Features

Aspire Classics has checked over the bike for Chris Green In tune with what was perceived to be the buying public, MotorCycling’s editor Bernal Osborne was pictured in Stormguard and waders trickling along at walking pace on the test model released by Velocette. In the main this would be the sort of riding equipment a…

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The first real motorbike I owned was a 1955 Velocette MAC. It was barely two years old and cost £125. I used it for daily commuting and weekend pleasure, as did most of the fraternity in those days. Among the best rides was to Glasgow for a three month work secondment, and a similar trip…

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Arriving 12 months after the CD the twin carbed 12v machine also featured something of a Honda trademark, an electric start. With sufficient va va voom to embarrass a 350 Triumph owner, the little CB was something of a watershed for Honda. By then a mainstream UK player the sporty 175 twin effectively defined exactly…

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Quadrent never made it to production The same capacity as Triumph’s Trident, Honda’s CB750 caught the public eye by virtue of its extra cylinder and race tech spec, though it wasn’t particularly fast. Naturally, thoughts at the then experimental department at Kitts Green turned to a four too. So, how did they do it? Design…

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Interesting machine from OEC… No matter what modern riders think, it has all been done before and while it is amusing to laugh at old motorcycles and deride them from the 21st century, drawings like this one show people who were in the industry in the 1920s could think ‘outside the box.’ When the military…

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Designated the Victor Grand Prix the new version of the motorcycle carried an engine much more suited to MX racing. Bottom end and big end bearings were much stronger giving a stiffer base for the power to churn from. The unit produced only ‘modest’ power compared to a 500 MX motor but, the advantages of…

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The smiling face of Ural UK When I asked David Angel, proprietor of F2 Motorcycles why he moved from his well established Oxfordshire base, the reply was to the point: “Did you ever visit the old premises?” They were situated in a steel unit, cold in winter and hot in the summer, so when the…

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They were designed to take workers to work – I’ll allow that some motorcycles were, and still are, glamorous and eyecatching but they’re still transport and it’s our rose tinted view of the past that has altered that perception. It is also true that the more glamorous machines – Bonnevilles, Goldies, HRDs, Broughs etc –…

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Iconic Norton engine Launching in 1932, the International was available in 350cc and 500cc forms and joined two other ohc machines Norton already had, this in an age when even a pushrod overhead valve engine was considered sporting. Though the previous engines had been powering the sporting range this job swiftly became the purpose of…

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Velocette Thruxton Naming a machine after a race or event is a fairly common theme in motorcycle circles – think Bonneville, Manx, Monza, Oulton, Silverstone. In which case perhaps the super sporting Venom-based single from Velocette could have been named Montlhery in honour of the 24 hour record the company had taken at the Montlhery…

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