"Patrick Turner" wrote in message
...


Keith G wrote:

"Eiron" wrote in message
...
Patrick Turner wrote:

I did like BSA and Matchless and Norton, oh, and Vincent. They
made
music.
Especially The Vincent, and at 166MPH on Conrod Straight at
Bathurst.

The older you get the faster you were. Let's have some more
details.

Yes, I'd be interested to hear how they clocked the speed -
especially
as the standard speedos were only calibrated to 150 mph (AFAIK)....??

Speeds were recorded by the marshals on the course.


OK, I didn't realise you were talking about a *timed event*!



On the day I was there his speed was announced on the PA.
Once Eric hit Conrod straight he just rocketed away from all the
others.

The single 500 7R-AJS and Nortons were doing 125mph, maybe more, im
Ron
Toomb's case.

The Conrod Straight is 1.9km long, or 1.2 miles, and at that time was
one long straight
without the chicane put there later.

So to get an extra 41mph with 1,000cc seems about right.
The bike wasn't a stock standard Vincent.

I have no idea what had been done to it.


Blower?



Bear in mind Bert Munro's speed on a highly modified
Indian on the salt at Utah.

He still has the record for the World's Fastest Indian.


Love the film and watch it on a regular basis, that bloke is ever a hero
in my book - even if the movie fudges the facts!

When I was a schoolkid my school was two doors up from the then
recently-closed Vincent factory and opposite, over the 'bowling green',
was George Brown's motorcycle shop. I was the only snot-nosed kid he let
hang around in there, looking at his 'Neros' and asking hundreds of
stoopid questions:

http://www.motorbike-search-engine.c...uper_nero.html

(Didn't realise/know back then the orange patches on his face was early
*plastic surgery*!!)

See: "George had a secret ambition to be the first British rider to top
200mph on British soil, over a measured distance. He had already been
docked on Super Nero over a finish line at Elvington Speed Meeting at
236mph." I also harbour a secret ambition to do 200mph (just the once)
on a bike before it's too late, but not sure I'll ever get it together.
My present bike:

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/mybi...%20GSX1400.jpg

....easily (and regularly) beats the above-mentioned 'AJS and Norton'
speeds (usually less than 3 minutes from me leaving my garage and after
a good warm-up, naturally!) -it's got the grunt but doesn't have the top
end....

Or a fairing....