Classic Bike Hub UK

Sarah bought her Dad a One Hundred Pound Wonder, and we tried to figure out exactly what kind of classic bike it might be… It started as a message on the message board and an email to Frank W. Sarah said: ‘We bought an old Ariel for £100 for a surprise present for our Dad’s…

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Ariel’s Arrow was certainly an oddity, and it is most definitely an old British bike. But is it a genuine classic motorcycle? Paul Friday doesn’t really care, because his Arrow was certainly the worst bike he’s ever owned… It wasn’t all the bike’s fault. I was the previous owner from Hell. I was young and…

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The Ariel VB is a plodding old sidevalve single, with plenty of torque but with no power and no brakes. Right? ‘Borrow mine…’ suggested Tony Page. Frank Westworth took up his offer… Everyone knows all about bikes. This is a Great Truth. Somehow and mysteriously, we all know everything there is to know about bikes,…

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There’s no doubt that readers adored Graham Ham’s adventures aboard Daisy, his Triumph Speed Twin. In fact, they like the cut of his jib so much that they demanded a sequel to the original ‘Daisy’s Diaries’ book. And now it’s just been published… Regular readers of RealClassic will be familiar with Graham Ham’s adventures in…

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Malcolm Arnold runs and rides AMC bikes; among them is a favoured 650 twin from 1963… ‘I always hankered for an AJS CSR. The previous owner had lost faith completely in this one so I knew it was going to be a challenge. Every time my wife came out with me it always had a…

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Traditional British singles tend to be solid, dependable workaday machines. Paul Whitney’s AJS 500 is a little bit more lively… ‘Discretion, dignity, and an ability to cope with hard work without showing signs of stress – these are some of the essential attributes of a statesman. Thus when AJS decided to give their machines names…

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Some classic bikes stay with you for life. Tony Ayliffe went a-courting on his Ajay, took it on honeymoon, and doesn’t seem to think they’ll ever be parted… It was the 2nd March 1976, I was 20 and had taken the day off work to go in search of a new bike with my mate…

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It’s probably good news when the only item you need to fit to a 44 year old British bike is a bicycle bell. John Whapshott tells a rider’s tale Like many Marters before, I reluctantly packed away my crash helmet soon after I got married twenty years ago. Mary and I both liked bikes, and…

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Was Yamaha’s ground-breaking FZR as good as its reputation suggests? A new collection of old roadtests helps to place it in perspective… This collection of 28 magazine articles spans eight years and the several incarnations of Yamaha’s FZR1000, from the original 1987 Genesis through to the final fox-eye EXUP, with a detour here and there…

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Before there was Elsie, Yamaha built an equally memorable two-stroke tearaway. Anarchy shows us his 400C… Although there’s an inevitable family resemblance between the RD400 and the 350 which preceded it, the 40bhp two-stroke had been considerably developed to make it bigger, smoother, quieter, faster and longer-lived. Yamaha increased the engine stroke to add 51cc…

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