I've always loved the cafe racer style, so here's my story
Its 1971.
Bear in mind I was only just 16, when you were allowed to start out on a 250 and ride without a helmet.
My dream bike at the time was a 250 Royal Enfield Continental GT, however...
My Dad had impressed on me that the twelve-year-old, bought-for-£45 BSA C15 constantly needed the valvegear oiling because the oilways were bunged up internally. This I did with absolute dedication for a week. A month later, almost home from a Cadwell Park meeting, the valvegear seized through lack of oil and wrecked the top end. Now my uncle was forever my saviour, he rescued me from all sorts of automotive catastrophies over the years. He was the chief mech at a local scrapyard where they made & sold whats now termed cut & shut cars. They did it properly of course, he was a proper engineer.
Anywho, we told him of the C15 engine's mysterious demise
and he took me to the yard and showed me a Bond Minicar 3-wheeler. These two-seater death traps had a single powered front wheel and two freewheeling rears. They usually had a Villiers 197cc two-stroke motorbike engine, but this one was the sporty version with a Villiers 4T 250cc twin, an ideal donor for the C15! Actually its the same engine used by Royal Enfield in their 250 Turbo Twin (which didnt have a turbo, but was a twin...)
Whilst at the yard I had a rummage and found two Suzuki 250 exhausts, in fact I found a complete Suzuki Super 6 250 which I begged to have - but neither Dad or uncle approved as it was "far too fast for a lad".
There are a three things about the Bond Mini which gave the converted C15 a unique character. The first was that the gearing was for a tiny 10" wheel which when translated to the C15 frame and its much larger wheels meant it was geared for the speed of sound. Almost. Which meant I was the only one in our little group with a 3-speed box plus overdrive.
The second thing was that the engine had a "Siba Dynastart", electric start facility. This was done by magic, it was unheard of in small engines. A bike that started by turning the key. Even the big expensive bikes couldnt do that! Heady stuff!
The last thing that made this bike utterly unique was that in theory, it would easily top 80mph. Backwards!
The Bond version of the 4T had two opposing sets of points, allowing the engine to be stopped and restarted in reverse, to allow you to reverse the car - bike engines of course having only forward gears, no reverse. The electrics to accomplish this were a complete mystery to a 16-year old (and to his Dad) so the whole lot was transplanted. There were no safety interlocks and there was nothing to stop you using all 4 gears with the engine running backwards!
So me & the rejuvenated C15 had many happy years together, me & the lads regularly went to race meetings, camping trips, plus commuting to BT at Maltravers Road , Sheffield. I cannot for the life of me remember what happened to it, probably sold to help pay for an old Hillman Imp California, which is another story altogether (a story which also involves broken engines and great times)
Happy days. Well, no, it was unreliable, slow, heavy, greedy... but it was a 16-year-old's first taste of freedom and I loved it!
Cheers
Phil
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...and here's its present-day replacement:
at Squires:
the similarity between the Conti GT and my old C15 is striking:
- "My name is Phil and I'm a trackaholic..."