Better Beaters - Building Cars and Daily Drivers

 AMCA Western Nationals and swap meet. Dixon California June 20th. Part Two.

An antique Indian will always catch my eye.

I'm going to show some more of the very nice bikes that I saw.

I have never been enamored with British Bikes, but they do have a strong following and there were quite a few nice examples on display. At one time I had a 70 ish, Kawasaki WT650 twin. It was a non unit construction twin that very strongly resembled an old BSA. At the time it was kind of an orphan among Kawasakis, as the rest of their line up consisted of two stroke twins and triples. From what I understand, this machine was originally built by a company named Meguro. Kawasaki bought out that company and folded the 650 twin into their line up. It was one of the largest displacement machines of it's time, reportedly favored by gangsters and others in the criminal element. This is one reason that large displacement bikes were frowned on by the general public in Japan.

I will admit that a fairly light weight 650 twin featured plenty of torque in an easy to handle package. I taught a buddy of mine how to ride the bike in a few hours. I can see the appeal of this type of motorcycle.

A nice looking bike that I owned between my  junior and
senior years of highschool; 1972-73.

This is a late 60's unit construction BSA.

I especially like the color of this BSA.

The Norton Comando was an English twin that rode out the first era of the superbike wars, along with the Triumph and BSA triples. The Norton is probably most memorable for the advertising campaign that they ran in the 1970's. What red blooded adolescent boy could forget the "Norton Girls" that were featured on the inside of the front cover of motorcycle magazines of the period? Hard to believe, but those same "girls" would now be in their 80's!

Just in case you need something to jog your memory.

Now, back to reality.

This Triumph has the popular tracker look. The air filter
is set up in an unusual manner under the seat.

After looking at the photos that I took at the event,
my Wife asked me the question, "Does EVERYBODY have a beard?"

It seems that I've seen quite a few Vincents in the last couple of years. That's probably because I've attended more antique motorcycle events. These were always rare bikes.You might wonder, "what makes these bikes so special?

Rollie Free letting it all hang out!

At the time these were the fastest production motorcycles available. A specially modified, highly tuned, Vincent Black Shadow was prepared for the Bonneville Speed Trials. In 1948, Rollie Free set a world motorcycle speed record at Bonneville of 150 mph. To add just a mile or two to his speed, he stripped down to his swim trunks and wore a swimming cap and slippers. He laid out prone on the bike to reduce the frontal area. This reduced the drag enough for him to barely exceed 150 mph. Thank God he did not go down on this run, the abrasive salt would have shredded his skin! I find it hard to believe that the timing officials would have allowed him to make the run, but as you can see, even helmets weren't required. Either that, or he snuck out before they could stop him.

Just to put this into perspective, eleven years earlier in 1937, Joe Petrali rode a specially modified version of the just released Harley Davidson EL 1,000cc Knucklehead to a record speed of 136 mph, at Daytona Beach. The bike was initially covered in streamlining panels but they reduced stability and had to be removed after a few trial runs. All reports indicate that Joe did not assume the prone position and he kept his pants on!

The tail section was removed, but the rider's pants stayed on.

It takes a lot of extra horsepower (and another decade!) to gain another 15 mph. of top speed.

Heir to Harley's extensive racing heritage was the XR750.

Flat trackers always generate a lot of interest. HD was almost unbeatable in this arena of competition. This was where thew famous red white and blue Number One symbol arose. Their riders would score the highest total of points in AMA competition, though HD was not really competitive in road racing.

More and more riders are leaning towards the tracker image for their street bikes. This could be an actual XR engine or it could be a Sportster engine.

This bike done up in Union Jack livery is a speedway racer. This type of racing is done on short dirt tracks, which may be more intense than flat tracking, which takes place on a mile track. The speedway track is small and the heats are quite short and fast.

Speedway bikes are distinctive, brutal, but quite beautiful

For cylinder bikes are nothing new. Even before Honda released the CB 750 in 1969, four cylinder bikes were produced in the 1920's by several manufacturers. Ace, Henderson and Indian. They were longitudinally set up. Their complexity and cost, as well as their lesser reliability compared to conventional designs led to the end of production.

Not ready for prime time.

I overheard that the asking price for this restored Ace four cylinder was well over 100,000 bucks.

We can compare the Sportster's evolution from the early 1960's to the early 1980's with these two bikes.

This is a 1980 XLS, the factory custom Sportster that was the counterpoint to the Low Rider. For 1980 the bike got a new gas tank, the 3.3 ga. unit used on the recent Super Glide, that traced it's roots back to the 250cc Sprint single. This bike should have two inch longer fork tubes like the Low Rider, but it appears that those were replaced by shorter standard length items. Set up like this, these 1,000cc Sportys were actually quite capable as touring machines. I took my '77 Sporty on a month long, around the country journey back in 1980.

This is a mid '60's XLCH kick start model. I'd put it at a '67 or '68. I had a '70 XLCH that had already been built into a chopper before I bought it. This was the hottest 900cc engine that Harley built. Higher compression, racier cams, a bigger carb, magneto ignition, lower gearing, and lighter weight differentiated the XLCH from the touring oriented XLH. Factory advertising claimed that these engines could rev to seven grand! However, that didn't do much for the engine's longevity. The XLH would later get an electric starter.

The XLCH set the styling cues for future Sportsters.

Sportsters had been in continual production from 1957 to 2022. After a five year hiatus, the Sportster will be back in 2027! 

Harley sells a current model that could be
mistaken for this 68 year old antique.

You could be forgiven for thinking that this red Harley is a late model bike. HD has continued their heritage styling since the mid Fifties when this Panhead Duo Glide was new. Once the bikes gained front and rear suspension, their look became a template for future Big Twin models.    

There are lot's of guys like me that appreciate and prefer the classic looks of Harley's models. But  there are probably those who, based on looks alone, think that Harley Davidson is still building the same old stuff. I have recently discovered that HD has made major changes in their motorcycle's engineering during the last twenty years. There's a lot of new thinking at the Company, but you have to take a closer look to see it.  

There are still a couple of more posts to follow on my coverage of this event.