I got a few of those telegrams myself, but living in a West Midlands industrial town (or at least it was then) evey kid and his dog had a bloody Bantam (I even had one for a while in the 60's, and that's a confession worthy of the Pope !!! :shock:) so it wasn't much use as a warning unless you wanted to go totally paranoid ... (and I'm still working on that.) :supercool:

The red 125cc down-rated D1 Bantam used by Royal Mail had a quite distinctive exhaust note which was not quite the same as the, normally larger engined, bikes available to the public.

Yes, I too had a Bantam - The one enduring memory was the upside down gear selectors which was bad news if, like many of our ilk, you hopped onto your mate's machine which had the gears the other way round and promptly stalled it......

Old Francis (Fanny) Barnett?

Imagine the confusion when they changed the brake and gearlever sides. Trying to change gear with the brake lever was bad enough, stomping on the gearlever for braking made some very unholy (and expensive) noises. :eek:

First car was a Fiat 500 - must have been in about 1970.

It had been my Mothers car and I worked in a timber mill in the school holidays, paying my parents a bit every week for the car.

No synchromesh gears so learned to double de-clutch quickly on the downward shifts which helped greatly when I started to drive 1930s and 1950s cars. To start the beast you had to turn on the ignition then pull a starter lever next to the gear stick (If I remember correctly).

Wish I had it now but I managed to write it off by colliding with a bus. I was lucky - I came out through the open sun roof and spent a couple of nights in hospital before being in court for dangerous driving!

Ah well. I went on to run Minis, MGs (A, B and C), Triumphs, and classic BMWs. Still have a 1930s Alvis though!

McC

My old BSA trike, although I never got it well enough to work, had the conventional arrangement of pedals, clutch, accelerator then brake. We have all been radical experimentalists since, using that go pedal on the right.

Bob, I am not a motor bike expert but I don't think that all two strokes were rubbish, in 1980 I had a Suzuki GT 250 (I did not have a full license), I used it to get me to and from work and it never let me down, it also had decent acceleration and speed.....

Cheers Frank...............:thumb:

I'm just not a lover of two strokes. But I do remember when the Yamaha RD250 came out in the 70's it was seriously fast and could still be ridden on L plates :eek:
I think it was those sorts of bikes that led to a total re-think of the learner rider laws in time as that bike could eat most British 650 cc bikes that were still around from earlier years.

I agree with you there Bob. The Suzuki GT 250 would easily do 90+ mph, I was told that it was one of the fastest production 250's around at that time (late 1970's)

It is interesting how the learner rider laws used to be. One of my earliest bikes (while still on L plates) was a BSA C11G at 250cc single cylinder. It had the old Jam Jar suspension on the back and could easily hit 65mph if you had a following wind and big sail on the back .. :chuckle:

I searched around online for a pix of one and came up with this .. phenomenally clean example. :eek:

Not a particularly elegant bike but a good old plodder for all that.

My brother, who is 8 years my junior, had a BSA C15 Star while I was at sea. He seemed to spend much of his time falling off it if I am to believe the letters that I received from home. I do know that whenever I came on leave, it seemed always to be in pieces being repaired.

Whether he was to blame, or it was the bike's fault, I can't say. But it was his pride and joy and he was always praising its handling and pace. I can't comment since I have never ridden a motor bike, nor been attracted to them in any way.

Even when it was working, it was no match for my Triumph Spitfire and I used to tease him on the Snake Pass out of Glossop by letting him almost catch me, before pulling away again. Even two-up, with that horrible rear suspension and its inherent lift-off oversteer, the car could corner faster than the bike which, on that road, made a lot of difference.

saw this yesterday

They really were quite a pretty car. I remember someone rather foolishly trying to drive his brand new one over the green lane of Mastiles Lane (now thankfully illegal). Then they made the TR7...