Real Classic

March magazine out now

5th March 2018 RowenaH Latest Issue Leave a comment

There’s something of a twin-cylinder theme to this month’s magazine, which features a really rare postwar V-twin, a sidevalve parallel twin, an overhead cam inline twin, a traditional British ohv twin and a BMW Boxer. If that’s too many cylinders for your tastes, RC167 also includes a couple of old-fashioned singles (and one rather more modern example). If you already…

Racing Nortons Galore

1st March 2018 RowenaH Bikes Leave a comment

The South of England Classic Show at Ardingly on 25th March 2018 incorporates a mammoth Norton Extravaganza, to celebrate more than 100 years of the marque. Brooklands Museum will be displaying several of their unusual Norton motorcycles, including the ones you see here… First up is this 1927 racing Norton outfit, ‘LPD1’; a genuine Pat Driscoll Norton Brooklands race bike…

Plugs & Leads

27th February 2018 RowenaH News Leave a comment

Five Triumph Tigers are up for auction; there’s a rapid replacement for old Lucas Rita ignition systems; the Beamish Trophy Trial date has changed, and here’s a quick kit to fix a snapped speedo cable… RITA REVIVED! It’s been years since the Lucas Rita electronic ignition system has been available, which means that owners have been mending and making do…

Scott Flying Squirrel

16th February 2018 RowenaH Bikes Leave a comment

Scott’s innovative engineering set the standard for two-strokes for decades. These idiosyncratic machines inspire dedication and exasperation in roughly equal measure in their owners – but they’re capable of travelling very high mileages and still abound on the classic scenes, as Richard Jones discovers… I’ve never liked squirrels; rats cunningly disguising themselves with furry tails and nasty, beady little eyes…

Classic Techniques: Superblend bearings, part one

15th February 2018 RowenaH Tech 2 comments

When the main bearings in Commando engines started disintegrating, Norton came up with a super solution – the ‘Superblend’ bearing which proved to be one of the success stories of the 1970s. Andy Heathwood explains how it was little more than smart marketing, and leads us through the potential pitfalls of specifying replacement bearings for big Norton twins today… The…

Triumph Daytona T100R

9th February 2018 RowenaH Bikes Leave a comment

Triumph introduced their unit-construction 500 twin in 1960. By 1966 it had evolved into a proper proddie racer, the Daytona, which packed considerable poke into its petite package. Marion Thirsk found an interesting example at last year’s Ayr Show… When Steve purchased this Daytona it’d been lying forlorn in a garage for seven years, with the fallen roof of the…