Real Classic - June 2019 - Preview

SCOTT SQUIRREL  BSA FLAT-TRACKER  MEGOLA!

Running, Riding & Rebuilding RealClassic Motorcycles

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WHAT LIES WITHIN

SCOTT SQUIRREL  BSA FLATTRACKER  MEGOLA!

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Running, Riding & Rebuilding RealClassic Motorcycles

BRILLIANT HYBRID

ONE MAN AND HIS MATCHLESS

RICKMAN CR750 .............................................. 6

BSA FLAT TRACKER.....................................52

REALCLASSIC 182: PUBLISHED JUNE 2019

How do you turn a slightly stodgy K-series Honda 750/4 into a cutting-edge supersportster? Simple. Throw away half the original bike and rebuild the rest with the help of Messrs Rickman and their radical café racer kit. Rowena Hoseason reports

Odgie updates us on his flat-tracking exploits with a much-modified Beesa twin – and his dalliance with the Dark Side...

RC REGULARS

MATCHLESS G11............................................. 26

An affinity for old motorcycles can definitely be inherited. Stuart Urquhart meets a man whose choice of classic was entirely inspired by his childhood experiences…

A Megola? A New Imperial? Where are all those Triumph twins when we need them?

NEW IMPERIAL 250.....................................62

Dave Baddeley’s first vintage rebuild occurred almost by accident, but happenstance provided a pleasingly practical and technically advanced pre-war machine…

WE’VE GOT MAIL! ...................................16

As lively as ever! It is impossible for us to receive too many letters, so…

TT RACER.......................................................70

Why would anyone consider building a multicylinder motorcycle with the engine built into the front wheel? Alan Cathcart asks the Question Why? SCOTT FLYING SQUIRREL ..........................44

MOTO GUZZI LE MANS...............................74

Imagine you’re going to emigrate half a world away, far from spares supplies and expert advice for old British bikes. Which classic motorcycle would you choose to take with you? The dependable, conventional, air-cooled single, perhaps? Stuart Francis took instead the road less travelled…

Last month, Nolan Woodbury revealed a limited edition Le Mans V-twin, built for the German market at the end of the 1970s. This time he traces the evolution of the animal into the 1980s and lets it loose on an autobahn…

ESS G80 LE 0  MATCH  BSA SS8

!

NDAMATIC  HOND

TRIUMPH / LEVIS SPECIAL

 BMW R65LS  RE CLIPPER!

Running,

ER S UP

E ET

M

 BSA FLATTRACKE

ISSUE 181  MAY 2019  £3.70

& Rebuilding RealClas

RealClassic Motorcycles

FOR THE

R  MEGOLA!

Running, Riding

Running, Riding & Rebuilding

RACER ROAD sic Motorcycles

It’s notionally summer now, so there’s loads to do, loads to see, loads of friends to miss by ten minutes because you took a detour…

READERS’ FREE ADS ...............................90

Not many bikes (again), but some tasty treats in here

PUB TALK ..............................................102

A disastrous day at the show. PUB reports…

TALES FROM THE SHED ........................108

NORTON COMMANDO REBUILD..............92

Martin Peacock had a vision, a conversion on the road to Bude. He understood that he wanted a Commando, and this is how he made it… Part 8: Fixing and Fettling

It was April. It was raining. Time for the biggest old bike show in the whole world. Frank went…

AERMACCHI BUILD .....................................98

Stu Thomson has finished his refurbishment of his 1959 Ala Azzurra single. So… what’ll it do, mister? And what did it all cost?

TURNTO BRILLIANT HYBRID

TASTY TWIN ONE MAN AND HIS MATCHLESS

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SCOTT SQUIRREL

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EVENTS ...................................................82

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 APRIL ISSUE 180

ISSUE 182  JULY

THE CONTENTS PAGE ...............................3

The glory days of clubman racing bred tough competitors. Some of these hard and fast riders became works riders and world champions.

Others were fated to finish further down the rankings, but they were every bit as fiercely determined. Richard Jones reveals the riding life of one such privateer…

MEGOLA SPORT! .........................................36

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52

TASTY TWIN

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WHO’S DONE WHAT REALCLASSIC is glued together by Rowena Hoseason and Frank Westworth of The Cosmic Bike Co Ltd in Cornwall, with wonderful stuff supplied by RC regulars, readers and riders. Chris Abrams of AT Graphics Ltd has designed some stunning pages this issue (thanks, Chris!), while all the grown-up publishing stuff is handled by Mortons Media Group Ltd at Horncastle Cover image: take a bow Kay Eldridge!

We’re online at www.Real-Classic.co.uk TRADE ADVERTISERS for the magazine or website should call Helen Martin on 01507 529574, email hrmartin@mortons.co.uk EDITORIAL ENQUIRIES should be sent to Frank@ RealClassic.net or to PO Box 66, Bude EX23 9ZX. Please include an SAE if you want something returned or a personal reply SUBSCRIPTION INFO is on pg114. Call 01507 529529 to subscribe or renew or buy back issues SUBS QUERIES, late deliveries, or changes of address should be directed to 01507 529529, or email subscriptions@realclassic.net ALL MATERIAL in RealClassic is copyright its authors, so please contact us before reproducing anything. RealClassic is printed by William Gibbons & Sons of Wolverhampton. Our ISSN is 1742-2345.

THIS MONTH we’ve been reading NOT TILL THE RED FOG RISES by Derek Raymond (seriously grim Britcrime); JARHEAD by Anthony Swofford (a marine’s eye view of the Gulf war); UNNATURAL CAUSES by Richard Shepherd (the autobiography of a forensic pathologist); PASTIME, DOUBLE DEUCE and PAPER DOLL, all of those in Robert B Parker’s excellent Spenser series. Oh, and we’re not forgetting to mention that Editor Westworth’s KILLING SISTERS trilogy is once again available as ebooks at Amazon – go buy them!

MEANWHILE AT THE MOVIES we felt slightly let down by AVENGERS: ENDGAME (it could’ve been two much better separate films); were entranced by Christopher Walken as the Angel Gabriel and Viggo Mortensen as Lucifer in THE PROPHECY; dozed off during the remarkably dull TOLKIEN, and have utterly over-indulged in an X-MEN frenzy of the first six moves in the series…

FROM THE FRONT You’re in for a treat inside this issue. I mean, it’s not every day that a magazine like ours includes a road test of a Megola. And not just any old, common or garden Megola – this one’s a Sport!

Have you ever heard of a Megola? I had, but only in the same way that I’ve heard of a Böhmerland. In other words, I’ve read about them and I’ve stared at the pictures, but I’ve never seen one (I think) and I’ve certainly never ridden one. Nor, to be entirely honest, would I ever actually want to ride one. Call this cowardice, or stupidity, or anything else you like, but I have no wish at all to ride a motorcycle with the Megola’s unlovely combination of special features.

Its engine is a 5-cylinder radial (or rotary, depending on your favourite definition). That’s OK. I almost always enjoy riding bikes with unusual engines. Heck, I ran rotary Nortons from 1988 or so until very recently. But a 5-pot radial? OK – bring it on, as they say in the movies. However… that engine lives inside the front wheel. Curious. But… OK. Let’s give it a try. Bet its steering is heavy, ponderous, like a 2-stroke Panther fitted with those Earles forks constructed out of thick-wall gas pipe or the like. By such comparisons with the familiar and mundane is confidence restored.

It has almost no gears. Just the one, in fact.

Blimey. Let us look on the bright side: this suggests that the engine boasts a seriously wide spread of power, and is flexible enough to maintain road performance in a single gear.

PUB would probably prefer a bike with only the one gear.

It has no clutch. At this point my mind had sprinted past bogglepoint and was fast approaching disbelief. No clutch? What! I have ridden a bike with no clutch … that’s not true.

I’ve ridden several bikes with an automatic clutch, almost always centrifugal – maybe that’s the case here? Nope. It has no clutch. So starting it can’t be entirely easy? Nope – it also has no kickstarter. So it’s permanently in its one gear, has no kickstart lever and no clutch? How on earth…?

You can read all about it, written in the best of journalistic traditions.

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I have no wish to ride one. I have no wish to reacquaint myself with the delights of A&E at a hospital nearby, charming though I’m sure the staff would be. Also encouraging, no doubt.

I was chatting about the bizarre Megola with Alan Cathcart – who is demonstrably bolder than I, as well as more youthful, good looking and rich, no doubt – and remarked that it would be miles worse than the strangest bikes I have actually ridden, of which that true gem among gems of aesthetic delight, the Moto Shifty, is but a single highlight. And I scored a point! Alan’s never ridden a Shifty. I felt smug for most of a whole minute.

The Shifty – careful how you say that, the bike’s owner was quite sensitive about mispronunciation when he loaned it to me – featured a water-cooled straight-four engine in a seriously hefty frame, complete with probably the most hideous fuel tank ever. But the serious ugliness paled beside the gearchange. The engine and gearbox were from a Fiat 127, and the box still had its H-gate shift pattern. It was a foot shift. I’m sure you can work out how it worked – a clue: the lever operated in two planes.

But at least it had a clutch.

Variety: the very spice of life.

Frank Westworth Frank@realclassic.net

THE NEXT ISSUE

RC182WILL BE PUBLISHED ON JULY 1st, AND SHOULD REACH UK SUBSCRIBERS BY JULY 5th

TR

TRA Photos by Kay Eldridge of FocusedImage.com. au, Steve Reilly, Martyn Roberts, RC RChive, Mortons Archive

6 I JUNE 2019

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RICKMAN CR750

RICK KIT

ANSFORMATION How do you turn a slightly stodgy K-series Honda 750/4 into a cutting-edge super-sportster? Simple. Throw away half the original bike and rebuild the rest with the help of Messrs Rickman and their radical café racer kit.

Rowena Hoseason reports

It’s a monster, isn’t it? An orange monster, too, which really does stand out in a line of stock CB750s

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JUNE 2019 I 7

Honda built around 446,000 K-series CB750s, much like this one.

Rickman made around 300 CR750s. Which would you choose?

Beneath the startling orangeness and polished nickel lives an sohc Honda engine. These did indeed take the world by storm

‘D

on’t sell that monstrous four-banger just because it wiggles like a wounded snake every time you even think about tilting it from a vertical plane,’ said Cycle World in 1974. They were, of course, talking about the five year-old CB750, and familiarity with the four-cylinder superbike had bred a smidgen of contempt for its sporting credentials.

No need to throw the baby out with the bathwater: there was a solution which retained the CB’s best attribute – its engine – although the fix didn’t come cheap.‘What you need is a new chassis to put around the mill. One that isn’t designed to be the best for a given price, but one that is designed to be the best.’

Of course, Honda were well aware that their flagship four was coming in for some flak, and attempted to address its issues with the K series of updates that spanned 1971 to 1978. We also shouldn’t get carried away with the notion that between 1969 and 1970 this seminal machine somehow shifted from being the greatest thing since sliced bread into yesterday’s burned toast crusts. Read any of the original roadtests from 50 years ago and you’ll see that the CB750 was initially praised for its stable handling and luxurious ride. Few people mentioned any problems with its chassis. At first.

But if you give motorcycle riders a big fat engine then you have to expect them to use it – and while the CB was ideally suited to America’s

Original four-silencer exhausts for the CB750 cost that well known pair of limbs, so owner Steve fitted the Motad device seen here. Observe how the pipes permit access to the engine’s oil filter, too. A good thing

The inevitable selection of ‘before’ pics. These are always a great guide to the effort that’s gone into recreating the feature bike. And yes, the frame’s nickel plate was well on its way out…

8 I JUNE 2019

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RICKMAN CR750 freeways and interstates, it didn’t cope so well with twisting British backroads and writhing Alpine passes. Once the four-cylinder fuss had died down and riders could see beyond the shock of the new, the CB’s steering, handling and roadholding all came in for some stick.

For starters, at 485lb dry it was a lot of motorcycle to muscle around; the engine alone weighed 175lb. This was especially obvious at slow speeds and in tight turns.‘The weight on the front end is very noticeable. It doesn’t inspire confidence and you are aware of the weight, particularly as some café racer goes tracking by in a hard left-hander’said Cycle Guide.

Irregular roads surfaces made things worse.

‘Rough spots set off more wheel hop and fork waggle than is comfortable in such a large and heavy motorcycle, and the CB750 definitely is a double handful under these conditions. It’s big, heavy and needs both time and muscle to get it from hard-right to hard-left. You really wouldn’t ever want to get it into a big slide.’

To be fair, Honda had attempted to avoid the old Triumph issues where the engine obviously outperformed the frame.

The CB’s double-cradle tubular frame was given extra bracing around the steering head and substantial triangulated support at the back. But riders still reckoned it was prone to flexing. This situation wasn’t improved by the harsh ride provided by the early suspension. The forks were stiff with limited travel, and the front end wasn’t suited to soaking up road ripples, which could lead to an unpleasant oscillation.

By 1973 it was obvious that riders were demanding more than Honda’s chassis could

Seriously hefty Betor forks provide a rugged front end, while the pair of 254mm Lockheed discs provide a fine power : weight ratio

Steve the owner is extremely pleased with his rebuilt CR750, but says that it couldn’t have happened without Alan Graham who found it, or John Hanckel who sold it. Thanks to both!

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JUNE 2019 I 9

deliver. It was still supremely comfortable and stable, but lacked the precision and poise of its European counterparts.‘It feels like its springs are a bit too stiff and the damping too limp by about the same amount,’ said Cycle.

Ground clearance was another bugbear; the centre and sidestand both scraped on the left with enthusiastic use, while the footrest and centrestand touched down on the right. The CB’s stopping power, which was considered worldclass in 1969, was out-matched by the machine’s mass a couple of years later. The front brake needed‘an enormous amount of lever pressure… and the feel is slightly mushy, so bringing the wheel to the point of maximum stoppage takes a split second longer than normal.’

At the back, stopping efficiency was hampered by the CB’s struggling suspension.‘Braking and control are limited by the hopping and chattering the rear wheel often goes through during hard braking’said Cycle

Rickman were proud that their kit was designed to accept as many parts from the donor bike as possible, as seen here. Observe the pillion rest, and wonder…

1975 RICKMAN HONDA CR750 FACT PACK Engine

736cc air-cooled sohc transverse-mounted inline four

Bore / stroke

61mm x 63mm

Compression

9:1

Power

68bhp @ 8000rpm

Carburetion

4x 28mm Keihin

Transmission

5-speed, chain final drive

Electrics

12V alternator, coil ignition

Frame

531 Reynolds duplex cradle

Front suspension

41mm Betor tele forks

Rear suspension

Swinging arm, Girling shocks

Brakes

Lockheed 254mm discs

Front tyre

3.50 x 18

Rear tyre

4.25 x 18

Weight

440lb

Seat height

31.5 inches

Wheelbase

56.5 inches

Top speed

109mph in 1974

10 I JUNE 2019

The pilot’s vi view includes the original Honda da clocks and warning lights, as a well as a lot of orange and a sset of excellent swan-neck clip-on ns

Guide, while Cycle’s rider found‘it becomes almost impossible to avoid locking the rear wheel.’ This meant it took some 36ft to slow the CB750 from 30mph – that’s 7ft further than an 850 Commando.

Each K model came with tweaks to its front and rear suspension: increased preload at the back, different damping at the front, often to very little effect. Although forks and shocks could be swapped out, the sohc CB’s limitations were integral to its geometry and in particular its raised centre of mass. The engine was positioned high in the frame to give the bike a modicum of ground clearance, but when leaned over this mass would encourage the machine to drop into the bend as the turn tightened. Stay too upright and centrifugal forces would draw the mass towards the outer edge of the curve and the bike would stand up and attempt to go straight on at the most inconvenient moment.

‘If you hit a bump,’ explained Cycle,‘the bike will lean in the direction of the bump and if it starts to wobble, the high centre of gravity can act like a pendulum and give the wobble the ability to continue.’ This type of handling quirk only becomes apparent when you’re riding at ten-tenths, but give a fast lad a fast bike and he will inevitably test it to (and beyond) its limits.

A series of suspension tweaks followed, but when Cycle tried the K3 they concluded‘we are not at all certain that this“improvement”is a reality. In plain fact, the CB750 neither handles nor rides as nicely as its smaller brother. Road surface irregularities are far more unsettling for the CB750; it twitches over freeway grooves and has a comparatively harsh ride. Motorcycle suspension engineering,’ they concluded,‘is still more art than science.’

Enter, then, the artists from the old country.

Paul Dunstall’s specials were lighter, quieter

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AN OWNER SPEAKS You can rely upon Ace Tester Miles to have rattled around on most iconic motorcycles, and indeed it turns out that he too was tempted by the Rickman Brothers’ treatment of the mighty UJM. Paul’s CR was Kawasaki flavoured, a Z1000.

‘I worked at Dresda as a teenager and we occasionally had Rickmans in for work.

They always seemed to be a more integrated design than the“bits stuck anywhere”Dresda approach. About 15 years ago, a Rickman-Z came up for sale. The handling was excellent with the Betor forks; not so great if you retained the original Kawasaki twiglets.

Lockheed brakes were also phenomenal compared to the Jap stuff of the time. The petrol cap was missing on mine: it turned out it came from a Triumph TR7 car!

‘The bike came with a thick instruction build book, incredibly comprehensive. The nickel-plated frame was an utter pain to keep clean (and I enjoy cleaning bikes). I loved the chain adjusters which gave me a rare sense of security that I couldn’t muck up wheel alignment. So make sure you get the wheel adjustment kit, and always go for the uprated brakes and better forks.

‘But anyone buying now should expect to be slightly underwhelmed. The Rickman chassis so successfully tamed the power of the Zed that it became a fast, well handling and braked machine and a bit... boring.

Ultimately, by taming the power they’d

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JUNE 2019 I 11

Wrap the Rickman chassis around Honda’s solid 750 engine and you had a genuine competitor.

This is Hugh Robertson during the 1974 Thruxton 500 mile race

ANOTHER OWNER SPEAKS

Martyn Roberts tried a friend’s Rickman Honda 812 on the Isle of Man in 1981, as seen here, and was so impressed he had to track down one for himself…

‘It took me three or four years, and I settled on a black Rickman Z1000 – and never once regretted it. Compared to the stock Z1000 I ride today, the Rickman had better suspension, massively better brakes (AP Racing kit all round) and sounded fabulous with a 4-into-1 exhaust. Every ride home from work became a lap of the Isle of Man in my head.

‘The riding position and seat were not as comfy as stock, but that didn’t matter back then. The reliability was just as good as a standard Kawasaki, as was the fuel economy. It must have returned 45mpg.

It was cheap to buy and difficult to sell, probably because the Japanese had finally discovered handling by the mid-1980s (with the GPZ900 and GSX-R750) so the Rickman was seen as a bit of an oddity.

‘It’s one of the few bikes I’ve owned that had no downside; thrilling, characterful yet undemanding to live with.’

12 I JUNE 2019

and faster than the standard machine, but stopped short of a complete chassis transplant.

The Rickman brothers went the whole hog. They were well used to making competition frames for British bikes and set about taming the CB750.

And by all reports they may actually have been too successful… but more of that later.

As well as the famous off-road frames, in the latter half of the 1960s Rickman also made roadrace frames for AJS and Matchless singles, with roadster chassis for Royal Enfield and Triumph twins and triples. Creating a café racer chassis for Honda’s four was a logical next step, especially with the range of new British bikes diminishing by the day. The CB-powered CR750 was accompanied by a surprisingly low-key introduction:‘The Japanese produced very good engines, but they put much less attention into their chassis,’ said the Rickman literature.‘We developed our own frames to accept those new four-cylinder engines.

Our kits handled very well as compared to the production models.’ Well, you’d certainly hope so, considering the CR Rickman kit cost as much as an entire donor bike: £498 in 1974.

If it cost as much as a whole motorcycle, that’s because the CR wasn’t a cosmetic kit of optional extras but instead a full rolling chassis which replaced much of the original machine.

It utilised the Honda power unit and associated components – 28mm Keihin carbs, airbox, exhaust, stands, oil tank, wiring, sidepanels, levers and cables, electrics and instruments – but everything else was part of the Rickman package.

The single most important item was the large-diameter Reynolds 531 manganesemolybdenum tubing which formed a substantial but narrow double-cradle frame with a 29-degree steering head angle. All the joints were custom profiled and brazed with

bronze rod. The flash nickel coating wasn’t simply intended to catch the eye – it’s a canary in the mineshaft, which immediately highlights any frame fractures.

At the back, Girling shocks were paired with a stiff swinging arm that featured Rickman’s unusual chain adjusters. Up front, the complaints about the original Honda’s uncertain steering were answered with a chunky set of Betor forks – 41mm diameter, when most beefy bikes were equipped with 35mm components. Even Kawasaki didn’t feel the need to go further than 36mm when they specified the front end for the Z900.

Dunlop TT100 tyres were fitted to Borrani GP shouldered rims; Akront alloys were also offered.

The café racer styling was accomplished with a long fuel tank that was secured by a single strap; rearsets; Tommaselli clip-ons, a choice of solo or dual seats and an optional fibreglass fairing. Two 254mm Lockheed discs at the sharp end and a third disc at the back addressed the criticisms about the original Honda’s braking performance.

Rickmans’instructions promised that‘the stock Honda parts bolt straight on without modification. No drilling or welding necessary’ and, apparently, a skilled mechanic could transform a vanilla CB750 into a Rickman CR in a single day. However, some customers recall a considerable delay – up to a year, even – after dropping off their donor engines at the brothers’ workshop. Was the end result worth the wait?

‘The chassis is rigidly accurate and the brakes perfect,’ said Cycle World.‘On fast turns you can almost take your hands off the bars and steer the bike with your rump. You’re heeled over more than you’ve ever been, but it isn’t through yet… the traction provided by the tyres is phenomenal.’

And the triple discs definitely did the trick.‘They haul you down with such fierce

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RICKMAN CR750 smoothness that it’s hard to believe. Braking stability is second to none… they make it easy to go way beyond all those old braking markers you memorised so diligently.’

The CR750 was an inch shorter and around 45lb lighter than a standard CB750 – and in fact the Rickman chassis was so good that it outclassed the standard spec, softly-tuned engine. Once owners acclimatised to the CR’s nimble ability, they yanked the engine back out of the frame and bored the motor to 810cc, 836cc or more to provide the power they felt the chassis could handle. When Kawasaki introduced the Z1 and the Z1000, the next steps were obvious…

And you needed to be a single-minded kind of individual to ride a Rickman CR. Most of the criticisms of the machine are common to all café racers and limited-edition specials. Comfort was not on the cards. The seat was relatively high; the handgrips weren’t particularly cushioned, and a couple of hours in the saddle would

Rear shocks are on their softest setting, which tells its own story, and the neat indicators are useful, but not original Honda

result in seriously sore wrists. Some riders cut out the seat padding to lower it and raised the handlebar height.

The bike’s restricted steering lock made parking and round-town manoeuvres a nightmare. It was almost impossible to see anything in the rear view mirrors. The fuel taps were awkward to operate and there was no reserve; the rubber pads under the petrol tank frequently went walkabout. The Rickman rear-sets reversed Honda’s gearchange pattern, which took some getting used to; the linkage had to be cut and welded to keep the standard gear-shift arrangement.

Some early examples suffered spoke failure on the rear wheel, so if rebuilding wire wheels it’s wise to go up a gauge when specifying the spokes. These days, the fibreglass petrol tank will need to be protected against the effects of modern petrol; Caswell’s two-part epoxy sealant is recommended by owners. They also suggest

that the wiring harness from the K3 model is best suited to the CR… should you find one in need of an overhaul.

Around 300 Honda-powered CR750s were built, so they are hardly something you’ll see every day.

Restored machines with big-bore motors and all the trick kit go for big money, about $30,000 in the States. In the UK, we’ve seen a couple that needed full rebuilds on offer for around £7000 and you can expect to cough up that much again to restore a CR to its original glory. But for some people, that price is more than worth paying.

‘I’ve always been drawn to British specials,’ says Steve, the owner of the machine you see here,‘and have been after a Rickman since the 1970s.’ If a CR is a rare sight in the UK then looking for one in Australia was an optimistic quest indeed. But Steve finally found his Rickman CR750 in 2015 and it was that actual thing, a genuine barn-find which had been stored on a farm since 1994.

Rear chain adjustment is by eccentric swinging arm pivots, while the rear-set pedal links cleanly to the rear master cylinder. Beautiful welding on the frame’s gusset, too

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JUNE 2019 I 13

It is a CB750, but not as we know it…

Credit where it’s due

‘I’d asked my friend Alan to keep an eye out for a Rickman for me. He said he knew of one and 18 months later let me know that it had come up for sale.’ The Rickman was genuinely off the beaten track – about three miles from a road, in fact! ‘It was on a farm, a four-hour drive away. John the seller was its original owner and when he became unable to ride it’d been left sitting in a dirt-floored shed for 23 years, which really hadn’t helped it cosmetically. It was a little rougher than I’d hoped for, but even so it was a complete bike, one owner from new, and John had kept every original part.’

Deal done, Steve set to work. ‘The bike was completely stripped and checked for straightness and cracks as some of these frames had a tendency to crack around the steering head.’ This CR’s frame was fundamentally fine but cosmetically close to the point of no return. ‘I spent three months of spare time hand-polishing everything on the frame. The swinging arm and a few brackets required polishing and re-plating. It took a lot of polishing to save the nickel plating on the frame.’

The engine was stripped, checked and rebuilt to standard spec using

original components where possible – Steve opted not to tune the engine but kept its mild cam and original carbs. A standard exhaust in good condition probably would’ve cost more than the rest of the machine, so a Motad system was fitted. Steve discovered that seals and spares for the Betor forks are still available online, so the front end was overhauled and the rear given a set of Koni shocks.

Steve’s machine is fitted with the optional extended swinging arm, 2” longer than stock, and its corresponding chainguard. The original Rickman fairing was intact, so Steve had it colour-matched to return the bike to its first colour scheme. The fibreglass was repaired and then it was refinished in its original, amazingly orange livery. Just 12 months after he found it, Steve returned the Rickman to the road – a true labour of love, especially considering that he completed 90% of the work himself. The moment when it all came together counts as one of the best of Steve’s riding life: he can’t forget ‘seeing the bike assembled and painted in the original colour for the first time.’

Since then, the Rickman has become a regular ride. ‘It really wasn’t built to commute on, but the Honda engine and the

nice light clutch make it a very usable classic. We use it regularly and do a fair amount of two-up riding. My partner Jen finds the seating position comfortable enough for an hour or two in the saddle. It has typical Honda reliability – it runs very well and I haven’t had to touch it since I put it together! Even chain adjustment is by eccentrics at the swinging arm pivot, easily done.

‘The Rickman kit was very complete and well thought-out, and packaged in a beautifully welded frame. So the CR is unique but usable. It stands out in a line of motorcycles today – just as they did in the 1970s. The riding position is a lot more aggressive than the original Honda 750. l fitted swan-neck clip-ons made by Rod Tingate that ease the back a bit. It has great handling for the era although by modern standards it steers a little slowly. It’s very similar to a 1980’s Ducati.’

So is Steve completely happy with his CR? Well… ‘I would prefer wire wheels. Anyone got a spare set or know where I could find some?’ Contact the magazine should you happen to have a set of spoked wheels in your shed and we’ll pass the word. Apart from that, it seems Steve has been bitten by the same bug which affected the first generation of Rickman CR750 owners. ‘It could do with a little more power,’ he says. Aha. Do we see a bigbore kit on the horizon?

It was obvious back in 1974 that the CR750 was something extra special. Cycle World said it was ‘without a doubt one of the most attractive and incredibly functional pieces of two-wheeled engineering on the street surfaces of the world.’ They reckoned that ‘with proper care, this chassis should easily outlast more than one motor.’ As it happens, they were entirely correct.

Rickman specialised in off-road frames…

bikes online: Real Classic.co.uk

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JUNE 2019 I 15

RC readers write, rant and rattle on...

Summat to say? Send your comments, hints, tips, tales of woe and derring-don’t to: RCHQ@RealClassic.net

THE ROAD TO RECOVERY Thank to Rowena for her Members’ Enclosure article about MoTs and breakdown cover. I have just received my renewal quote from Carole Nash and, in the notes covering the breakdown cover, it stipulates that your bike will need a current MoT. I called them to ask if this applies to vehicles over forty years old which do not require either tax or MoT. Would my bike be collected if it broke down?

The advisor had to go away and ask, but he did already know about older cars and bikes not needing an MoT or tax. He returned to confirm that if I did have a breakdown then the breakdown cover would come out and pick me up. They do know about the DVLA rules covering vehicles over forty years old.

Anthony Curzon, member 1010

GEM Motoring Assist are rarely mentioned.

They’re a spin-off from the old Guild of Experienced Motorists to which I have belonged since about 1980. They cover you, rather than any particular vehicle (so that MoT problem does not arise) and I have used them many times over the years for motorcycles, cars and caravans. I must have covered my yearly premium many times over!

You either contact their national helpline for assistance or make your own arrangements locally. You pay the bills up front and claim the costs back from GEM. They are extremely prompt in settling claims. I pay by credit card and have always had a cheque from them, no quibble, before the card account is due.

16 I JUNE 2019

Everything is covered; homestart, roadside assist, national recovery and onward travel / accommodation. If you are a member, as a passenger in another’s vehicle, then the same assistance applies to that vehicle, too. Their current annual premium is £78.50 and they

will send you an excellent quarterly magazine which often includes motorcycling articles by known authors.

Which? rated them #1 in 2018 and they also got top place in the Auto Express driver power survey. I am in no way connected to GEM,

More old bikes online: Real-Classic.co.uk

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