HELP ! Who knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in CRMC -UK

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Fabrizio Di Bella

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Aug 13, 2010
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Hello, :D

I'm a newcomer of CRMC,
my name is Fabrizio Di Bella from Italy .

I've just bought a Norton Commando in PR trim which was raced in some CRMC events in the late years of 1990 (I think from '95 to 99).

The bike is fitted with an original PR tank (white), half fairing (red with white racing number plates) and seat (the same as above) but has a "S" upswept pairs of "peashooters".

The engine boast as highly tuned and is equipped with two 36mm Mikunis, AP Lockeed racing front brake caliper, Borrani wheels (the rear with a higher central flange) and still run fine.

I like to know something more about the history of my bike ,as infos on its UK owner, who maybe still joins CRMC races and his forum, too.

Some guys in CRMC told me that two UK guys in this forum race with two Commando (one maybe with a Seeley Commando) so suggested me to post my enquire also here.

My private e-mail is : fdibella09@libero.it

On the half fairing there are two round stickers of CRMC and other two with a "grunty" bulldog with the Union Jack flagging on the screen.

Any suggest will be greatly appreciated. :)

Now is not so easy to start it (due to a recent crash in a vintage scrambler) but thanks to live in a small mountain village, I can push it downhill...and fly ! :lol:

Before strip the engine (or to avoid it) could be useful to know who has tuned it.
I can do it in my own workshop http://www.classicfarmmotorcycles.com but like to avoid to open an engine (maybe) still in good conditions

To see my bike click on: http://www.k21.co.uk/smf/index.php?topic=731.0

Thank you and best regards.

Fabrizio "McDeeb" Di Bella


(the Mcdeeb nickname came from my 2.nd job as special bikes manufacturer: http://www.mcdeeb.it)




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Re: HELP ! Somebody knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in

Bienvenido, Fabrizio.
 
Re: HELP ! Somebody knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in

Thanks GrandPaul! Grazie mille, amico mio!

i've just visited your nice website!

Interesting bikes: we make the same job! :)

Look also to our limited edition specials http://www.mcdeeb.it

(sorry the english version is under construction, but picture and video can explain, and the "dicono di noi" section ahs also some English and American magazines articles)

I'm i holiday now, so can be focused on investigate on my Norton Commando history. 8)

Ciao

Fabrizio
 
Re: HELP ! Somebody knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in

Yes, I checked out your site and I can almost understand it (I speak & read Spanish).

Very nice specials using the Royal Enfield 500s!
 
Re: HELP ! Somebody knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in

I like the bike, but the Thruxton style pipe design crossing over the engine hampers servicing on many of the bikes they are used on.
 
Re: HELP ! Somebody knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in

Oh, yes...
but it need a few second only to take off and gives the right taste to our replica,
which must have exactly the same look of a 1969 origjnal Velo model. :lol: ...

also with its little unconfortable features 8)

Nothing yet about my bike :(
one guy in CRMC forum (the same who suggested me to place my enquire here, )
told me that all the UK classic racer are in Donington now, so maybe I have to wait their return home. :)

While waiting, I spend a little time to explore some interesting threads here :D

(in Northern Italy the weather is really bad now, so cannot drive so far away my home: on the mountains could be dangerous if you run on motorcycles under a storm..... :( )


another nice way to spend time is cleaning and servicing my 53 bikes :roll: (I've not time to do it normally)

Cheers

Fabrizio
 
Re: HELP ! Somebody knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in

Yeah, that's really 53 ! :D

About 14-15 are in basket case form or need for deep or mild restoration , depending how damaged are by its long purpose, :(
but about 20 are perfectly running or mint conditions and carefully used to preserve it. :p

Due to the job of motorcyles mechanic I started over 30 years ago, I was able to buy mostly of my present bikes- about fourty pieces year by year- at cheap prices.

To be honest, I bought my first classic motorcycle (a Motobi 250 Super Sport which I still own, but tuned to race) when I was 13 only...and push it walking home being without the licence to hold it ! :oops:

When I was young, both student as worker in a carbody repair workshop, sometimes I avoid to eat due to the money I've spent on buying another bike (as a Moto Guzzi V7 Sport I took when was 19) :roll:

At 24 , when I married the first time (actual 3 times...the last, I hope :oops: ) I had more as 12 bikes in my own garage, and only 2 were missed due to the divorce some year later.
After finishing the bad period, I start again to buy interesting old motorcycles, which were still unexpensive in those years, because considered "obsolete only" and not good items for collectors as thinked by me and few others.

During the last years, I've bought in a slower way, due to increasing quotations, but have sold or exchanged only a few of it.
I'm not a merchant but a classic bike user and collector and sometime I has refused some good offers by professional buyers thanks to their arrogance.
To explain my opinion, I wasn't so interested in offering it , but a man come to my home asking me three times my NCR Ducati Pantah 680cc...... :x :x always trying to squeeze the price showed in all the classic bikes magazines, by "barking" about its supposed defects...Being bored, I started the engine easlily, it turned perfectly as clutch and gears when I runned arount in the shed, , then I closed the garage door and the talking, too! :) :)

One month ago, I thinked to became too old (amd too damaged by crashes :roll: ) to run some of my bikes on the racetracks anymore,
so have sold some of the more precious models, except for my loved Laverda 750SFC which still "sleep" in our dining room.

My "strange " decision is due the fact that I consider race bikes "make to race" instead to stay steady, becaming rust in a shed.... or runned slowly by fat and rich collectors who usually speak like they are skill enough to use it in proper way(that is not allways true).
So, my whish was to sale the bikes I am not able to run in a decent way.

One of the most expensive (and hard to ride) racing bike I've just sold, was a ex works Laverda 1000 3 cilynder endurance racer...only four were manufactured and 3 still exist,
the quotation was so "adequate" that the best bidder offered me also some road legal classic bikes in exchange (Norton, BSAs, Laverda, Moto Guzzi, etc) plus a Honda 1000 CBX I am going to sale.


I like to use these British & Italian classic bikes on the road, while somebody younger can use my former racers in a btter way on the racetracks, I hope. :p

For the above reason, I am going to sale also an ex works SAIAD-Suzuki Titan 500TT (a "smoking" but powerful twin two strokes) which I runned in hillclimbings for some years, after was dismitted by the famous italian Team Ceramiche della Robbia, the same of the former 500 World Champion. Marco Lucchinelli.

Note: the price of the above bike is for "discount" because I hate its smell and noise :wink:

And tha's all ,folks!

Cheers
Fabrizio
 
Re: HELP ! Somebody knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in

53 is a very decent collection!

You mention much nicer bikes than my lowly Brits & Japs now numbering only 47 and dropping as the economy continues to slide.

Thankfully, I have been surviving so far by selling "from the bottom, up", just basket cases, rolling projects and lesser-loved runners.

Hope you soon get info regarding your beautiful replica PR!
 
Re: HELP ! Somebody knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in

Hi,
thanks for both the suggest and the warm welcome to me and my handcrafted specials, mate ! :D

It's funny, It was just on the NOC which I was suggested to post a thread here, in order to find informations about my
""PRized" Commando :lol: :lol:

Some news arrived but it 's hard to select it.

About to sale our own collection startin' " from the bottom, up" it could be better...but maybe the hope to survive enough to complete a lot of basket cases is a good way to do it ! (it means to live 100-120 years :lol: )

My dad, after two surgeries for cancer (liver and stomach ,a few years later) , some crashes and an hearth attack, now luckily feels good and still drives daily is Honda CBX750F and some smaller bikes (Moto Guzzi, Laverda, Velosolex, etc))

he is 78 year old and not slow as you can suppose...... :shock: :shock:

I think maybe it depend on his wish to drive it everiday.

Cheers

Fabrizio
 
Re: HELP ! Somebody knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in

Fabrizio - very pleasant to know that your Dad rides!

My Dad (and Mom) never liked motorcycles, and now both are gone after living long and happy lives.

I had to buy my own bike, my parents NEVER would have bought me one. Anyway, we were 10 children, so they never bought ANY of us a vehicle, we had to work for them!
 
Re: HELP ! Somebody knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in

Hi Paul,
I'm sorry about you never received an help to buy a bike from your parents.
Sometimes due to finance or being worries about a "dangerous thing" , parents avoid to their son to have a motorcycle.

My family was involved in this field since the early fifties, due my father was an amateur racer, with scooters as first, on an Aermacchi-Harley Davidson 250cc later.

I think that for us motorcycles were more important as a simple hobby (or a job I do now)

My mom often says: "I was lot of times worried about your dad's health while driving or about you and you younger son (a racer, too), but I must admit that also without bikes, your dad could be dead. After so much surgeries , sometimes he thinked to be a dead-walking man and I cannot help him to change this idea but everytime you come with a new bike for him . So, after gaining a little strengh he started to drive again , believing to have a future again."

(everytime I remember these words, some drops fall...)

Enjoy riding, mates.

Fabrizio
 
Re: HELP ! Somebody knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in

That is a fine story about your Dad; you can be proud. My Dad was the same, but with FISHING. I was the last one of his 5 sons to take him fishing in my boat, and of course he caught a fish and I didn't! It was very windy and rough water, and he needed help to get in and out of the boat to go after the fish in the shallow water, but he worked hard at it, as though he were my age.

The fine people on this forum have so much in common, it's a great place.
 
Re: HELP ! Somebody knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in

Hi Paul,

also you must be proud of your father (fisherman is an hard job).

About my Norton , I discovered that to race in CRMC events it has need to be registered, so there are more chances to know its history.

I'm waiting some British guys came back from Donington to receive some infos.

You're right about this forum: it's a nice place.

Cheers.

Fabrizio
 
Re: HELP ! Somebody knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in

Hi,
I forgot to post some news about my Commando.

One admin of CRMC give me a good suggest: having raced in their event, my bike was surely registered when they decided it to be eligible. So I have just contacted the person in charge for these matters.

(Having stoppin' to race some years ago, I forgot to make this simple investigation :oops: :oops: )

Waiting to know more about its engine tuning without stripping it, I runned my just bought Commando for a few kilometers on my favourite mountain "test-track" after did a complete service and...

How much fun it is ! :D :D :D :D :D

Quite fast (enough for those roads , with short straights but of strict corners)
Smooth but torquey, too. ((Less as my big bore Guzzis but more as the Lav 750SFC)
Decent front brake (AP Lockeed racing is less powerful as the Laverda's twin Brembos but enough for this lighter bike)
Good gearbox (Quaife 5 speed)
Good fork (Roadhlder with some stuffs inside...)
Wooden Koni shocks (it's strange, maybe the former owner was over 100 kgs..as I am)
Vibrations (what's ?..... ride an unbalanced stock Laverda 750S and you can undertand what I mean)
Good noise (Loud peashooters were less appreciated by a few neighbours, but they can improve 'nd learn to love it...)
Outstanding look (which is an hearturner also in a small town where I usually run on the above classic bikes)


MY OWN VERDICT:
Later classic I raced and still use were (are) heavywehight Laverda and Guzzi, but Norton faced to it seem a 250cc :shock: :shock: :shock:

I plan a nice autumn to improve our mutual "relationships" ...ahrr ahrr ahrr :twisted:

Cheers.

Fabrizio
 
Re: HELP ! Somebody knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in

Mostly to mainta this thread alive and in a good position on the "grid" :oops: :oops:

while waiting (or hoping) a guy from UK gives me some news about... :wink:


Cheers.

Fabrizio
 
Re: HELP ! Who knows my Commando PR lookalike raced in CRMC

An administrator of CRMC forum in charge for bikes eligibility to race has kindly contacted me a few hours ago.

I am hurry to know the racing history of my bike. :twisted:

Maybe his owner wasn't so strong contender , but will be nice to have infos about.

i will inform you about oncoming news.

Fabrizio
 
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