently a side-valve single, hitched to a family-sized saloon or a utility box.…
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Sam Hewitt

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