AN Acquires Thruxton Club Racer

According to AN's latest newsletter, Joe has just purchased an original Norton Thruxton Club Racer. In this description of his acquisition, he includes some intoresting history and comments on it. I'm particularly taken with his statement that it's the only Norton ever officially sold with the short stroke 750 engine, a topic of much discussion here on the forum. Also interesting that he gives his source for saying only 10 were built.

"The 1975 “Thruxton Club Racer”
Ever since I read about the “Thruxton Club” racer I wanted one. Not only are they rare- according to a letter I have from Frank Perris, and Norman White confirms the number is realistic, only ten were built- but they are the only Nortons ever officially sold with the short-stroke engine. Those who know our old “Norton Motors Ltd” homepage may remember I was looking for one of these bikes even before I bought Andover Norton. A bike I had already heard of was recently offered on various internet platforms. It was in Vienna, and offered at a rather high price. I was contacted by the seller through a mutual acquaintance and we started a long row of e-mails which led him to grudgingly admit I was the only serious suitor, the others being from the usual “I’ll give you a couple of thousand for it” brigade. In the end we agreed on what I had seen as a fair price right from the start. The seller’s handicap, which I told him immediately, was that nobody knows these bikes. Even Richard Negus and Nick Hopkins had never heard of them when I first mentioned my yearning for one. The bike has reputedly not been run since around 1980. It was entered in some local races (the Greater Vienna Suburbs Championship?) and then blissfully forgotten. Some modifications were carried out at the time, not all sensible.There are some features on the bike “Production” Thruxtons don’t have- but Norman White’s prototype Thruxton did. Though Norman cannot confirm if this is the actual machine- he was not involved in the “Production” Thruxtons, having left at the time- all details
indicate it is. I will try to fully rebuild the bike over the winter and hopefully test it at Pannoniaring in May. I will also do more research in the meantime."

There's great picture of it in the newletter, but I haven't figured out yet how to capture it from the .pdf document and post it.

Ken

And here's the picture:



Ken

wow, beautiful sight... but werent some 750 short stroke engines sold? Sure I saw one in Gus Kuhns

Norton sold quite a few of the short stroke 750 engines, mostly to dealers and racers. Ron Wood got his from the NVT distributor in Duarte, and I recall seeing at least two others at other dealers. I still have the remains of one of them from a factory flat track race bike, and another one built from factory parts. The question has been whether they ever delivered any standard Commando production bikes from the factory with that engine. As far as I have been able to tell, they didn't. They built the one roadster with the engine as a show bike, from which they used the pictures in their advertising brochure, and I assume somebody ended up with it. But so far I haven't seen anyone document a street legal, production Commando that was delivered from the factory to a dealer for sale to a customer with that engine. At least a few Commandos had the normal 850 engines replaced with short stroke 750s by dealers, but you can't count those as factory delivered bikes. So far, we haven't seen any factory records that support the delivery of any complete bikes from the factory, except for the Thruxton Club Racers. My conclusion, supported buy the statements from Frank Perris and Norman White, is that there weren't any. But it's still possible, I suppose, that someone might show up with paperwork to prove otherwise. I'm not holding my breath for that.

Ken

Lucky bastard ! - Sometimes I wish I lived in Europe.

Beautiful bike, Ken. Congratulations on your purchase. Sounds like the result of much searching and perseverance.
Let us know if you ever run across another one!

I seem to remember a pic of a 750 short stroke Commando that had the words "Short Stroke" on the side panels, but looked ordinarily stock otherwise. Real or someone's idea of a joke?

I think at the time, 200 units were required produced to homologate for AMA Racing.

Danno said:

I think at the time, 200 units were required produced to homologate for AMA Racing.

Click to expand...

The requirement for homologation was to produce 200 engines, not 200 bikes.

Ken

Danno said:

I seem to remember a pic of a 750 short stroke Commando that had the words "Short Stroke" on the side panels, but looked ordinarily stock otherwise. Real or someone's idea of a joke?

Click to expand...

The only picture I recall seeing of a short stroke Commando is the red roadster in the Norton sales brochure, but it doesn't say "Short Stroke" on the side panel. I think it is the one that they put together for display at a motorcycle show (I used to know the name of show, but I've forgotten it in my old age).

FWIW, the short stroke 750 was, in theory, offered as an option on both the regular Commando and the JPN replica, but I've never heard anyone claim to have actually ordered one with the option.



Ken

You got me curious, so I started searching for pictures. This might be the one you are thinking of. It's not an original bike. It was built up from a stock 750 or 850 by a former Ron's Cycle Sales (Leominster, Mass) mechanic.

It was up on ebay a couple years back.



Ken

I just ran across a quote that conflicts with my comments above about the JPNs and the short stroke engine. Peter Henshaw, in his recent book "The Norton Commando Bible", quotes Mike Jackson as saying that he thinks about 120 JPNs were sold fitted with the 750 short stroke engine. If that's true, I would have expected some of them to show up either in the media or for sale by now. It also conflicts with the comments from Norman White and Frank Perry. I guess we'll have to wait and see if anyone can come up with more data from someone's archives.

Ken

Danno said:

I seem to remember a pic of a 750 short stroke Commando that had the words "Short Stroke" on the side panels, but looked ordinarily stock otherwise. Real or someone's idea of a joke?

Click to expand...

The short stroke motor usually looks like an 850. My friend has one which steadfastly refuses to sell.

Are there any tell tale signs that a motor is a short stroke, fewer barrel fins etc?

Hi
Facebook Andover Norton https://www.facebook.com/Andover.Norton/
Nice

Chris

Fast Eddie said:

Are there any tell tale signs that a motor is a short stroke, fewer barrel fins etc?

Click to expand...

The only visible exterior difference I know of is the RH7 stamp on the head above the right exhaust rocker cover, indicating the big valve head.

If it was bought as a complete engine, with carbs, or supposedly delivered in a production Commando, the carbs should be 32 mm Amals, bored out to 33 mm and so stamped on the side. I'm not sure how many carbs like that were actually delivered, but that's how they were advertised. Internally, as I'm sure you already know, there are plenty of differences.

Ken

so far how many still alive ?
To my knowledge should be 5 or 6
Does anybody has other informations.

There is a genuine one in Thailand, belonging to a Belgian expat living there for many years who has several outstanding bikes.

Why would they fit a big valve head to a motor which was designed to rev higher ? Wouldn't the heavier valves cause valve-float more easily ? Theinlet ports might be bigger, but the motor would lose midrange power if that was the case.