U.S.A - Australia

I have been very busy sending dampers to NZ and Australia, I am pleased that Chris Swallow as requested a set for the famous Les Diener "Eldee" velo, the little Manx based D.O.H.C 250 is set to give the strokers a dusting next season.
les Diener was a great Kiwi engineer/racer . along with Burt Munro ..theres been some great motorcyclists from down under.
Just wondered if NZ and Australia had more Commandos than the USA. :?:

Possibly the first time in history an Ozzie has been called a Kiwi.

They alway steal well known Kiwis. They even stole my son!!!!!!!!!

Les Deiner was from Adelaide South Australia. Eldee 1, Eldee 2 and the forerunner push rod MOV all still exit.

http://www.ma.org.au/index.php?id=593

But yes - Eldee 2 is now in New Zealand and being run regularly in the NZCMRR series. It is seriously quick. It sits in the same garage as the ex Arthur Wheeler Mk 8 KTT. Chris Swallow lives in NZ these days and his Dad, Bill Swallow, comes down in the summer. Bill rode my Dommie a few weeks ago but as normal when a name rider gets near a bike it immediately has a temper tantrum

http://chrisswallowracing.com/history-results/

There are certainly a lot of Commandos in NZ including many that were imported into NZ from the US in the 80s, 90s and 2000s.

'
'Just wondered if NZ and Australia had more Commandos than the USA. :?:'

These days we import them from America, Nortons were never that common here in the 70s. Most people bought CB750s, Z900s, H2s, and T500s. Even Triumphs and BSAs were fairly rare after the early sixties.

please tell me more! Ok Les was a Australian
thanks for the info,

johnm said:

Possibly the first time in history an Ozzie has been called a Kiwi.

They alway steal well known Kiwis. They even stole my son!!!!!!!!!

Les Deiner was from Adelaide South Australia. Eldee 1, Eldee 2 and the forerunner push rod MOV all still exit.

http://www.ma.org.au/index.php?id=593

But yes - Eldee 2 is now in New Zealand and being run regularly in the NZCMRR series. It is seriously quick. It sits in the same garage as the ex Arthur Wheeler Mk 8 KTT. Chris Swallow lives in NZ these days and his Dad, Bill Swallow, comes down in the summer. Bill rode my Dommie a few weeks ago but as normal when a name rider gets near a bike it immediately has a temper tantrum

http://chrisswallowracing.com/history-results/

There are certainly a lot of Commandos in NZ including many that were imported into NZ from the US in the 80s, 90s and 2000s.

Click to expand...

john robert bould said:

please tell me more! Ok Les was a Australian

Click to expand...

This is the MOV (prewar 250 pushrod Velo) that was converted to DOHC ?
Hard to see how any manx (comparison) was involved, it was all gear drive (cam gear), and velo's had dohc before the war.

This was the machine that could do 100+ mph in short circuit races - when the Velo factory first heard about it, they reportedly refused to believe it was possible....

To Put things in their Proper Perspective ! note : way up top in the Middle .

Matt has these maps all correctly positioned !!

There is a fair bit on Deiner on the website link I gave.

In 1956 he was timed at 186 kph (116 mph) on this Velo 250. Thats not bad for a 250 Velo at that time. Deiner was obviously a world class rider as well as an engineer and he beat Fergus Anderson on the works Moto Guzzi when they came to Australia.

The Eldee 2 is now owned by a mate of mine Phil Price in NZ . Phil also owns a couple of KTTs and the Joyce Brother's MOVs. Phil rides a Joyce Brother MOV and Chris Swallow rides Eldee 2 in the NZCMRR meetings. The bikes are looked after by another friend of mine Nick Thomson. Nick and Phil have been playing with Velos since they were teenagers. The Velo in this clip is Nick's Venom ridden by Chris Swallow. The Dommie, Im pleased to say, is mine, ie the bike that wins ridden by Tony McQueen. Tony is not a bad rider ;-)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TyekqMox4tw

This is them at Wyndom. Tony dropped it at the last corner.What you cant see is that they were passing a lapped rider who moved over when Chris passed him and Tony had nowhere to go but straight ahead and down.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HjvM0GXz ... 2F19142F7F

Eldee 2 was built by Deiner when he couldnt get back his original Eldee 1 which he sold in the 1950s. Eldee 1 had a light weight Manx style frame that he made himself but when he came to Eldee 2 he was getting a bit old so to save time he used a Norton International frame and Roadholder front forks. For a 250 Eldee 2 frame is a bit heavy. The motors are MOV cases (now Mac) with shortened Mac barrels, Head and rocker cover timing cover were cast in Oz. Crank, cam timing gears, cams etc made by Deiner. Yes it is a gear drive DOHC. When Nick got the engine it had been a bit in the wars so he has been through the motor plus redone all the guides, valves etc, remade the cams and is in the process of remaking the timing gear train. The bike has proved to be reliable and is really fast. Deiner did a good job on head and port design.

One big advantage we have is that Les Deiner was also good mate of a friend of mine in Adelaide and Deiner's widow left him all Deiners tuning notes which have been copied and sent to NZ. He also owns Deiners last push rod 250. He used to travel to meetings with Deiner toward the end.

What seems to be true is that in the 1950s there were a collection of Australians who were building very advanced 250s. This group of people had some of the best bikes in the world in that class.

My friends have been racing old bikes for almost 40 years now and Eldee 2 has been a real surprise to them. It is really an outstanding machine.

For those who think an old bike like this shouldnt be raced my Ozzie mate says Deiner would have been as pleased as hell. He says Les will be up there somewhere jumping up and down every time it gets the checkered flag - Nick knows how to look after a bike and Chris is a Manx podium rider - they will do him proud !

Chris is in England up at his dads this week, he is taking a set of Lansdowne dampers back home for Eldee 2 , Fingers crossed he will get some good results from them ,
Eitherway i will be interested in seeing how the dampers perform in a light racer.

He gets around that Chris, he was racing here near Auckland just a few weeks back.
A friend of mines 15 year old son was riding a hot ES2....I think he was in the top 10 times for the weekend.
Can't say I have seen lots of Commandos on the road here, but they are around.
I see Mikes one at quite a few race meets :wink:
Given any thought to making dampers for Airhead BMW's ? I'd be keen to test a set on the track for you
From all the chatter on the BMW forums they would be keen me thinks.
Currently running Racetech internals.

Hi,
I have made a set for Dave Matravens BMW k1000 , last i heard he was struggling with the bike's cornering, not sure a K 1000 is a good choice with all the weight :?:

72Combat said:

He gets around that Chris, he was racing here near Auckland just a few weeks back.
A friend of mines 15 year old son was riding a hot ES2....I think he was in the top 10 times for the weekend.
Can't say I have seen lots of Commandos on the road here, but they are around.
I see Mikes one at quite a few race meets :wink:
Given any thought to making dampers for Airhead BMW's ? I'd be keen to test a set on the track for you
From all the chatter on the BMW forums they would be keen me thinks.
Currently running Racetech internals.

Click to expand...

The K bike is heavy, I modified my forks , works better than original but not easily adjustable.
drilled out fixed orifices, emulator sits on top sandwiched by fork spring.

72Combat said:

He gets around that Chris, he was racing here near Auckland just a few weeks back.
A friend of mines 15 year old son was riding a hot ES2....I think he was in the top 10 times for the weekend.
Can't say I have seen lots of Commandos on the road here, but they are around.
I see Mikes one at quite a few race meets :wink:
Given any thought to making dampers for Airhead BMW's ? I'd be keen to test a set on the track for you
From all the chatter on the BMW forums they would be keen me thinks.
Currently running Racetech internals.

Click to expand...

I beleive he went to the UK for a wedding !

He is riding in the Classic Manx this year and a few of us are going for a look as well. Maybe with a bike one day but not this time.

Im sure there are more Commandos per head of popu;ation in NZ than the US but in the 70s and 80s especially the Japanese used NZ and Oz as the testing grounds for their next year US and European models. The Castrol Six Hour races were a big deal and after the first couple of years no Brit bike was going to have a chance.

The other big downer was that the hoods all rode Brit bikes and if you could keep it a year before some lowlife stole it you were damn lucky. I had my Commando stolen. Fortunantly they have pretty much now moved on to H.D.

When I started racing in the late 60s, Les DIener had not raced for about ten years , however I think he made a comeback in the early 70s. He was a South Australian rider, and I only ever went there about three times (to Mt Gambier). I seem to remember he was killed on a Sunday ride through the Adelaide Hills when he hit the Armco fence. He was certainly as famous 'name rider'. In the early days there were some strange bikes about - including the REG, and the Hunter Picaninny which was a 250cc Manx

Commandos are rarely raced in Australia as our historic racing rules create a situation where they are very uncompetitive. I saw this beauty a few years ago, but most guys don't persist with them :

The CMCRR rules the original machine was available before Dec 1976 ( non Jap), In my open post classic 500 + class , Ducati's and Guzzis rule but there are a couple of Commandos that nip on their heels. One of the guys runs with the Posties made up of ......Jap bikes (eek).....he holds his own at the pointy end.
I suspect that a lot of money gets poured into the fast bikes, my BMW owes me about 4K and only had 1 DNF in 21 races. I'm never going to be one of the fast riders but I do enjoy 'the scene"
Last Barry Sheene here was good, lots of Aussie bikes came over.