bike motorcycle magazine: December 2009

Thursday, December 31, 2009

Another Year...Over

2009

STEEDS VERASSEND, ALTIJD DICHTBIJ!

Motoring George Spauwen

The Twin Man

Sponsored by
Victrace Sitebuilding

Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Unapproachable...The story of the Norton. Part 10

From "Motorcycle Sport", June 1971, page 230-231. By C.E. "Titch" Allen. Part 10 of 19

Click the images to enlarge.

A Triumph Tiger 110 650 cc 1960

(Advert 1954)

(Johnson Motors Inc. US Advert 1954)

Wij kennen inmiddels allemaal wel de toch fraaie

Triumph Tiger 100 uit 1953 van onze Nestor Dr.Tiger Roelofski....

Welnu in Castletown op het Isle of Man kwamen wij

deze fraaie two-tone Triumph Tiger 110 650 cc uit 1960 tegen.

A Triumph Tiger 110 650 cc 1960

and quater circle Rodark pannier boxes

The Triumph Tiger 110 was a British sports motorcycle first made by Triumph at their Coventry factory between 1953 and 1961. Developed from the Triumph Thunderbird the T100 first appeared in 1954. Although it was supposed to be the sports model of the Triumph range the Tiger 110 was fitted with the enclosed panels from the smaller twins in 1961 which earned it the nickname 'bathtub' and made it look outdated, so was replaced by the Triumph Bonneville.

Development:

The Triumph Tiger 110 650 cc OHV Twin was Triumph's fastest production motorcycle to date, developed for the American market which wanted a higher power output. The T100 first appeared in 1954. Originally produced with a cast iron cylider block and head, this was quickly replaced with a light alloy cylinder head with special airways to improve cooling and austenitic iron valve set inserts. The external oil fed pipes were also replaced with internal oilways via the pushrod tubes.

The Triumph Tiger 100 was named because it was capable of 100 mph (160 km/h), so it was an obvious marketing idea to call the new bike the Tiger 110 - although technically the best one way speed obtained by The Motor Cycle magazine in tests was 109 mph (175 km/h) (with a strong tail wind) - but the speedometer was reading 114 mph (183 km/h), so there was a margin of error.

By 1961, the Tiger 110 was being replaced by more modern models, such as the T120 and had acquired the enclosed panels from the Triumph Twenty One which were fashionable at the time but gained it the nickname of the 'bathtub'.

World Speed Record:

On 5 September 1962, at Bonneville Salt Flats American racer Bill Johnson secured the world land speed record on a heavily modified Triumph T110 with a top speed of 224.57 mph (361.41 km/h). This success led to the development of the Tiger T110's successor - the Triumph Bonneville.

(Tekstbron: Wapedia )

STEEDS VERASSEND, ALTIJD DICHTBIJ!

Motoring George Spauwen

The Twin Man

Sponsored by
Victrace Sitebuilding

Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Unapproachable...The story of the Norton. Part 9

From "Motorcycle Sport", May 1971, page 189-192. By C.E. "Titch" Allen. Part 9 of 19

Click the images to enlarge.

The Ultimate Triton

We all know the Triton Caferacer...

(Motorcycle Art by: Gaston Vanzet)

But now a Triton completely different...

I’m not sure about you, but I’d love to wake up on Christmas Day and find this in my garage. This gorgeous Triton is the brainchild of French designers Frank Charriaut and Vincent Prat from Southsiders MC, and was built by the extraordinarily talented Daniel Delfour, one of France’s leading motorcycle builders.

As with most beautiful motorcycles, there’s a story behind ‘CP Project #1′. It was inspired by a trip to the 2008 Legend Of The Motorcycle event in California; Delfour’s exquisite Norton Ala’verda caused a stir there, so the three friends hatched plans for a sequel. “As English motorcycle fans, we choose to use a Norton featherbed frame and a Triumph 750 Bonneville engine,” says Vincent. “But we didn’t want to make the thousandth café racer or Triton; we decided to follow our own road. We started designing a mix of Batman’s motorcycle with a T.Rex fastback and Cat Woman’s curves. Inspiration came directly from the culture of comics.”

The design brief for Delfour was to create a very slim and low-slung motorcycle, all in black. By this point, a leading French fashion house was on board, and the tightly imposed specifications proved to be a challenge. But Delfour is also a violinmaker, and his thirty years of experience in that field came to the rescue. Working from sketches provided by Vincent and Frank, Delfour carved multi-part moulds for the bodywork in plywood, balancing the volumes and shapes of the tank and seat until the styling came together as a whole. The featherbed frame is spacious, whereas the Bonneville engine is compact, so the visual balance of this bike became doubly critical.

Delfour decided to do away with front brakes, flat-track style. So he used a vintage Yamaha hub, with a Bonneville item at the back, and laced the hubs to black anodized rims with stainless steel spokes. The front forks are Yamaha items, connected to Moto Guzzi triple trees modified to match the original Norton geometry. And the jewel-like detailing is amazing. Many parts are hand-made, including the oil tank, rearsets, levers and pedals; the speedometer and billet alloy gas tank cap were designed by Vincent, taking cues from a classic French chronometer. “Purists will say that it’s a sacrilege,” says Vincent, “but why do we have to follow any rules? The only thing we’re talking about here is fun. Why the length of the fork tubes? Why a front wheel without brakes?

Just because we wanted it like this.”

The engine was rebuilt to original specifications, but using a TR7 single-carburetor head rather than the fussier stock twin-carb item. The visual finishing touches came from French master builder Momo, who not only painted the frame in gloss black and the bodywork in a black flake, but also created the exhaust system and heat guards. The completed bike was then handed over to Benoit Gerry from Studio Ze for the first image captures.