Cycle World Book Reviews

CYCLE WORLD BOOK REVIEWS

Motorcycle Road Racing in the Fifties

Brave were the road racers of the 1950s, bucking and leaping around the Isle of Man or the Nurburgring on an AJS Porcupine, a three-cylinder DKW, an NSU with a duck-bill aluminum fairing. In those days men were men, wheels were narrow, brakes prone to fading and tires hard. Helmets were padded with cork, dohc was an

exotic concept, and a V-8 Moto Guzzi reached 178 mph! Andrew McKinnon’s book, Motorcycle Road Racing in the Fifties, is full of fascinating photos of the racebikes—the leading edge of motorcycle technology—of the fifties. The text is divided into three sections, The Machines, The Men and The Meetings (which is British for The Races). Those three sections are further subdivided into machine brands, individual racers, and each grand prix event. The section on the machines held the most interest for me; mainly those wonderful photos since the text is decidedly superficial and lacks technical details. McKinnon tells us that Benelli lost the 1951 lightweight TT to Moto Guzzi due to “a carburetion error,” but offers precious little else about Benelli’s 250cc dohc Single. McKinnon’s captions are no more helpful, an example being the shot of a latedecade Benelli, clearly showing dohc, hairpin valve springs, dry clutch and remote-float carburetor in a small-tube duplex cradle frame, the caption mumbling only that Benelli’s late-1950s “machinery had an altogether more refined look about it” compared to the firm’s early1950s efforts.

The photos of bikes and scenes are worth the price of admission, I figure, but anybody who’s looking for hard facts and data is bound to be disappointed.

—John Ulrich

Haynes Super Profiles

^ack in ancient Rome there was a statesman, a natural leader. He was always fair, always patient. He did his job perfectly.

The people got so tired of his perfection that they threw him out of office.

We don’t have that problem with our politicians, but we do sometimes get bored with history books that describe flawless machines ahead of their time, speedy, elegant, tough and so forth.

In most cases the bike under review and its company have been gone for years, leaving us readers to wonder why.

For a refreshing change of pace, welcome to the Haynes Super Profile series.

We have received three titles, “Sunbeam S7 and S8”, “BMW R69 and R69S” and “Honda CB750 Sohc”. And the Sunbeam came first, and thus the impression may be too strong.

But. How can one resist a history book that says on the first page “The original S7 was put into production with several inbuilt disadvantages and suffered accordingly” while the S7 Deluxe and S8, the improved models “were then allowed to soldier on, almost unchanged and undeveloped, until they were outclassed by newer designs from rival makers.”

The book goes on to say that the S7 was supposed to be a copy of the BMW military model but because German bikes weren’t exactly popular in England in 1946, the copy was powered by an inline vertical Twin designed in the early 30s and lying around the BSA shops since. Then we learn of the various mistakes, leading to the machine’s designer being given 15 minutes to clear out his desk and run for it. And there are quotes from Engish tests of the day, for instance saying the bike’s speed was deceptive because it was so quiet. That means there was no speed, but back then any magazine tester would rather ride the bus than actually criticize. (Of course any tester who did criticize would quickly find himself riding the bus, which explains at least some of the misleading remarks.)

This is fun. This is believable. This is the sort of history book that wins the heart simply because there is no pretense about the wonders of the past. The BMW and Honda books aren’t quite as packed with such revelations, but then, the models under discussion weren’t so woeful, either.

Each book has a quick history of the model, with changes during production, engine numbers, etc. There are reprints of tests, interviews with owners, sources for parts, details, clubs and the like and many pages of detailed photos, something no restorer can have too many of.

The books are sort of hardbound, and are about the size of this magazine. A nonowner or a reader who never owned or wished to own one of the models in the series probably would be bored, but those with a personal interest will have great fun. Other titles are for the Norton Commando, MV Agusta and BSA Bantam. Boy, can you imagine what little bothers that one reveals?

—Allan Girdler