Meyers Lynx 65
MEYERS LYNX 65
CYCLE WORLD IMPRESSION
It does everything but cut grass...
THE DAY is coming that a man will be able to buy a family of implements for sport or utility—chain saw, garden tractor, boat outboard, power generator, snowmobile, bug sprayer, motorcycle and lawn mowerall engineered to accept a single quickchange powerplant assembly. The Meyers Lynx 65 minibike, and its proliferating ilk, appear to be the initial step toward this end. The Lynx’s 5-bhp Briggs & Stratton Series 130200/130292 air-cooled single-cylinder engine is a dead ringer for the unit that powers one CYCLE WORLD road tester’s lawn barbering machine.
The engine is mounted in a double cradle tube frame; four bolts attach the Lynx 65 power source to a steel plate welded between the cradle tubes. A top loop, extending rearward from the rudimentary steering head, provides longitudinal rigidity, as well as anchor location for seat and upper rear suspension mountings. The latter is of the swinging arm and non-damped enclosed coil
spring variety. Lront suspension is accomplished by the simple expedient of the lower fork leg tubes sliding within the upper leg tubes—that eventually bend outward to become handlebars. Snubbing action is by coil springs.
The Lynx’s in-unit powerplant is a complete package with recoil rope starter, magneto, fuel tank and carburetor bolted on. The engine’s bore and stroke are 2.562 in. and 2.125 in., respectively, for total piston displacement of 12.57 cu. in. (201 cc). The B & S unit is rated at 5 bhp at 3600 rpm, but maximum torque delivery, 7.66 lb.-ft., occurs at 3000 rpm.
Drive is through a tough centrifugal clutch at the left, and through a singlerow chain primary, underneath a cast alloy safety cover, to a jackshaft sprocket. Power is carried laterally through the jackshaft to the single-row chain final drive.
Braking is by a single internal expanding system on the rear wheel only.
Six-in. wheels are fitted front and rear. The diamond tread rear tire is 530 width; the ripple tread front tire is 450 size. Wheelbase is 38 in. Other dimensions are overall length, 47 in.; width, 24 in.; height, 23 in. Total weight of the Lynx 65 is 85 lb. Paint is a metallic gray. And, list price is just over $220. (Other 3-bhp Lynx models are priced from approximately $150.)
Lynx and loose sand are a combination that results in just plain fun. The Lynx makes no pretensions at utility, as do some other minibikes. Its suspension system and the manner in which it is shod mark the Lynx simply as an entertaining plaything for off-road exuberance. Turn up the wick on the B & S lawn mower-sounding engine, and the Lynx thunders away in very uncatlike fashion. Grab a handful of brake and the mini slews to a halt. No one cares whether the rider uses one foot (or two) to maintain stability in the rough going. No one cares whether the undamped coil springs produce a leap that would make Orphan Annie’s lizards take up another sport, and a jump that induces an inordinately large patch of daylight between saddle and rider’s hip pockets. So the Lynx high-sides and flings the rider into a mesquite bush, no matter. He arises, smiling, to try again.
The Lynx is easily totable. It can go where the family goes in brush country, woods or desert, riding in car trunk, pickup bed or trailer. It’s hardly arguable that a Meyers Lynx 65 is a keen way to work up an appetite for campfire cookery and the need for a solid eight in the sack-if the mini can be kept away from the kids.
Now, when Bruce Meyers, who manufactures Manx and Tow’d dune buggy kits, fixes his Lynxes so the engines will slip quickly into the family’s boat at the lake, or the lawn mower back home, he’ll really have something.
