Manx road bike engines, new

We have about three multi-millionaires involved in our historic racing and one of my friends has a Molnar Manx on the road. The price is inconsequential to them. The guy with the road-going manx raced only once, and banged himself up very badly, so the street bike fulfills a need. He is the sort of guy that if he thinks he wants something, he just buys it. To me, if I could afford a Molnar, I would be looking for full value from it - you only get that from racing. It would really annoy me to be riding that sort of bike and have all the restraints - that is not what having fun is about. I can understand people being chicken-shit about racing, you can really hurt yourself. However to buy a road going Molnar, you would just be a wanker - it only has pose value. It'd be really good walking into Harrod's dripping Castrol R on their carpet ?
 
To a lot of dyed-in-the-wool Norton enthusiasts, a road going manx would be the ultimate road bike.... ??

And was the model that Nortons didn't ever make.
So a secondary reason for doing one.

Nortons had done race replicas since about, Oooo, 1910 or so ?
You could buy the Brooklands Road Specials all through the teens.
Belt drive, one speed, no mudguards !!
Oooo aaah ! - and sold like hotcakes...
Then the Model 18, CS1, Inter.
But no dohc version.
And even a sheep-in-wolfs-clothing JPN Special (ie Commando cafe).

Hmmmm, that old featherbed in the corner should take a manx engine.
Hmmmm....
 
One of the fellas had a long stroke manx as a road bike years ago. Thankfully it has now been restored as a racer. To see it as a road bike was really sad. It always reminded me of what it is like to fang a good one around a race track - probably near the ultimate bike experience. If you were going to buy a manx to race , you would not buy a long stroker - I'd love to own it. I suggest that droning down public roads on any manx is sacrilege. I wonder how many guys will convert PW Norton Monocoque 750 replicas for road use ? Buy yourself a nice Goldie or an SR500 Rohan and have a ride on a race circuit where there are other guys with similar bikes.
 
All those old dungers that are no longer competitive on racetracks make great road bikes.
And can be taken out and given a fang on any day of the week.
And even kept within the speed limit, unless you go completely nutso = they have less performance than near most modern day road bikes... !

But then you wouldn't know, by your own admission you haven't ridden a road bike for what large chunk of a half century now... ?
 
Rohan said:
All those old dungers that are no longer competitive on racetracks make great road bikes.
And can be taken out and given a fang on any day of the week.
Click to expand...

I once knew a guy in the Southampton area who had an outdated G50. He had raced it but it was to slow etc etc. So when he got a new 500 racer, he turned the G50 into a road bike. Startlingly it looked exactly like a well used racing bike with number plates and lights, it went very well, and apart from the total loss electrics was an entirely practical road bike.
cheers
wakeup
 
Hi

My friend Graham used to race an original G50, it was so mildly tuned by the factory that they used to start it by turning the rear wheel by hand when it was on the stand!
I always thought that it would make a lovely roadbike.

Chris
 
Chris said:
Hi

My friend Graham used to race an original G50, it was so mildly tuned by the factory that they used to start it by turning the rear wheel by hand when it was on the stand!
I always thought that it would make a lovely roadbike.

Chris
Click to expand...

Sounds like a late closing inlet valve, which is the opposite of mild tuning.
 
You often see this in the pits at races, where they just flick the back wheel over compression and it starts.
Haven't taken a lot of notice of this, but had kind of assumed this was 2 strokes.
G50's and Manxes are quite similar stages of tune, and similar performances most days ?
 
Chris said:
I always thought that it would make a lovely roadbike.
Click to expand...

Like Manxes, you see quite a range of folks making G50 engined versions of roadbikes.
Not to mention a range of old retired racers doing duty on the roads.

Roy Bacons "Norton Twins resto" book has a pic, mid-book, of a DOHC Manx on a workstand at Tayler Matterson (London Dealers).
Bike has speedo and tacho, and number plates.
Mid-60s pic by the look of it...
 
I have seen a Manx start by flicking the rear wheel, so it can be done. Needless to say, the ignition and carburation must be spot on to do this. They can also be made to tick over and should generally behave themselves if they are set up well. My G50 ticks over when warm, at about 500 rpm, but I won't let it idle that low for more than a few seconds. I will have to try to start it with a flick of the wheel some day. It might start if no-one was looking…

I'd like to try a Goldie for the road. Less complicated and the replica engines are quick.

Manx road bike engines, new
 
What carb is fitted that does this ?

Most race carbs don't have the throttle stop - so unless it hangs on the cable at precisely the correct point, it isn't set to idle.
Many of those setups required the throttle to be blipped to even keep the motor running at low rpm.
 
Here's my Manx being started on the back wheel by Andy Savage. He makes it look effortless :)

[video]http://vid1080.photobucket.com/albums/j331/Horror/m.VIDEO0031.mp4[/video]
 
Would you guys go shooting rabbits with a target pistol ? Or hang the Mona Lisa in your toilet to brighten it up ? A Seeley Condor would be great if you stripped it for racing.
 
This is the prototype road-based G50. The caption on the reverse (dated 11 Oct 1961) states that it was a mock-up for a very small batch of models for the USA only

The gents in suits are (Left to right) L.O. Paul (President Indian Company, USA), A.A. (Arthur) Sugar & J.F. (Jack) Kelleher, Joint Managing Directors, A.M.C., and W.J. (Bill) Smith, General Sales Manager, A.M.C. Bill Smith had been sales manager of Norton Motors.

Manx road bike engines, new


Given the choice, I think that I might choose for the Bedford C Type dropside in the background. At least I'm capable of using all the performance of that :roll:
 
The British could never sell a road going G50, it would be too much like a decent motorbike. Can you imagine it in market competition against an SR500 ? I'd never own a road going manx, however a G50 (Seeley Condor) would be a real turn on. Even the good guys sometimes stuff up the cam timing and bevel gear clearances on manxes, - in the hands of some of the guys who get on this forum ..... ?

That road going G50 proves that the failure of the British motorcycle industry was due to their own miserable mindset, and the fact that they did not run their own race. I was looking at the Triumph and BSA DOHC 350s in this month's Motorcycle Classics magazine - so much potential especially if they had been upgraded to 500s. I really think that a lot of British motorcycle design got lost in industrial bullshit. These days I think most corporations do market research and find out what rider customers really want and need. I suggest the old commando was only a fairly decent bike because of Peter Williams, an engineer who actually raced.
 
Talking about engineers. When I first came to Benalla it was as a consultant on a defence project. I'd bought a house here and my Seeley 850 was in the garage. Our group leader was a young mechanical engineer and I showed the bike to him. He said ' I am really impressed' and I appreciated his affirmation. However I know very well that he himself could not build a race bike which was in any way successful or even safe. My professional qualification is in industrial chemistry, however I've been involved in engineering for decades , and raced quite a bit. Most engineers are always one step removed from reality, and I wonder how close guys like Edward Turner ever got to it. I think Peter Williams was significantly different from the majority in his profession and as a result the commando was the 'last of the Mohicans'.
 
The Commando was more than a fairly decent road bike before Peter Williams came on the Norton factory scene. I don't doubt his contribution to the race effort. It was the only British parallel twin which could be ridden comfortably over anything like long distances at anything like high speeds.

The G50 with road equipment could never have been sold in the UK in any sort of significant numbers. Production processes didn't allow it to be mass-produced. It would simply have been too expensive to build. From the 1950s onwards, UK factories pandered to the demands of the powerful US importers and gave them what they wanted as loss-leaders. No UK dealers who had to deal directly with the factories could have demanded the same treatment. With very few exceptions, the UK motorcycle market in the early 1960s was one of practical transport and not the leisure industry that it has now become.

Those with purchasing power wanted bathtubs and deLuxe rear ends so that they could arrive clean in blazer, flannels and brown brogues, they didn't want to be soaked to the waist in Castrol R.
 
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