Classic bike review

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Well that stirred things up a bit!

I weigh too much to test it at the moment, but the top numbers were always achieved with a greased weasle of a rider , 8 stone ringing wet and the bike would need help afterwards!

There are 920/ 1000 coversions around, and With the new 961 pushing out 80bhp? i wonder what they put out.

The weight thing does seem odd, but if the crank, tank (interstate) seat, rear disc/front disk, starter must all add up to something more. Bikes and cars tend to put on weight as companies 'improve them' with successive models (bit like us)!

I have a mk3 850 roadster, but have interstate tank etc on it. I'll check the sprocket tomorrow as all our bikes are 30+ years old and would have been through numerous owners and sprocket/gear/ and all sorts of changes.

i once had an A65L, American re-import, and the mechanic I knew at the time was convinced it was the quickest he had ridden, (it wasn't an A70 or whatever the 750 version was called). Having never had another, I wouldn't know.

thanks for the replies- interesting.
 
I guess I should point out that I weighed 135 (wish I still did) and had some pounds off the Commando also. If I recall some drag strips were just faster in those days, not sure if it had to do with timing equipment, sea level, etc., or what. Seems I always heard of better numbers in CA that we could swing in Maine. I toasted my clutch every time I dragged the Commanfdo at a strip so I didn't do that a lot with that bike.
 
A '72 750 Combat would do 12.9s at 102 mph on a very good day according to the road tests at the time. Ain't no way a stock 850 could beat that. They were tank-like. You have to read the fine print on some of the tests because they removed air cleaners, changed jetting, did Stage XXX modifucations etc to achieve the figures they claim. Even then a 12.1 is hard to believe.
 
The Mk1 850 was pretty quick, however if you can find the article on the 850 Commando HP, an 850 Combat version that was to be offered to the public, you'll find it was bloody quick. I think I got it from http://www.classicmechanics.com. It ran low 12s to high 11s and clocked 145mph in the flying quarter mile blowing off the factory Z1.

Not bad for a naked old Brit twin in 1974 eh! :D
Cash
 
I once weighed the second prototype with me sitting on it and it came in at about 435 pounds, if I remember right. At the time, I was around 140, so the bike would have been just under 300. It had the ugly non-production gas tank with only about 1.5 gallons in it and no center stand or prop stand, but otherwise was like the first year's production models.
 
You can make something very fast for a little while. My concern would be how long would a Norton hold together under stress like that?
 
I don't read classic bike mags or MCN, they stress me.
The facts are, in the real world, is
A standard Mk.1 850 is quicker than a 750, also quicker than the old Triumph Tridents, Rocket 3's, Ducati 900ss.
Not as quick as a Z1.
Ducati 900ss had a higher top speed.
Honda 750, no comparison.
 
the 72 combat I bought new would run 13.0 to 12.90's back in the day. but and that is a skinny butt as I was only about 135 lbs back than. 750 Honda's was a waste of my time unless the rider was REALLY good , a Z1 was a hard one to beat as was an H2 kow 750 tripple unless the road turned curvy than it was all norton.


windy
 
That comparasin would have been better if the bikes had similar gearing and maybe if they used two bikes with fresh motors. I put the magazine down halfway through the article and grabbed a chopper magazine to look at instead.

Does anyone really care about the side by side performance of two tired old bikes? If both were rebuilt that article might have been good.
 
Flo,

I kind of wonder if we had exactly the same bikes over here. I guess due to the performance of a couple of 850s I ran into I thought they were maybe better cruisers, but slower stoplight to stoplight. By the time I ran those guys my 750 Norton was detuned a bit for long life, but you don't know how good the other driver is or how well their bike runs.
 
It also depends very much on the gearing, on the street, you run what you have so if a bike has long legs, it won't be good on the stoplight grand prix circuit. One Norton I built with a lightened center main was really quick but it vibrated really badly so I put a stock flywhel back in.

Jean
 
From some 70's road tests, a 750 with 19T sprocket did a 12.93s standing quarter, an 850 interstate with 20T 14.93s.
 
Hi Cookie,
I based my, what I call my facts, on the bikes I used to go around with in the late 70's/ early 80's. A couple of friends had Tridents, 1 a Rocket 3, 1 a 900ss, 1 a Mike Hailwood Replica (Tarty 900ss), a couple of Z1's, Bonnies, etc.
We were all lunatics then & very fast riders. Although, on the whole, I could out accelerate most but the Z1's it did depend on your riding skills at the time. The 900ss had a higher top speed which came onto it's own on long straights. After all that, it didn't really matter, as we all had similar bikes, with similar nutcase riding skills, & had bikes we fancied at the time.
By the way, my "L" is sticking on this bloody keyboard & it is taking me ages to type this. Should be more careful with the coffee.
 
Rich_j said:
From some 70's road tests, a 750 with 19T sprocket did a 12.93s standing quarter, an 850 interstate with 20T 14.93s.


One would think that would be a MK3 850. That is an extremely sluggish quarter mile time with 2 teeth lower gearing than standard, even for a MK3.
There is a world of difference between the earlier 850s and the MK3s.
 
Iam not sure of some of the numbers I have seen posted. I have no time stubs, only seat of the pants(or stains!). In 1980 I owned 2 roadbikes, a 75 850 commando and a 74 H2. Both mostly stock, K-N air filters. Sprockets, whatever they came with, low miles on the 850, the H2 I bought in boxes, rebuilt to stock specs, rode for a few years before I got the Norton. I can think of no comparison in speed or acceleration, it was all H2, and even in the twisties if one were to push the comfort zone(mine at least), get into some sliding and scraping, it was still H2. I miss both of them...

Dan
 
That does not surprise me, the H2 was rumored to have ungodly hp, supposedly they had cured some of the handling problems. A well ridden one would have to beat a Commando. I'm not sure it was true but I've heard of H2s seeing 80 hp on a dyno.
That said I never saw one on the street. You had to like two strokes for what they did and ignore their bad sides.
 
Flo said:
I don't read classic bike mags or MCN, they stress me.
The facts are, in the real world, is
A standard Mk.1 850 is quicker than a 750, also quicker than the old Triumph Tridents, Rocket 3's, Ducati 900ss.
Not as quick as a Z1.
Ducati 900ss had a higher top speed.
Honda 750, no comparison.

Love it, sounds like a challenge. Bring on the 850s we'll run 'um against the 750s..remember Nortons only.
 
Frankly Dave I think there were huge differences between Nortons. When I put mine together the second time I found that factory stuff was way off. This was not that far off from Detroit at the time but they were closer.
The first Norton I had was the G15 CSR, that sucker was on the money. There is a minor chance based only omly the silencers I had and coloring that it was the New York show bike.
Everything on that bike measured out to blueprint . My Commando was loose as goose as shipped.
I bet there were Nortons that were rockets and Nortons that were dogs.
 
A friend of mine had a H2 in the 70's and I can say there is no doubt his would walk away from a Norton. But then his was gone through and had all of the top of the line race stuff in it, It would bounce the tire off the ground in the first 3 gears without even trying. I only rode it once and that was enough to know that it was a scary fast bike, And I can say he never lost a stoplight race I heard of. Maybe someday I'll get one, LOL LOL.
 
I'd be more tempted by the Kawasaki 900 as I was at the time. I suspect they could be made to handle and brakes should be no problem to upgrade. Bu then when I went out and bought my 70s fantasy bike it turned out to be old Goldwings. Almost as fast as the Kawasaki but handles much better and runs forever.
 
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