Why bother with a Commando?

platinumsmith said:

I'll share with y'all my personal git out. I didn't know Jack about bikes until my Dad brought home a brand spankin' new '67 TR6C. I thought that was the most beautiful piece of machinery I had ever laid eyes on (I was 14 & hadn't met Carol yet). He became ill shortly thereafter & passed, leaving me the Triumph (I still have it). Many years later I got my first Harley, '03 RoadKing, but recognized I didn't need all the crap they sell to chrome/encumber. I next purchased an '08 Vrod & although it seems like a Porsche on two wheels, that purchase experience ended my propensity to endear HD. The HD is heavy and that has it's place but the Triumph and Norton are nimble & make me grin. I picked up a '67 TigerCub and that balanced out the US vs Brit thing going on in the stable. The britBikes seem so much more regal next to posers. Sort of like Billy Bob Thornton meets Prince William. Then one Sunday (a few months ago) a friend calls from outa the blue & knows a '74 CDO for sale. I jumped on it for a grand & drug it home. I've just gotten it dusted off & tuned. Already done a ton (don't know just how smart that was). Now I saunter out to the garage & all I see are the brit-Irons. I hardly ride the Harleys and they start with a button. You might figure that since the '67 650 was my father's, it would hold court, but I am inexplicably drawn to that Norton with a locomotive for an engine. It's quite possible that it brings out the regal hooligan in me. I hope I don't die on it (the Triumph has tried to kill me twice).
#1. We had to have a fistFight with England to win our independence, now England is a steadFast friend on the world stage. No harm there.
#2. I've never had an Asian car or motorcycle. I know they do a marvelous job. Just not my cup of tea.

Darrell in Texas

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Thanks Darrell,

Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Your point no.1 is just the sort of thing I'm after. It's getting abit 'deep' and I don't want to offend anyone but I'm really interested in how you reconcile Independence with loving an English bike?

I know 1776 was a long time ago but these things die hard in a national consciousness. Like 1066 figures largley in ours. So I'm getting the impression Britishness is less objectionalable than Oriental or even HD?? I read somewhere 'Americans are wedded to HD, but Triumph is their mistress'. Sound good? But can anyone put it into words- WHY?

Love to hear an Aussie opinion on this (Where are you AC?). And for that matter some other Brits...

"I know 1776 was a long time ago but these things die hard in a national consciousness. Like 1066 figures largley in ours. So I'm getting the impression Britishness is less objectionalable than Oriental or even HD?? I read somewhere 'Americans are wedded to HD, but Triumph is their mistress'. Sound good? But can anyone put it into words- WHY?"

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crusader, I think thats a generalization. I was born in america, and I'd rather ride a robot-built, mass produced, plastic japanese thang than an 800lb. pig. On second thought, yes you may be right... I don't consider myself mainstream american.

by the way... is nationalism a thing that we should embrace or consider to be a relic of the past?

Seems a bit unpatriotic that most US posts on here are highly supportive of Norton, yet HD seems to be held in very poor regard!

Carbonfibre said:

Seems a bit unpatriotic that most US posts on here are highly supportive of Norton, yet HD seems to be held in very poor regard!

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G Day Carbonfibre, that 's only coz it's a Norton forum! Look at this way- atleast HD is still going in recognisable form- we won't dwell on how mangled, raised from the dead, old James's Pa's marque has been over the years...Yet it endures

DonOR, no of course I don't want to get into national stereo types- nowt much to be done there but inadvertantly offend good folk. Thanks mate for your story- that's really interesting how you came to the Norton! How our parents shape us!

I was born and raised in Blighty and have Australian, Irish, Scottish, Welsh and English ancestry in the family. It's something to feel good about, me thinks. But most folk here are into Norton's just coz they're British- they don't think whether Nortons are actually any good- you must have noticed what slaves we are to tradition in England! Other Brits may disagree of course- that's just how I see it.

Having lived in Australia for 12 years and observed 'Britishness' is not what draws folk to Brit bikes there, I'm very curious to see what attracts other folks to Nortons- and it seems it's a very interesting mix of links to the old country and 'don't care where it was built just like the bike' attitudes. Fascinating! I suspect we each have our own tale to tell and I'd love to hear 'em!

Someone said 'good question'- thanks- glad you found it interesting too!

I bought my Norton new in 75 because it was fast and handled better than anything else I could afford. It didn't matter where it was made.

maylar said:

I bought my Norton new in 75 because it was fast and handled better than anything else I could afford. It didn't matter where it was made.

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Exactly!! Bought mine new in1973 for pretty much the same reasons......Couldn't have cared less if it were made in Italy, Germany, Sweden, Spain or Hondurous.

1970 it hosed of everything on a race track in a cycle test.
74 was voted best mountain road bike.

Z1 still coldnt hold one on a twisty road, undulateing.

First wizz bang that wouldnt spit you of was a GS 1000.

Seen a T150 do a GS 1000S at meremere at sundown ,
car & bike street meet , last run of the day.The Final .

Plus most jappers sounded bloody awful , and were
owned by pretty boys. Italian bikes required a
mechanic for an owner too with bevel drives .

Honda boys wilst snotty about pommie bike , fell over laughing about dewcatis

shows how mindless the genre is. No Class , couradge or determinaton.or tools. :shock:

crusadersports said:

To be utterly impolite, why do Americans, Aussies and Scots (McVic?) etc, bother with a fundametally English bike?

Or is it actually that good that it doesn't matter what one feels about Englishness?

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Oh bugger :shock: !!! I always thought of it as British. (The Made in England decal has some how rubbed off my bike, sometimes wire wool can do that! ) I have never had names for any vehicle but I do talk to my bike, mostly to shout start you b#stard start. I have made a mental note the next time I am kicking furiously to shout start you English bast#rd start :mrgreen: !!

I just love anything with an engine. I have had different bikes over the years but have always held on to my Norton it just makes me smile. I had a crap day yesterday but driving back home through town last night a commando past me going the other way (sadly a rare sight around here.) It made my day like no other bike could. So if you were the commando rider passing Myreside in Edinburgh last night thanks!! Anyway must go, off to have a sing song and polish of my bike “And did those feet in ancient time. Walk upon England's mountains green, And was the holy Lamb of God, On Englands pleasant pastures seen! la la la la Till we have built Jerusalem!!” :mrgreen:

Cheers
McVic

I'll keep it short (as I can).

1. First big bike I ever rode. Wanted one badly from then on.
2. Bought one in '75.
3. The only bike I ever regretted selling.
4. No other bike has EVER made me feel as good while riding/servicing/fixing/cleaning/looking at. None.
5. Where are all the fancied Jap bikes from that era? Not on my roads.
6. Probably the most practical old bike from a day to day riding/owning/servicing perspective as you can get.
7. Can be made reliable.
8. Oh, that motor/clutch/gearbox. Yummy.
9. No drivetrain backlash. I absolutely hate backlash in a bike.
10. Cheap parts. I sell the most expensive part that you can buy for them. Everything else you buy for them is cheap for what you get.
11. Economical.
12. Unimportant in the overall scheme of things but has to be one of the most handsome bikes ever built.
13. Ease of servicing/fixing/tuning.
14. Depreciation. What's that?
15. Handling and steering. Nothing modern approaches the feel.
16. Modern mechanics can't believe it when I drop the back wheel out to change a tyre and the chain and sprocket stays in situ.
17. Don't care what they say about icons. That Norton logo kills them all. Without exception.
18. As a thrown together stopgap it's done pretty damn well. Much, much better than many a fancied bike designed from the ground up.
19. What plastic?

That'll do for now.

crusadersports said:

platinumsmith said:

I'll share with y'all my personal git out. I didn't know Jack about bikes until my Dad brought home a brand spankin' new '67 TR6C. I thought that was the most beautiful piece of machinery I had ever laid eyes on (I was 14 & hadn't met Carol yet). He became ill shortly thereafter & passed, leaving me the Triumph (I still have it). Many years later I got my first Harley, '03 RoadKing, but recognized I didn't need all the crap they sell to chrome/encumber. I next purchased an '08 Vrod & although it seems like a Porsche on two wheels, that purchase experience ended my propensity to endear HD. The HD is heavy and that has it's place but the Triumph and Norton are nimble & make me grin. I picked up a '67 TigerCub and that balanced out the US vs Brit thing going on in the stable. The britBikes seem so much more regal next to posers. Sort of like Billy Bob Thornton meets Prince William. Then one Sunday (a few months ago) a friend calls from outa the blue & knows a '74 CDO for sale. I jumped on it for a grand & drug it home. I've just gotten it dusted off & tuned. Already done a ton (don't know just how smart that was). Now I saunter out to the garage & all I see are the brit-Irons. I hardly ride the Harleys and they start with a button. You might figure that since the '67 650 was my father's, it would hold court, but I am inexplicably drawn to that Norton with a locomotive for an engine. It's quite possible that it brings out the regal hooligan in me. I hope I don't die on it (the Triumph has tried to kill me twice).
#1. We had to have a fistFight with England to win our independence, now England is a steadFast friend on the world stage. No harm there.
#2. I've never had an Asian car or motorcycle. I know they do a marvelous job. Just not my cup of tea.

Darrell in Texas

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Thanks Darrell,

Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Your point no.1 is just the sort of thing I'm after. It's getting abit 'deep' and I don't want to offend anyone but I'm really interested in how you reconcile Independence with loving an English bike?

I know 1776 was a long time ago but these things die hard in a national consciousness. Like 1066 figures largley in ours. So I'm getting the impression Britishness is less objectionable than Oriental or even HD?? I read somewhere 'Americans are wedded to HD, but Triumph is their mistress'. Sound good? But can anyone put it into words- WHY?

Love to hear an Aussie opinion on this (Where are you AC?). And for that matter some other Brits...

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I think you might be applying the quirkiness of Europe to America a bit too much. For example, I find it odd that people are still torqued over stuff that happened in Ireland before Virginia was ever colonized in 1607, let alone what happened in the 1840's. The vast majority of families were not here in 1776, and if they were there is a very likely chance that they would not have supported independence (about 60% if I remember my books correctly). Ironically those same people didn't really actively support the loyalist cause either - we just want to be left alone kinda like Canadians when we invaded Quebec. Oddly enough, "unreconstructed" southerners are still pissed about our civil war which practically no one can agree on why it was fought, let alone the extremely (IMO) complex chain of events as to our revolution.

Back to my Norton (and others) - I buy British because and most importantly it has a soul. Asiatic machines are just that, and I not sure BMW ever had one (my 65 didn't), and I cannot get my head around the "lifestyle" of Milwaukee aluminum.

Milwwaukee bikes don't use much aluminum, mostly steel. At least that's how they feel, heavy. And don't get me started on copies of bikes. Harley-copied honda copied I don't know of any norton copies out there. Harley has S&S and others making their versions of the motor, you can buy chineese copies of honda 50's and others. Heck a Ural is a copy of a BMW. Kawasaki tried to copy Triumph. But no one has touched norton.

Carbonfibre said:

Seems a bit unpatriotic that most US posts on here are highly supportive of Norton, yet HD seems to be held in very poor regard!

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I wouldn't say that I personally don't like HD's. I even could say I've seen a few I'd like to own. Many have become their own cartoon though. So lost in their own sense of style that there isn't much left. Although it is probably the best corporation we have left, to love them just because they're American would be like loving President Bush just because he was President. Some people just won't. And the same goes for Nortons being British. I don't love or hate them for being British. I love them for being Nortons.

The simple ageless elegant styling of a classic spoke wheel air cooled vertical twin that I can afford to own.
That's why I bother with a Commando.
That and the gas station questions from 16 year olds like "Norton? oh, who makes that?

As one guy said to me a while back on my way to work whilst stopped at traffic lights "you just made my day"
Just sums it all up in 5 words either riding or looking! Nothing seems to bring out the passion what ever nationality you are.
One might ask the question "Why bother with any thing else?"
Tim

I wouldn't say that I personally don't like HD's. I even could say I've seen a few I'd like to own. Many have become their own cartoon though. So lost in their own sense of style that there isn't much left.

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Ha! I meet the nicest people on Harleys but also some drug dealing murdering color club riders. But in support of you opinion the first president of Hell's Angels in his book admitted he wished they'd gotten into GoldWings instead. On the other hand reviewing decades of outrageous customs and one off's I don't think I've seen as many extremes "lost in their own sense of style that there isn't much left" as done with the cockey power unit of the Norton Commando.

I read a lot of cycle mags back in the '70s and fell in love with the Norton girls on the inside covers. The demure British charm but with a feisty side (like Emma Peel) did it for me. The older guys (early 20s) in my neighborhood in the late '60s were all into Brit bikes -- Royal Enfield Interceptor, BSA Spitfire Mk IVs-- firing them up at the bar across the street at 2am got British bikes into my blood early.

I was a jr studying electrical engineering at Cornell and just turned 21 when my buddy and I took a 10 day trip to England in June '72 to buy our Nortons and put some touring miles on. Have never had or even ridden a modern bike and now I'm 60!

I'm English but I've lived in Europe for fifteen years so I don't really belong anywhere anymore. The sight and sound of the Commando was what first attracted me to it but I'd always felt that English bikes sounded like proper motorcycles and have always regarded anything plastic as cheap and nasty (or cheap and cheerful at best). That great Gothic monstrosity of an engine dominates everything. Having chosen British, the constant oil leak and reliablity jibes from Jap bike owners did tend to make for a bit of a siege mentality. the more the bikes were slagged off, the more committed I became which is one reason why I now resent their owners trying to take over the 'classic' scene. The "My old bike is better than your old clunker" argument is just a re-run of the seventies all over again.

I do also have a definite anti-Japanese feeling. I grew up with stories of their maltreatment of allied prisoners of war and I can't quite forgive them for it. I've run German and Japanese machinery but never felt any emotional connection with them. The Norton is like a well-worn windsor chair or a favourite old wood plane. I can feel a bond with the artisans who made it or used it.

...all of which is a load of sentimental clap-trap but it works for me.

Having bought a Commando, it is certainly remarkable as the only big British twin that can be ridden hard for long distances and in practical terms, I soon had far too much invested in it to sell it when it was playing up and never wanted to move it on when it was running well...so we're stuck with each other.

Those outside of the old bike scene often seem to regard them as all much of a muchness but I could never be a BSA enthusiast. I'm unmoved by M20s or A10s or A65s. Some of my best friends ride them but there is no magic there for me.

crusadersports said:

But most folk here are into Norton's just coz they're British- they don't think whether Nortons are actually any good- you must have noticed what slaves we are to tradition in England! Other Brits may disagree of course- that's just how I see it.

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I don't know which posts you are reading. What I'm getting is that the majority of the people on this list simply like the bike for what it is, or more accurately, what it can be made to be with a 'little' work. :wink:

You seem to be fishing for the presence of an Anglophile sentiment in the forum members that doesn't exist, for the most part. A few years ago while riding in Canada I got into a conversation about my bike with some locals. They liked the bike a lot but didn't have much good to say about "The Old Country". Scots-Irish, I guess. Maybe you need to look up the definition of Empire. Personally, I don't give the matter much thought at all. When I do, I regard the Norton in the same light as I do England. Quaint, and on a good day; endearing. I don't want to be rude, but you've just been repeatedly asking for it.

It's no bother! It's a pleasure!
Bill G