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Boris Karloff eating toast and drinking tea on the set of Frankenstein, 1931

via reddit

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Careful preparation of a fish fossil

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My ‘75 850 Commando

I remember my brother in law Bill McQuillan, taking this photo at his mum’s house.  I had the bike for sale at the time.

I had fitted those Interstate mufflers and Glen Roche had painted it for me.  Black over a gold base.  Pinstripes etc came out well, but the colour was just horrible, best described as a dark metalflake brown.  What was I thinking, what was he thinking?

It also had the single 36mm Mk11 Amal on a manifold I built.  I think Waynebow told me he saw that manifold and Carburetor on another Commando recently.  I know I bought the carb off Eric Pemberton, but have no idea what happened to that rig after, probably I sold it.

Looking very earnest in my WW1 aviator goggles.  Photo was taken by Bruce Linnell on the road down to the North Kaipara heads from Dargaville.  I had been to the Cold Kiwi Rally in Waiouru so must have been mid August.  I had loved the ride on the Norton so much I just kept going when I hit Auckland and went up north for a few days to see Bruce.

We all wore those goggles back in the day, and Al Roche even made up some tinted lens’ for his.  Full face helmets were for sissy’s back then.

We always rode in jeans and leather jackets and denim cutoffs, mine was lined with sheepskin to try and keep a bit warm.  The leather jacket only had a thin synthetic silk lining so was not remotely warm at speed.  We have it easy these days.  I still have the remnants of the leather jacket somewhere.

The sheepskin mittens were warm, well until it rained anyway.

.....and riding with the goggles up. FFS, no wonder my eyes are about shot now.

I remember now when I was at the Cold Kiwi, we had done a run at full noise down the Desert Rd, and when I pulled into Waiouru one of my headers on that 2/1 exhaust pipe had snapped clean off and it sounded like a submarine.

And thus I learned that when you build exhaust pipes you machine new exhaust pipe flanges, you don't just cut them off an old set of pipes and weld them on, because the chrome and carbon, alloys into the weld and makes it very brittle. Talk about learning stuff the hard way.

Found a gas station at Waiouru with an Oxy Acetylene welding set, and I welded it back on. The guy at the gas station was insistent that he was going to weld it, but he was crap welder and I rubbished his skills until he relented and let me do it properly. Poor guy.

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Frog’s Tiger Chopper

Here’s the late Frog’s Tiger.  Not sure who originally built it, but Frog (aka Brett Richardson, RIP) bought it largely as you see here.  This photo was taken around about 1981 or 82.  Looks like Otto Horvath’s K-Model Bedford truck in the background maybe.

I had just done some work for him, building those exhaust pipes you see, and those forward controls.  I also built him a better battery box and that taillight mount on the rear shock you can see. 

Frog was good to work for, he always paid cash, and he kept you ‘ahem’ ‘motivated’ while you worked.  And he was always laughing about something.

I tell you Brett could ride, on a windy road he would push that Bonnie chopper as fast as anyone and faster than most. I recall chasing him over the Kopu Hikuai  road on my Commando at ridiculous speeds, and being about tapped out keeping up with him.  He had plenty of ground clearance on that chopper, and he used it all.

I saw that same bike up for sale on Trademe not too long ago.

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71 Dunstall Norton Commando

My ‘71 Dunstall Norton Commando 750. 

I think the year was 1975, and I was 17.

I bought the bike with all standard Roadster tank and side-covers, but swapped them for this Dunstall setup.  In hindsight it was a dumb swap and I saw later why the other dude was so keen on swapping.  Really should have questioned that at the time.  Ah well.....

That Dunstall gear was not well made, it didn’t fit real good and the gas tank leaked.  That sexy, metalflake silver and blue paint had me won over, as soon as I saw it.  Sucker!

Sitting on my Dad’s driveway in Manurewa, my old mate Pete sitting on my Commando, another friend Ron Heperi (obscured) and his girlfriend Kaye Bresnahan. 

Ron had a very nice 1970 Triumph Trophy 650.

This is the Norton shortly after I bought it in ‘75. 

I bought it from Weston-Webb Motorcycles Ltd, in Station Rd Otahuhu, and it cost me $1250. 

It could go like hell, and I thought this was surely as good as it was ever going to get, when I bought it. 

It did leak some oil though, and I hated messing with those bastardly Lucas ignition points all the time.  There was no such thing as Boyer electronic ignitions back then so you were a slave to Joseph Lucas’s ignition systems.

That twin leading shoe front brake was very good too.  I could do ‘stoppies’ with if I tried.

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Genuine Old Skool Bobber

So for all you young whippersnappers who reckon you invented bobbers about 2 years ago, here is one that my old mate, Peter Woodham, built in 1979. 

That is Pete in all his glory in the first picture, he was always a snappy dresser.  He’s still my mate today although we don’t see each other so often.  Been friends for about 47 years, since form 3 at James Cook High.  We did get into some mischief, in those early years between then and now.  Now we’re both Grandfathers and respectable!

Originally it was a 1970 Triumph US Export Bonneville, but it was a bit rough when he bought it, it had a hard life.  So he did what any sane person would do and built a bobber.  Only we called them low riders in those days, not bobbers, that's a term got invented by HD a few years back I think

This is from way back, in the days when ‘Old Skool’ was just called ‘Skool’!

Orb Morbey & Kirk Rawle did most of the work for him at their shop, the Hog Farm in Drury NZ.  It was running a Z1 Kawasaki front end, 16″ back wheel and a hand built rear sub-frame.  Sounded fine with those short reverse cone megaphones too.  Clean and simple, way ahead of your time Pete.

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‘57 BSA A10

I had this old ‘57 A10 BSA in about 1975 or ‘76 I think.  It was a 650 Golden Flash originally with a cast iron head. It was a very heavy machine for a 650 as i recall.  So heavy, our mate Ogre Evans used to joke that the tank, frame and guards were also made of cast iron.

Bought it off a guy called John Dwen, who had been my high school maths teacher at James Cook High School.  Originally it had been an MOT traffic cop bike, it still had the old cop fairing with TRAFFIC across the front when I bought it.

I put a Super Rocket alloy head on it and it went pretty good.   It lacked any sort of snappy acceleration, but on a ride it would mostly keep up with the later 650 Triumphs my mates were riding at the time. It handled just fine.  The wheels had the full width BSA alloy brakes, but they weren’t too flash either.  Only marginally better than putting both feet down and praying.  Those Goodyear Grasshopper tyres were pretty terrible too, especially in the wet, but they did last for a very, very long time however.

Later on I put some lighter guards and a brand new chrome and metalflake green US export tank I got from Valentines in Hamilton.   Just after I did that, I  got knocked off it by an old bloke doing a U turn on Clevedon Rd.  I had Sue on the back and to this day, she still remembers that I picked the bike up and checked it out before I picked her up off the grass.  I maintained I could tell she was fine, in better condition than the bike anyway.

That’s Jamie Clausen on the back in the pudding basin helmet.  Pretty sure we were riding down Dominion Rd in Papakura.  Jamie went to Australia in 1980, as did I, but Jamie stayed there, never came back. 

No goggles or gloves either, I must have had cast iron eyeballs and knuckles back in those days too.  I dunno!

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Bruce’s ‘42 WLA

Bruce Linnell and Julie (cant remember her surname then, later I think they got married?) and Bruce’s WLA, sometime around ‘78.

He had just ridden the bike up from somewhere in New Plymouth, where he had bought it for NZ$500 as I recall.

It was at a bike shop and they were apparently hugely disinterested in it, it had been sitting out the back for years, not going.  As I recall Bruce spent a day or two fettling it and got it running.

He rode it up to our place and Julie rode the Ducati GTS860 in the background.

Bruce let me ride the Ducati, and I was blown away.  A fantastic bike in its day, so much more sophisticated than the Nortons and Triumphs we were used to.  I later  bought one in ‘79 when we went to Adelaide in Australia to live for a while.

The WLA was an ex US Army bike left over from the war effort.  There were never as many of these in NZ, as there were 741B Indians, which were incredibly popular after the war, when the Americans decided they couldn’t be bothered to take them all back to the States.  There was many a back country farm broken in, from off the back of an Army Indian.

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Norton & Triumph, Mt Maunganui, 1976

Al Roche, my girlfriend Suzy (now wife) and I rode down to the Mount for a weekend, to stay with Suzy’s Aunty Kath, sometime around about ‘76, maybe.  I was on my ‘75 Norton 850 Commando, and Al was riding his brother Glen’s 69 650 Bonneville.

Suzy’s Uncle Don, and Aunty Kath ran the motor camp at the base of the Mount.

On the way down the the Norton developed a tiny split in the oil line to the rockers, which meant Suzy and I were oily from the knees down when we got there.  That scrawny rooster working on the Norton is me.

Suzy’s other Aunties and cousins were staying at Kath’s place and didn’t want Kath to give us the time of day, or even have anything to do with us “dirty bikies” (fair call I guess, we were dirty indeed).  Kath stuck up for us and basically told them to fuck off instead, we were staying in the house with them.  So we stayed.

Kath took great delight in getting Al to take her around Mount Maunganui town shopping centre on the back of the Bonneville, so she could show off to all her friends.  She was quite a character.

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‘52 Thunderbird Chopper

A 1952 Triumph Thunderbird chopper I was building around about ‘76.  Orb Morbey did all the frame work, and built the springer front end.

I bought it as a stock bike  from a guy renting a farmhouse who had it out in the back shed.  The cows had eaten the seat off it.  It had a fully reconditioned engine, the guy had fitted the engine, ridden down the road and the pipes fell off, so he pushed it in the shed and left it.  Cost me $200 back then.  More than a weeks wage from memory.

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Came across these in a compressor store in Hamilton NZ. I had one of those Z1s once upon a time. Theres a fine GT550, a GT380 and a t350 Suzuki, and an S3 Kawasaki. Nostalgic for those old 2 strokes.

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My mate Pat painted up these sidecovers for my 1971 Triumph Trident and my 2016 Triumph Bonneville. Both in the style of the decals originally used in 1971.

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This my 1971 BSA Firebird, when I first built it back in 2007.  I had it in Lightning trim back then as I didn't have any Firebird high-level headers.  Fully rebuilt engine still going strong today, and still leaking NO oil. (Thank you, Hylomar)

When I first had it, it had one forged and one cast piston with different compression ratios, two different sized inlet valves, and a frame that had a badly crushed backbone, (I didnt see that when I bought it, because the tank hid it). Surprisingly before I rebuilt it, it ran sort of ok, not fast, but ok, although the two cylinders always sounded quite different from one side to the other.  I only really pulled the engine down because I had it out to fix the frame and thought i best have a look inside.  It was as well I did. The guy I bought it of was actually a real live butcher, but in more ways than one.

There were no good frames to be had but i found two other rough frames and I had to weld the frame up from 3 damaged frames, it took me  a whole weekend just to set it up for welding, so it was straight and true.  I am very pleased with the result too, if I say so myself.

Back in 07 there was so much new old stock stuff on ebay, but its all gone now.  I bought a new head for $100, NOS crank for NZ$400, mint set of cases for $100. 

The paintwork is all paint too, no decals, skilfully applied by my mate Pat Reardon, aka “Stoat”, who has to be the best British bike painter in NZ.  I still prefer that UK market ‘breadbox’ tank.

So its a ‘bitza’, no matching numbers, custom paint,  therefore not really worth much to those ‘anorak’s who care about these things, but it runs sweet now, I like it, and I doubt I am ever going to sell it, so what does it matter.

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‘75 Norton Commando 850

Back in about 1976 or ‘77, I had this ‘75 Norton Commando.  Used to keep it chained up in the kitchen of this old house I shared with Al Roche in Manurewa, because back in those days a lot of bikes got stolen. 

It was a good bike. Went to so much trouble to machine up those handlebar risers, not so sure I still like them anywhere as much, as I did back then.  I made the under-slung 2 into 1 exhaust for it too, from U bends and tube.

It had a Boyer electronic ignition which was brand new technology and cost me a week’s apprentice’s wage. Machined up a trick brass and transparent acrylic points cover to show it off.

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1200 Indian powered BSA A10

Bruce Linnell in Semaphore, Adelaide, South Australia, 1979, with his 1200 Indian powered A10 BSA desert racing outfit. 

A fearsome beast indeed.

The dog’s name was “Boy”, he was a stray that just turned up and jumped in the sidecar while it was parked at Bruce’s work , and he stayed.

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‘66 Bonneville chopper

Al Roche’s ‘66 Bonneville chopper, Orb Morbey frame and springer front end.  Probably taken in about 1976 or so, in Manurewa, Auckland, New Zealand.

Everything was hand fabricated from scratch back then.

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BSA A10 Chopper

Met this guy up at the Kaipara heads around 1978.  Can’t remenmber his name, but he did have a fine A10 chopper.